Harbor: The Comprehensive Repository Management for Cloud-Native Artifacts

Harbor is an open-source repository management platform on GitHub that places primary emphasis on security, compliance, and multi-tenancy. It is part of the Cloud-Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) and adheres to the Open Container Initiative (OCI) standards. Harbor is instrumental in fulfilling the need for a comprehensive, well-structured and easy-to-run registry for cloud artefacts.

Project Overview:

Harbor offers its users the flexibility of storing, scanning, and distributing container images and other cloud-native artifacts including Helm chart. DevOps industries are its main target audience. Being a powerful, enterprise-class registry server, Harbor taps into needs such as private/tentant repositories, role-based access control, in-build comprehensive vulnerability scanning, and much more that are essentially part of today's IT companies operating in digital transformation.

Project Features:

Key features of Harbor include:

- Security and Vulnerability Analysis: Harbor incorporates robust security management, enforcing policies around image provenance and vulnerability analysis.

- Content Trust: It signs images as a measure to establish content integrity and authenticity.

- Multi-Tenancy: Harbor provides each tenant with a private registry and supports LDAP/AD user authentication.

- Extensible API: Harbor exposes an expansive API and CLI for the automation of tasks and easy integration with existing platforms.

Technology Stack:

Initially launched by VMware, Harbor is built using languages like Go and TypeScript. The primary objective was to create an efficient, lightweight, and portable registry for cloud-native deployments, achieved by using Docker for containerization. Kubernetes is hence used to deploy and manage Harbor, while Helm charts aid in Harbor's deployment into a Kubernetes environment.

Project Structure and Architecture:

Harbor is architected into various major components like Core, Jobservice, Registry, Registryctl, Chartmuseum, Notary Server, and Notary Signer each serving distinctive functionalities. The organizers follow the design principle of microservices architecture, which allows modules to work independently, with coordinated interaction.

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