Release notes for CloudNativePG 1.19

History of user-visible changes in the 1.19 minor release of CloudNativePG.

For a complete list of changes, please refer to the commits on the release branch in GitHub.

Version 1.19.6

Release date: Nov 3, 2023

Enhancements:

• Enhance the status command of the cnpg plugin for kubectl with progress information on active streaming base backups (#3101)
• Allow the configuration of max_prepared_statements with the pgBouncer Pooler resource (#3174)

Fixes:

• Suspend WAL archiving during a switchover and resume it when it is completed (#3227)
• Ensure that the instance manager always uses synchronous_commit = local when managing the PostgreSQL cluster (#3143)
• Custom certificates for streaming replication user through .spec.certificates.replicationTLSSecret are now working (#3209)
• Set the cnpg.io/cluster label to the Pooler pods (#3153)

Changes:

• Stop using the postgresql.auto.conf file inside PGDATA to control Postgres replication settings, and replace it with a file named override.conf(#2812)

Technical enhancements:

• Use extended query protocol for PostgreSQL in the instance manager (#3152)

Version 1.19.5

Release date: Oct 11, 2023

Important Changes:

• Change the default value of stopDelay to 1800 seconds instead of 30 seconds (#2848)
• Introduce a new parameter, called smartShutdownTimeout, to control the window of time reserved for the smart shutdown of Postgres to complete; the general formula to compute the overall timeout to stop Postgres is max(stopDelay - smartShutdownTimeout, 30) (#2848)
• Change the default value of startDelay to 3600, instead of 30 seconds (#2847)
• Replace the livenessProbe initial delay with a more proper Kubernetes startup probe to deal with the start of a Postgres server (#2847)
• Change the default value of switchoverDelay to 3600 seconds instead of 40000000 seconds (#2846)
• Stop supporting the postgresql label - replaced by cnpg.io/cluster in 1.18 (#2744)

Security:

• Add a default seccompProfile to the operator deployment (#2926)

Enhancements:

• Introduce the cnpg.io/coredumpFilter annotation to control the content of a core dump generated in the unlikely event of a PostgreSQL crash, by default set to exclude shared memory segments from the dump (#2733)
• Allow to configure ephemeral-storage limits for the shared memory and temporary data ephemeral volumes (#2830)
• Validate resource limits and requests through the webhook (#2663)
• Ensure that PostgreSQL's shared_buffers are coherent with the pods' allocated memory resources (#2840)
• Add uri and jdbc-uri fields in the credential secrets to facilitate developers when connecting their applications to the database (#2186)
• Add a new phase Waiting for the instances to become active for finer control of a cluster's state waiting for the replicas to be ready (#2612)
• Improve detection of Pod rollout conditions through the podSpec annotation (#2243)
• Add primary timestamp and uptime to the kubectl plugin's status command (#2953)

Fixes:

• Ensure that the primary instance is always recreated first by prioritizing ready PVCs with a primary role (#2544)
• Honor the cnpg.io/skipEmptyWalArchiveCheck annotation during recovery to bypass the check for an empty WAL archive (#2731)
• Prevent a cluster from being stuck when the PostgreSQL server is down but the pod is up on the primary (#2966)
• Avoid treating the designated primary in a replica cluster as a regular HA replica when replication slots are enabled (#2960)
• Reconcile services every time the selectors change or when labels/annotations need to be changed (#2918)
• Defaults to app both the owner and database during recovery bootstrap (#2957)
• Avoid write-read concurrency on cached cluster (#2884)
• Remove empty items, make them unique and sort in the ResourceName sections of the generated roles (#2875)
• Ensure that the ContinuousArchiving condition is properly set to 'failed' in case of errors (#2625)
• Make the Backup resource reconciliation cycle more resilient on interruptions by stopping only if the backup is completed or failed (#2591)
• Reconcile PodMonitor labels and annotations (#2583)
• Fix backup failure due to missing RBAC resourceNames on the Role object (#2956)

• Observability:

