Tasks for v1.11 release cycle

[cprivitere]

Please see the corresponding sections of the role-handbooks for documentation of individual tasks.

Tasks

Notes:

• Weeks are only specified to give some orientation.

Week 1:

• [Release Lead] Finalize release schedule and team Monday, 28th April
  • 📖 Update Cluster API release-1.11 release team members #12150
  • CAPI: Update with v1.11 release team members kubernetes/org#5587
• [Release Lead] Add/remove release team members Monday, 28th April
  • 📖 Update Cluster API release-1.11 release team members #12150
  • CAPI: Update with v1.11 release team members kubernetes/org#5587
• [Release Lead] Prepare main branch for development of the new release
  • 🌱 [release-1.10] Add 1.33 kind image to mapper.go file #12192
  • 🌱 Bump clusterctl_upgrade_test.go main and 1.10 tests to k8s v1.33.0 #12193
• [Communications Manager] Add docs to collect release notes for users and migration notes for provider implementers
  • ⚠️ Stop using FailureReason and FailureMessage in controllers #12148
• [Communications Manager] Ensure the book for the new release is available
• [Communications Manager] Update supported versions
• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.10.1 release Tuesday, April 29

Week 2:

• [Release Lead] Create a new GitHub milestone for the next release Tuesday, May 5

Week 1 to 4:

• [Release Lead] [Track] Remove previously deprecated code
  • ⚠️ Stop using FailureReason and FailureMessage in controllers #12148
  • ⚠️ Stop using deprecated replica counters in controllers #12149

Week 4:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.10.2 & v1.9.8 releases Tuesday 20th May

Week 5:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.0-alpha.0 release Tuesday, 28th May
• [Communications Manager] Communicate alpha to providers Tuesday, 28th May

Week 8:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.10.3 & v1.9.9 releases Tuesday, 17th June
• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.0-alpha.1 release Tuesday, 17th June

Week 10:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.0-alpha.2 release Tuesday, 1st July

Week 11 to 12:

• [Release Lead] [Track] Bump dependencies

Week 12:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.10.4 & v1.9.10 releases Tuesday, 15th July
• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.0-beta.0 release Tuesday, 15th July
• [Communications Manager] Communicate beta to providers Tuesday, 15th July

Week 13:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.0-beta.1 release Tuesday, 22nd July
• [Release Lead] Set a tentative release date for the next minor release
• [Release Lead] Assemble next release team
• [Release Lead] Select release lead for the next release cycle

Week 14:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.0-beta.2 release Tuesday, 29th July

Week 15:

• [Release Lead] Create release-1.11 branch Tuesday, 5th August
• [Release Lead] [Cut the v1.11.0-rc.0 release] (https://github.com/kubernetes-sigs/cluster-api/tree/main/docs/release/role-handbooks/release-lead#repeatedly-cut-a-release) Tuesday, 5th August
• [Release Lead] Update milestone applier and GitHub Actions Tuesday, 5th August
• [CI Manager] Setup jobs and dashboards for the release-1.11 release branch Tuesday, 5th August
• [Communications Manager] Ensure the book for the new release is available Tuesday, 5th August

Week 16:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.0-rc.1 release Tuesday, 12th August

Week 17

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.0 release Tuesday, 19th August
• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.10.5 & v1.9.11 releases Tuesday, 19th August
• [Release Lead] Organize release retrospective
• [Communications Manager] Change production branch in Netlify to the new release branch Tuesday, 19th August
• [Communications Manager] Update clusterctl links in the quickstart Tuesday, 19th August
• [CI Manager] Drop 1.8 jobs from test-infra Tuesday, 19th August

Week 19:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.11.1 release Tuesday, 2nd September

Continuously:

• [Release lead] Maintain the GitHub release milestone
• [Release lead] Bump the Go version
• [Communications Manager] Communicate key dates to the community
• [Communications Manager] Improve release process documentation
• [Communications Manager] Maintain and improve user facing documentation about releases, release policy and release calendar
  • Fix release notes generated for rc.0 tag #12277
  • Add check to validate the value of PREVIOUS_RELEASE_TAG in release-notes-tools #12278
  • Fix the MULTIPLE_AREAS and multiple colon(:) in same line of the generated release notes. #12280
• [CI Manager] Monitor CI signal
• [CI Manager] Reduce the amount of flaky tests

If and when necessary:

• [Release Lead] [Track] Bump the Cluster API apiVersion
• [Release Lead] [Track] Bump the Kubernetes version
• [Release Lead] Track Release and Improvement tasks

/priority critical-urgent
/kind feature

[cprivitere]

/assign

[mboersma]

As part of the "Prepare main branch for development of new release" task, we should include this (from the v1.10 "extra tasks"):

• After K8s v1.33 is released
  • Fix clusterctl upgrade tests starting from 1.10 to use v1.33 as InitWithKubernetesVersion/WorkloadKubernetesVersion

[mboersma]

/triage accepted

[cprivitere]

As part of the "Prepare main branch for development of new release" task, we should include this (from the v1.10 "extra tasks"):

• • After K8s v1.33 is released

    • Fix clusterctl upgrade tests starting from 1.10 to use v1.33 as InitWithKubernetesVersion/WorkloadKubernetesVersion

Added.

[sm4ll-3gg]

Hi! Sorry if it's a wrong place to write, but I didn't find better one

Is it possible to include #11172 into 1.9.8 release?
We need it to gracefully migrate from --use-deprecated-infra-machine-naming=true to the new naming strategy.

[mboersma]

@sm4ll-3gg I asked in #11172 if we could cherry-pick that change, hopefully one of the maintainers responds there, otherwise we can ask in the Slack channel.

[sm4ll-3gg]

@sm4ll-3gg I asked in #11172 if we could cherry-pick that change, hopefully one of the maintainers responds there, otherwise we can ask in the Slack channel.

Thanks! Can I help somehow to speed up the process? 🙏
I could contribute via PR if this is appropriate (saw that bot does it usually)