Comparing Self-Hosted to Lifecycle Cloud
Because Lifecycle Cloud is a hosted, managed deployment of IQ Server, using and managing Lifecycle Cloud is identical to using and managing a self-hosted deployment, with the following exceptions:
No self-service access to config.yml, the log directory, or the sonatype-work directory. Accessing these files/directories requires a Support ticket.
As a result of this, configuring some features, like notifications, will also require a Support ticket
Lifecycle Cloud is automatically upgraded during a specified maintenance window. See Accessing and Upgrading Lifecycle Cloud for more information.
Lifecycle Cloud is spun up alongside an Amazon Aurora PostgreSQL database, which is the primary and only database used for Lifecycle Cloud instances. No other database options are available.
Likewise, backing up and restoring the database is handled by Sonatype.
Lifecycle Cloud should be aware that the IQ Server LDAP feature will only be usable if you provide and support your own LDAP Reverse Proxy (or similar solution) that's accessible on the public internet.
As a security measure, Lifecycle Cloud instances do not use the default admin:admin123 username and password combo. Instead, a random password is generated and included in our setup email to you.
Lifecycle Cloud cannot integrate with webhooks that are not available on the public internet.
Custom integrations may not work with Lifecycle Cloud deployments. In any case, custom integrations are not supported by Sonatype or our Support team.
As general rules, when reading our documentation or considering how Lifecycle Cloud compares to a self-hosted deployment, keep in mind that Lifecycle Cloud has all the features of a self-hosted deployment. However:
Configuration options that require access to config.yml will require a Support ticket.
When calling the URL (as in the case of an API, for example), you'll use the URL of your hosted deployment, instead of the default http://localhost:8070 used in our documentation.
Feature Comparison
Because Lifecycle Cloud is a managed solution, you may have concerns about which features are available. Lifecycle Cloud has full feature parity with self-hosted deployments. Review the table below for more.
Features | Self-hosted | Lifecycle Cloud |
|---|---|---|
Initialized/Deployed by Sonatype | no | yes |
System resources managed by Sonatype | no | yes |
External Database | Recommended | yes |
Automatic Backups | no | yes |
Automatic Upgrades | no | yes |
Access to server configuration | yes | through support |
Access to log files | yes | through support |
Access to data on disk | yes | through support |
Configuring inbound traffic | yes | through support |
Notifications | yes | through support |
SCM Onboarding | yes | yes |
SCM Integrations | yes | yes |
CI Integrations | yes | yes |
Jira Integrations | yes | yes |
CLI | yes | yes |
REST APIs | yes | yes |
Webhooks | yes | yes |
Management Responsibilities for Lifecycle Cloud
Though Lifecycle Cloud is a managed solution, some features, processes, and customization options are still the responsibility of the customer. Review the table below for more information, and click the links in the left heading column to learn more.
Feature | Managed by you | Managed by Sonatype |
|---|---|---|
Initialization/Deploy | no | yes |
System Resources | no | yes |
Availability | no | yes |
Notifications | begins with a support ticket | no |
Application Onboarding | yes | no |
Policy | yes | no |
Scanning | yes | no |
Reporting | yes | no |
Remediation | yes | no |
Integrations | yes | no |
Waivers | yes | no |
Success Metrics | yes | no |
Automation | yes | no |
Quarantine | yes | no |
Allowlist | yes | System allowlist with support tickets |