Migrate from AWS Elastic Beanstalk to ECS

Containerization has revolutionized the way modern applications are deployed and managed in the cloud. As organizations embrace microservices architectures and seek greater control over their deployments, we’ve come across across quite a few teams who are considering migrating from AWS Elastic Beanstalk to Amazon Elastic Container Service (ECS).

In most people’s minds, Elastic Beanstalk has one main advantage: simplicity, and ease of use. That’s generally true. And as a result, it is no surprise that the general trade-off for simplicity and ease of use is: less flexibility and scalability. And teams that are leveraging Elastic Beanstalk today are typically just fine with that. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right?

That being said - we’ve recently seen an additional hurdle that teams on Elastic Beanstalk are dealing with, and that we think deserves a spotlight: network security challenges due to improper configurations.

In this article, we will be tackling 4 topics:

1. Explore the reasons why migrating from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS can be beneficial for organizations seeking to optimize their application deployments.
2. Showcase a few network security issues we’ve seen come in Elastic Beanstalk deployments
3. Provide a step-by-step guide on how to successfully transition from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS, ensuring a smooth and efficient migration process.
4. Describe how Kapstan can make your migration process seamless and pain free.

Why Migrate from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS?

Elastic Beanstalk and ECS are both powerful services offered by AWS for deploying and managing applications. However, they cater to different needs and use cases. Here are some compelling reasons why migrating from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS can be advantageous:

Greater Control and Flexibility

ECS provides a higher level of control over the underlying infrastructure and container orchestration compared to Elastic Beanstalk. With ECS, you have the ability to define fine-grained task definitions, configure networking and security settings, and leverage advanced features such as service discovery and auto scaling. This level of control allows you to optimize your application deployments based on specific requirements and performance goals.

Scalability and Performance

ECS is designed to handle large-scale, complex applications with ease. It supports dynamic scaling of containers based on demand, ensuring optimal resource utilization and cost-efficiency. ECS also integrates seamlessly with other AWS services, such as Elastic Load Balancing and Amazon CloudWatch, enabling you to build highly scalable and performant architectures. With ECS, you also have the ability to define fine-grained task definitions, configure networking and security settings, and leverage advanced features such as service discovery and auto scaling. This level of control allows you to optimize your application deployments based on specific requirements and performance goals.

Support for Advanced Deployment Strategies

ECS offers a wide range of deployment strategies, including rolling updates, blue/green deployments, and canary releases. These strategies allow you to minimize downtime, test new versions of your application, and roll back changes if necessary. With Elastic Beanstalk, the deployment options are more limited, making it challenging to implement advanced deployment patterns.

Compatibility with Docker Ecosystem

ECS is built around the Docker ecosystem, which has become the de facto standard for containerization. By migrating to ECS, you can leverage the vast ecosystem of Docker tools, images, and plugins. This compatibility enables you to take advantage of the latest advancements in containerization technology and benefit from the extensive community support.

Understanding the limitations of Elastic Beanstalk is crucial when deciding whether to migrate to ECS. While Elastic Beanstalk simplifies the deployment process, it may not provide the level of customization and control required for complex, containerized applications. ECS, on the other hand, offers the flexibility and scalability needed to meet the demands of modern microservices architectures.

Network Security concerns on Elastic Beanstalk vs ECS

The below analysis outlines some common Elastic Beanstalk security vulnerabilities, and how ECS may address these challenges (dependent on proper configuration, of course).

How to Migrate Applications from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS

Migrating applications from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS involves a series of well-planned steps designed to minimize disruption and maximize efficiency. The primary objective is to leverage ECS's powerful container orchestration capabilities to enhance application performance and scalability. This requires a thorough understanding of both platforms and an evaluation of the current application architecture to ensure a seamless transition.

Step 1: Containerize your applications

Progressing to ECS necessitates a strategic approach to containerizing your application. Start by packaging your application into Docker containers, ensuring each image is optimized for performance and security. Utilize proven base images and ensure that all necessary dependencies are included to replicate the production environment accurately, minimizing post-migration surprises.

The Dockerrun.aws.json v2 file remains a cornerstone for configuring containers in ECS. This file should articulate detailed container specifications, such as image repositories, resource allocations, and networking configurations. Pay particular attention to the orchestration of container relationships and environment settings within ECS, ensuring seamless interoperability. Through diligent configuration and validation, you lay the groundwork for a robust ECS deployment environment.

Step 2: Creating an ECS cluster

aws ecs create-cluster --cluster-name test-cluster

This command establishes a new cluster named "test-cluster" in your AWS account. The cluster serves as the logical grouping of container instances that will host your application containers. When creating a cluster, you can specify additional parameters such as capacity providers (EC2 or Fargate) and default capacity provider strategies.

