What are the definitions in the new Rancher Prime Release Cycle?

This document (000021405) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

Environment

Rancher Prime 2.8+
Longhorn
NeuVector
Harvester

Situation

Rancher Prime introduces a new release cycle to reinforce the value of the support subscriptions. The changes will include alignment with upstream Kubernetes releases, a consistent roadmap rolling forward and a predictable release schedule.

The new release cycle is expected to take effect starting August 2024.
EoM to EoL becomes, at this stage, the 12-months maintenance support window, giving us a total of 18 months (to align with the new release cycle - 6 months of full support + 12 months of maintenance support).
Release schedule - every ~4 months for Rancher Prime
New features are expected to be delivered only upon a new minor release, i.e. X.Y.0 (example 2.9.0, 2.10.0, etc.)
Since Rancher is currently releasing a new patch version every 4-6 weeks, these patch releases are expected to include critical bug fixes, CVEs and other fixes evaluated at the discretion of the Rancher Engineering team depending on the stage of the lifecycle.

Resolution

Here is the terminology that will be populated across the different documentation SUSE resources once the new Rancher Prime release lifecycle takes effect (ETA August 2024).

Community Release	The latest to-be-released is made available. Stability validation window of ~1 month before releasing to the Prime registry (for minor releases where minor is x.y.z -> y)
Prime Release	Available only for paying customers with active subscriptions through the Prime registry.
Full Support (6 months)	Urgent and selected high-priority bug fixes will be released during the full support window, and all other patches (non-urgent, enhancements, new capabilities) will be released via the regular release schedule.
Maintenance Support (12 months)	During this period, Critical and Important Security Advisories (CVEs) will be released via patches. Other bug fixes may be released at SUSE's discretion but should not be expected.

Here is a graphical representation to better understand the new release lifecycle.

Disclaimer

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