[llarsson]

That's right, and it's also why you see Kubernetes distributions popping up.

That way, someone has already done all the configuration of various plugins and components for you. For instance, the major clouds that all let you easily start with their Kubernetes services and that they integrate well with the logging and monitoring systems, IAM, server/node provisioning, etc.

Or ones that are not tied to any particular cloud provider, and perhaps focused on security (full disclosure: I work for Elastisys, who makes exactly that) or ease of use.

I'm sure we will see more and more such efforts in this space, exactly because cobbling together something yourself from scratch (basically just a control loop runner, as you said) is neither very appealing when you think about ongoing maintenance, nor very cost-effective for businesses to spend engineering time on.