CIO team wants to consider making Istio deployment a first class citizen on a OCP cluster. This would allow Gateway API to be a native part of the offer without complex dependency with OLM.

Given this need, a spike is required to analyze the implementation complexity, risks and if it can be done.

The spike must cover:

• If/how sail-operator can be used by CIO, as a library to deploy an Istiod instance that will be responsible for N/S traffic (Gateway API implementation)
• How upgrading a cluster that has Istio/Gateway API once managed by Sail Operator should happen
• If consuming sail-operator as a library is enough to have a proper Gateway API solution on a OCP cluster, or what are the followup needs (eg.: how the images can be customized, how they can be added to OCP install payload and be available for CIO without needing to get them from OSSM/OLM payload)
• What are the risks of deploying Istiod directly on a cluster shared with an OSSM installation

The spike document must have conclusions:

• If the solution is possible
• What are the followups and next steps
• What are the advantages of this solution
• What are the possible risks that should be considered with this solution