Step 3: Security Group Configuration

Think of Security Groups as virtual firewalls that control any and all inbound and outbound traffic to your ECS tasks, services, and other components. Security groups are important because they will:

1. Prevent unauthorized access to your containers
2. Minimize the attack surface by only allowing necessary traffic between ECS services, load balancers, and other infrastructure resources.

Security groups are to be used for ECS Tasks and Services, Load Balancers, Databases, and other AWS Services (such as Lambda, S3, etc.).

As an example - if we were to set up a new Security Group for an ECS Task called kapstan-ecs-sg, this is what it may look like:

‍

It is also possible to define this in terraform, and if we were to do this for the above, it would look like this:

resource "aws_security_group" "kapstan_ecs_sg" {
  name        = "kapstan-ecs-sg"
  description = "Security group for Kapstan ECS tasks"
  vpc_id      = "vpc-12345678"

  # Allow HTTP from ALB
  ingress {
    from_port   = 3000
    to_port     = 3000
    protocol    = "tcp"
    security_groups = ["sg-ALB-ID"]
  }

  # Allow PostgreSQL access
  ingress {
    from_port   = 5432
    to_port     = 5432
    protocol    = "tcp"
    security_groups = ["sg-RDS-ID"]
  }

  # Allow all outbound traffic
  egress {
    from_port   = 0
    to_port     = 0
    protocol    = "-1"
    cidr_blocks = ["0.0.0.0/0"]
  }
}

4. Register Task Definitions

After an ECS cluster has been established, the next step is to register task definitions. Think of a task definition as a blueprint for your app! Configurations such as:

• Container image selection
• Resource allocation
• Port mappings
• and more…

All of these configuration details should be listed in a task definitions file that may look something like below:

{
  "family": "kapstan-task",
  "executionRoleArn": "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/ecsTaskExecutionRole",
  "taskRoleArn": "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/ecsTaskRole",
  "networkMode": "awsvpc",
  "cpu": "1024",
  "memory": "2048",
  "requiresCompatibilities": ["FARGATE"],
  "containerDefinitions": [
    {
      "name": "kapstan-api",
      "image": "123456789012.dkr.ecr.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/kapstan-api:latest",
      "portMappings": [
        {
          "containerPort": 3000,
          "hostPort": 3000,
          "protocol": "tcp"
        }
      ],
      "essential": true,
      "environment": [
        {
          "name": "NODE_ENV",
          "value": "production"
        },
        {
          "name": "DATABASE_URL",
          "value": "postgres://user:password@kapstan-db:5432/kapstan"
        },
        {
          "name": "REDIS_URL",
          "value": "redis://kapstan-redis:6379"
        }
      ],
      "logConfiguration": {
        "logDriver": "awslogs",
        "options": {
          "awslogs-group": "/ecs/kapstan",
          "awslogs-region": "us-east-1",
          "awslogs-stream-prefix": "kapstan"
        }
      }
    },
    {
      "name": "kapstan-worker",
      "image": "123456789012.dkr.ecr.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/kapstan-worker:latest",
      "essential": false,
      "environment": [
        {
          "name": "QUEUE_NAME",
          "value": "kapstan-jobs"
        }
      ],
      "logConfiguration": {
        "logDriver": "awslogs",
        "options": {
          "awslogs-group": "/ecs/kapstan-worker",
          "awslogs-region": "us-east-1",
          "awslogs-stream-prefix": "kapstan-worker"
        }
      }
    }
  ]
}

5. Load Balancer Migration

Migrating your load balancer ensures that traffic is routed efficiently to your ECS services. Follow these steps:

• Choose a Load Balancer Type: Decide between an Application Load Balancer (ALB) for HTTP/HTTPS traffic or a Network Load Balancer (NLB) for TCP/UDP workloads.
• Create a Target Group: This is where ECS tasks (containers) will register dynamically. Define the protocol, port, and health check settings.
• Update ECS Service: Modify your ECS service to register tasks with the new target group. Ensure that the security groups allow traffic from the load balancer.
• DNS Cutover: Once the new load balancer is tested, update your DNS settings to point traffic to it, replacing the old one.
• Test and Validate: Monitor traffic flow, verify logs, and ensure zero downtime during migration.

