Application development
GOV.UK PaaS gives you a straightforward way to run your cloud native applications in containers. The platform supports most common programming languages and Docker containers.
Languages
GOV.UK PaaS provides a consistent experience for different programming languages through the use of language buildpacks.
| Buildpack | Description |
|---|---|
| Binary | a binary web application |
| Custom | a custom buildpack providing a language runtime from the wider Cloud Foundry community |
| Go | apps written in the Go programming language |
| Java | apps written in the Java programming language or Java Virtual Machine languages such as Scala |
| Nginx | a web server |
| Nodejs | apps written in the Nodejs programming language |
| PHP | apps written in the PHP programming language |
| Ruby | apps written in the Ruby programming language |
| Python | apps written in the Python programming language |
| R | apps written in the R programming language |
| Static | a static HTML/CSS/Javascript website served by nginx. The product of site publishing tools such as Jekyll, Middleman or Hugo |
Docker
GOV.UK PaaS also supports the deployment of Docker images with the following caveats:
- We do not offer a Docker registry service
- Images must be pushed to a Docker registry such as DockerHub or Google Container Registry before they can be deployed to GOV.UK PaaS. Your ability to stage and restage Docker applications is tied to the availability of the registry hosting the images.
- GOV.UK PaaS does not support Docker Compose multi-container applications
- The maximum size of Docker image that may be staged is 4GB
Backing services
GOV.UK PaaS provides a number of highly available backing services. Visit our marketplace to view more information about these services.
| Service | Description |
|---|---|
| Amazon Simple Queue Service | Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS) provides queues through a web service interface |
| Autoscaler | Apps can be configured to dynamically increase or decrease the number of running instances using autoscaling |
| CDN-route | Proxy traffic from a user controlled domain to an existing Cloud Foundry application or external URL. This allows you to bring your own domain to the platform and have the platform manage your TLS certificates using AWS Cloudfront + AWS Certificate Manager |
| InfluxDB | A time series database |
| MySQL | A relational database system |
| Object Store | Object storage using AWS S3 |
| OpenSearch | OpenSearch is a search and analytics engine that allows you to store and search data |
| PostgreSQL | A relational database system |
| Redis | A distributed, in-memory key-value database |
External services
In addition to the service we provide, applications can connect to other internet hosted back-ends allowing you to integrate third party services and other platforms through public web APIs.
Public and private networking
Applications on GOV.UK PaaS typically have a route to allow inbound connections via the internet.
The platform also supports private applications (applications without a public internet route).