  • Add TCP port label to default pg_stat_replication metric (#2961)
  • Fix the pg_wal_stat default metric for Prometheus (#2569)
  • Improve the pg_replication default metric for Prometheus (#2744 and #2750)
  • Use alertInstanceLabelFilter instead of alertName in the provided Grafana dashboard
  • Enforce standard_conforming_strings in metric collection (#2888)

Changes:

• Set the default operand image to PostgreSQL 16.0
• Fencing now uses PostgreSQL's fast shutdown instead of smart shutdown to halt an instance (#3051)
• Rename webhooks from kb.io to cnpg.io group (#2851)
• Let the cnpg hibernate plugin command use the ClusterManifestAnnotationName and PgControldataAnnotationName annotations on PVCs (#2657)
• Add the cnpg.io/instanceRole label while deprecating the existing role label (#2915)

Technical enhancements:

• Replace k8s-api-docgen with gen-crd-api-reference-docs to automatically build the API reference documentation (#2606)

Version 1.19.4

Release date: July 27, 2023

Enhancements:

• New logs command in the kubectl plugin, to retrieve or follow the logs of all pods in a cluster (#2375)
• Add support for specifying priorityClassName in pods, helping Kubernetes make scheduling decisions (#2043)
• Add a metric and status field to monitor node usage by a CloudNativePG cluster (#2257)
• Various enhancements to the documentation:
  • Add troubleshooting instructions relating to hugepages (#1390)
  • Extend the FAQs page (#2344)

Technical enhancements:

• Add a check at the start of the restore process to ensure it can proceed; give improved error diagnostics if it cannot (#2419)

Fixes:

• Ensure the logic of setting the recovery target matches that of Postgres (#2460)
• Prevent taking over service accounts not owned by the cluster, by setting ownerMetadata only during service account creation (#2462)
• Ensure correct permissions of the PGDATA directory for initdb and restore (#2384)
• Prevent a possible crash of the instance manager during the configuration reload (#2393)
• Prevent the LastFailedArchiveTime alert from triggering if a new backup has been successful after the failed ones (#1751)
• Prevent services from targeting non-instance pods (#2336)

Security:

• Updated all project dependencies to the latest versions

Version 1.19.3

Release date: June 12, 2023

Enhancements:

• Add the snapshot command to the cnpg plugin to create a consistent cold backup of the cluster from a standby using the Kubernetes VolumeSnapshot standard resource (#1960)
• First implementation of recovery from a set of CSI VolumeSnapshot resources via the .spec.bootstrap.recovery.volumeSnapshot stanza (#1960)
• Add pg_failover_slots to managed extensions (#2057)
• Improved Grafana dashboard with updated instructions in the documentation and the quickstart guide (#1916)
• Introduce the schemaOnly option in the import stanza, to avoid exporting and importing data when you bootstrap a new Postgres Cluster from one or more existing databases (#2234)
• Add support for TopologySpreadConstraints to manage scheduling of instance pods (#2202)
• Add PodMonitor support to the Poolerfor PgBouncer (#2034)
• Add option to override the default Kubernetes scheduler (#2013)
• Allow configuration of deployment strategy of a Pooler resource (#1983)
• Update default PostgreSQL version to 15.3 (#2022)
• Use PgBouncer 1.19 by default (#2018)

Technical enhancements:

• Updated k8s kind tested versions (#2054)
• Use separate transactions to reconcile role credentials. Before this patch, the operator would revert the synchronization of all roles if one failed (#2004)
• Ensure fencing is removed during cluster restore (#1987)
• Improve logging when deleting Pods (#2136)

Fixes:

• Fix unbound variable with k3d engine which could prevent setup on k3d (#2157)
• Report the correct PG version in the metrics (#2126)
• Use the correct walStorage key in the documentation (#2140)
• Halt reconciliation when the operator cannot connect with the instances, and provide a clear diagnostic on such occasions. This will help clarify cases where network issues obstruct normal operation of CloudNativePG (#2145), (#2233), and (#2242)

Version 1.19.2

Release date: April 27, 2023

Enhancements:

• Improve the --logs option of the report command of the cnpg plugin for kubectl to also include the previous logs where available (#1811)
• The -any service is now disabled by default (#1755)

Security:

• Enable customization of SeccompProfile through override via a local file (#1827)

