One of the key characteristics of any PaaS solution is Scaling on Demand which allows user not to be concerned about scaling the environment. Your app must be able to easily grow with increasing traffic and that too in a seamless manner. There are two different type of scaling approaches – Horizontal and Vertical Scaling. So what’s the difference between the both and which one is best suitable for your application? Let’s discuss them in detail.

Vertical Scaling:

Vertical scaling means scaling up or in traditional sense, called as concurrent computing, where memory and computing power of your already running VM is increased. The limitation of Vertical Scaling is that you can scale up to certain point i.e. the available capacity by your provider. Also It comes at the cost of application downtime as operation is being performed on single-node environment.

Horizontal Scaling:

Horizontal scaling means scaling out or in traditional sense called as distributed computing, where a replica of your already running VM is added to distribute the traffic to any of these virtual machines. Since there is no limit of scaling up, you can add as many VMs as you want and that too without any downtime. In case of Horizontal scaling, you need either load balancer or router to distribute your traffic to all the VMs running your application. Horizontal Scaling also lets your app work in High Available environment as it is spread across multiple instances.

There are many PaaS providers which give you the option to scale your application horizontally and only a few PaaS providers let your application scale vertically. App42 PaaS provides you the option to enjoy the benefits of both the worlds.

I will give you a run-through on how to scale/descale your application within few minutes on App42 PaaS platform. You can use  App42 PaaS Management Console as well as App42 Client (a command line tool).

Prerequisites

1. You must have an application deployed on App42 PaaS platform. To learn how to deploy your application click here.
   

Scale your application Vertically

To scale your application vertically , you have to run ‘app42 scale‘ command and choose ‘Vertical‘ option and provide the Kontena Power with which you want to scale.

Using App42 PaaS Client –

Using App42 PaaS Management Console-

You have successfully scaled your App vertically on App42 PaaS platform.

Scale your application Horizontally:

To scale your application horizontally, you have to run the ‘app42 scale‘ command and choose ‘Horizontal‘ option and provide the No. of Instances with which you want to scale.

Using App42 PaaS Client –

Using App42 PaaS Management Console-

You have successfully scaled your App horizontally on App42 PaaS platform.

Similarly you can descale your application vertically as well as horizontally by choosing ‘App42 descale’ from App42 PaaS Client or Choosing ‘Descale’ option from App42 PaaS Management Console.

If you have any questions or need any further assistance, please feel free to write us at support@shephertz.com.