6. Build a Continuous Deployment (CD) Pipeline

Automating deployments ensures fast and reliable updates to your ECS applications. Here’s how to set up a CD pipeline:

• Choose a CI/CD Tool: We’ve seen most modern teams on ECS make use of AWS CodePipeline or GitHub Actoins scripts to automate deployments
• Define Your Pipeline Stages:
  • Source Stage: Pulls the latest code from your repository (GitHub, Bitbucket, etc.).
  • Build Stage: Uses AWS CodeBuild or another tool to build and push the Docker image to Amazon Elastic Container Registry (ECR).
  • Deploy Stage: Updates the ECS task definition and triggers a new deployment.
• Use Blue/Green or Rolling Deployments: AWS CodeDeploy can facilitate zero-downtime updates by gradually shifting traffic to new task versions.
• Implement Rollback Strategies: Configure failure detection and automatic rollback in case of deployment issues.

Note: CD pipeplines are notoriously brittle. Just know that this is likely not a ‘set it and forget it’ moment. CD pipelines will need to be maintained, upgraded, and managed.

7. Set Up Logging and Monitoring

Ensuring visibility into your ECS environment helps detect and resolve issues quickly.

• Centralized Logging with AWS CloudWatch:
  • Enable ECS Task Logging to send container logs to CloudWatch Logs.
  • Create log groups and set retention policies.
• Enable AWS X-Ray for Distributed Tracing:
  • Helps track request flows across microservices and detect performance bottlenecks.
• Monitor with AWS CloudWatch Metrics & Alarms:
  • Track CPU, memory, and network usage of ECS tasks.
  • Set up CloudWatch Alarms to notify via SNS if thresholds are exceeded.
• Use AWS GuardDuty & Security Hub:
  • Detect security threats, unauthorized access, and suspicious activity.
• Enable Prometheus & Grafana (Optional):
  • If you need advanced monitoring, use Amazon Managed Prometheus with Grafana dashboards.

Our Overall Thoughts

The traditional path to moving applications from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS involves several intricate steps and potential pitfalls. Initially, containerizing your applications might appear straightforward, yet certain unique cases may present unexpected hurdles. Following that, setting up an ECS cluster manually demands precise configuration of security groups to maintain secure access controls and permissions.

Moreover, crafting ECS task definitions for each application introduces another layer of complexity. These definitions must align accurately with application requirements to ensure seamless operation. Transitioning load balancers and constructing continuous deployment (CD) pipelines are crucial tasks that require detailed planning and execution. Establishing robust logging and monitoring systems is essential for maintaining operational oversight and ensuring application performance remains optimal post-migration. This entire process can span several weeks, with risks including misaligned security settings and unintended downtime, posing substantial challenges to maintaining business continuity.

Common challenges with ECS often revolve around optimizing infrastructure management, handling dynamic scaling requirements, and ensuring smooth integrations with other AWS services. The ongoing maintenance of ECS environments can be demanding, necessitating regular updates to uphold system efficiency. Additionally, concerns about vendor lock-in persist, as reliance on a specific cloud provider might limit future adaptability and scalability.

Migrating Beanstalk to ECS | The Kapstan Way

Embarking on a migration journey without the right tools can be overwhelming. If you are looking for an alternative to the traditional path of moving applications from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS via the above steps (and potential pitfalls), you may want to consider Kapstan. Leveraging Kapstan transforms this complex migration into a straightforward, streamlined operation.  Take a look below - it’s as easy as that with us.

Kapstan simplifies the process by handling the intricacies—automatically containerizing your applications if they aren't already, and integrating seamlessly with your AWS account. With just a few clicks in Kapstan, the platform provisions a well architected network and control plane, minimizing manual configurations and reducing errors.

Beneath the surface, Kapstan manages Kubernetes clusters on your behalf, yet the interface remains intuitive and accessible. This streamlined approach means migrations are completed efficiently, adhering to AWS Well-Architected Framework principles to ensure robust and secure deployments. Think about it like this: you are getting a better-than-ECS developer experience, but the power of EKS + zero cloud or vendor lock-in, with none of the complexity .

The enhanced developer experience is characterized by minimized operational friction, optimized workflows, and a UI interphase that runs IaC under the hood (that you don’t have to manage). Just to look at a few examples:

‍
• Spinning up new, well-architected Kubernetes clusters for dev/stage environments

• Creating new microservices

• Adding a Secret key to your application

• Built-in Monitoring and Logging

By abstracting AWS resources, Kapstan standardizes and simplifies cloud infrastructure, empowering engineering teams to focus on innovation rather than infrastructure management. Automated infrastructure and CI/CD pipelines further accelerate deployments, ensuring reliability and efficiency in delivering applications to production.

Migrating from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS opens up a world of possibilities for optimizing your application deployments. By leveraging the power of containerization and the flexibility of ECS, you can achieve greater control, scalability, and performance. If you're ready to embark on this transformative journey, but don’t want the pain or hassle of migrating to ECS and then maintaining it, we’d love to help make your life easier. Schedule a demo to explore how Kapstan can help you migrate from Elastic Beanstalk to ECS in under a week.