Fixes:

• Apply the PostgreSQL configuration provided by the user during the initdb bootstrap phase, before the server is started the first time (#1858)

Version 1.19.1

Release date: March 20, 2023

Enhancements:

• Allow overriding the default backup target policy (#1602): previously, all backups and scheduled backups would use the cluster-level target policy
• Extend the debug cluster's log level to the initdb job (#1503)
• Support IPv6 and custom pg_hba for the PgBouncer pooler (#1395)
• Enhance observability of backups with two new metrics and additional information in the status (#1428)
• Document API calls from the instance manager (#1641)
• Clarify deployment name via Helm (#1505)
• Add the psql command to the cnpg plugin for kubectl (#1668) allowing the user to start a psql session with a pod (the primary by default)

Technical enhancements:

• Adopt Renovate for dependency tracking/updating (#1367, #1473)
• Inject binaries for all supported architectures in the operator image (#1513)
• Use the backup name to match resources in the backup object store (#1650) Leverages the --name option introduced with Barman 3.3 to make the association between backups and the object store more robust.

Fixes:

• Prevent panic with error handling in the probes (#1716)
• Ensure that the HTTP package and controller runtime logs are in JSON format (#1442)
• Adds WAL storage to a cluster in a single instance Cluster (#1570)
• Various improvements to make backup code more robust (#1536, #1564, #1588, #1466, #1647)
• Properly show WAL archiving information with status command of the cnpg plugin (#1666)
• Ensure nodeAffinity is applied even if AdditionalPodAffinity and AdditionalPodAntiAffinity are not set (#1663)
• Introduce failover delay during OnlineUpgrading phase (#1728) Previously, the online upgrade process could trigger failover logic unnecessarily.

Version 1.19.0

Release date: Feb 14, 2023

Important announcements:

• PostgreSQL version 10 is no longer supported as it has reached its EOL. Versions 11 and newer are supported. Please plan your migration to PostgreSQL 15 as soon as possible. Refer to "Importing Postgres databases" for more information on PostgreSQL major offline upgrades.

Features:

• Backup from a standby: introduce the .spec.backup.target option accepting that when set to prefer-standby will run take the physical base backup from the most aligned replica (#1162)
• Delayed failover: introduce the failoverDelay parameter to delay the failover process once the primary has been detected unhealthy (#1366)

Enhancements:

• Introduce support for Kubernetes' projected volumes (#1269)
• Introduce support custom environment variables for finer control of the PostgreSQL server process (#1275)
• Introduce the backup command in the cnpg plugin for kubectl to issue a new base backup of the cluster (#1348)
• Improve support for the separate WAL volume feature by enabling users to move WAL files to a dedicated volume on an existing Postgres cluster (#1066)
• Enhance WAL observability with additional metrics for the Prometheus exporter, including values equivalent to the min_wal_size, max_wal_size, keep_wal_size, wal_keep_segments, as well as the maximum number of WALs that can be stored in the dedicated volume (#1382)
• Add a database comment on the streaming_replica user (#1349)
• Document the firewall issues with webhooks on GKE (#1364)
• Add note about postgresql.conf in recovery (#1211)
• Add instructions on installing plugin using packages (#1357)
• Specify Postgres versions supported by each minor release (#1355)
• Clarify the meaning of PVC group in CloudNativePG (#1344)
• Add an example of the DigitalOcean S3-compatible Spaces (#1289)
• Update default PostgreSQL version for new cluster definitions to 15.2 (#1430)
• Cover the Kubernetes layer in greater detail in the Architecture documentation (#1432)

Technical enhancements:

• Added daily end-to-end smoke test for release branches (#1235)

Fixes:

• Skip executing a CHECKPOINT as the streaming_replica user (#1408)
• Make waitForWalArchiveWorking resilient to connection errors (#1399)
• Ensure that the PVC roles are always consistent (#1380)
• Permit walStorage resize when using pvcTemplate (#1315)
• Ensure ExecCommand obeys timeout (#1242)
• Avoid PodMonitor reconcile if Prometheus is not installed (#1238)
• Avoid looking for PodMonitor when not needed (#1213)