Release notes for IBM App Connect Operator 12.13.0

Review these release notes for information about supported versions, new features and enhancements, and known issues and workarounds.

Version information

This release relates to IBM App Connect Operator 12.13.0.

About Continuous Delivery: This version of the Operator is considered a Continuous Delivery release. Continuous Delivery releases undergo continuous testing, integration, and deployment to rapidly deliver new features, fixes, and security updates typically at monthly intervals, and offer a minimum of two years of support.

The support requirements for the IBM App Connect Operator 12.13.0 are as follows:

Option Supported requirement
Deployment platforms
  • Red Hat® OpenShift® Container Platform 4.12, 4.14, 4.15, 4.16, 4.17, or 4.18 (More information)
  • Kubernetes 1.27.x, 1.28.x, 1.29.x, 1.30.x, 1.31.x, or 1.32.x (More information)

    To receive support for IBM App Connect Operator 12.13.0, you must be running a supported version of the underlying Kubernetes platform. Operator 12.13.0 supports each listed Kubernetes version until it reaches end of life (EOL). After the EOL date, support is dropped for Operator deployments that run solely on the EOL version. For information about the Kubernetes support lifecycle and EOL dates, see Release History and Non-Active Branch history.

  • Red Hat OpenShift Service on AWS (More information)
Image Contains an image of IBM App Connect Enterprise 13.0.4.0
Installation
  • Compatible with IBM Cloud Pak for Integration 16.1.2
  • Supported as an independent deployment of IBM App Connect Enterprise certified container to a cluster

This documentation relates to the release for these listed versions. Documentation for the previous releases of the Operator is available in PDF format at Documentation for previous releases.

New features and enhancements

Support for a new IBM App Connect Operator channel, and custom resource (or operand) channels or versions

IBM App Connect Operator 12.13.0 is delivered on a new v12.13 Operator channel, which you must select to install 12.13.0 versions of the Operator, or to initialize an upgrade from a 12.12.0 or earlier Operator.

Accompanying versions and licenses are provided for the App Connect Dashboard, App Connect Designer Authoring, Switch Server, Integration Server, and Integration Runtime custom resources (or operands). To create an instance or upgrade to a 12.13.0-specific version of a custom resource (CR), you must choose both of these options:
  • Subscribe to the 13.0 or 13.0.4 channel for custom resources, or specify a fully qualified version of 13.0.4.0-r1.
  • Select a 12.13.0-specific license for approval.
More information:
Ongoing support for Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.12, 4.14, 4.15, 4.16, 4.17, and 4.18

IBM App Connect Operator 12.13.0 supports Red Hat OpenShift 4.12, 4.14, 4.15, 4.16, 4.17, and 4.18, but on a 4.18 cluster, you can create App Connect Dashboard, App Connect Designer, switch server, integration server, and integration runtime instances at version 13.0.2.2-r2 or later only. Similarly, if you upgrade your cluster to Red Hat OpenShift 4.18, you must upgrade all your existing instances to version 13.0.2.2-r2 or later.

More information:
Ability to enable the automatic creation of Red Hat OpenShift routes with custom hostnames for the App Connect Dashboard and the IBM App Connect API

A new set of parameters are added to allow you to enable or disable the automatic creation of Red Hat OpenShift routes for the App Connect Dashboard and the IBM App Connect API (if enabled for a Dashboard instance). When the automatic creation of routes is enabled, you can also optionally specify custom hostnames to use in the generated URL for accessing the Dashboard UI and the generated base URL for the API server.

The new parameters are as follows:

  • spec.routes.api.disabled
  • spec.routes.api.host
  • spec.routes.ui.disabled
  • spec.routes.ui.host

These new parameters provide enhanced support over the existing spec.disableRoutes parameter.

More information: App Connect Dashboard reference: Custom resource values

Support for service tracing on switch servers

To help with problem determination and troubleshooting of switch servers, you can now collect and manage service trace for a deployed switch server. From the Red Hat OpenShift web console or CLI, or the CLI for a Kubernetes environment, you can start (or enable) a trace by creating a trace object, and stop (or disable) a trace by deleting the trace object.

The Trace CR, which enables you to create trace objects, provides a new spec.switchServerName parameter that you can use to specify the name of a deployed switch server that you want to collect trace for.

Restriction:
  • User trace is not applicable for a switch server.
  • You cannot enable trace at startup of a switch server by using the server.conf.yaml file or an environment variable.
  • You cannot currently download or reset trace for a switch server like you can for an integration server or integration runtime.

More information: Trace reference

New connectors for App Connect Designer flows and deployed Designer integrations

New connectors are available for connecting to, and interacting with, target applications when referenced in App Connect Designer flows, or in deployed integration servers or integration runtimes:

  • Apache Pulsar (Supports events and actions)
  • Azure Service Bus (Supports events and actions)
  • Vespa (Supports actions)
The following connector now also provides support for events that trigger event-driven flows:
  • Amazon SQS
More information:

Deprecated or removed features

Deprecated operand versions and channels

A number of operand versions and channels are deprecated for the IBM App Connect Operator 12.13.0 and might no longer be reconciled by future versions of the Operator. A deprecation notice is displayed if you try to save a new or existing Dashboard, Designer, switch server, integration server, or integration runtime custom resource if its spec.version value resolves to a deprecated version.

More information: spec.version values

Removed operand channels and versions
The following operand version, which was deprecated in IBM App Connect Operator 12.12.0, is removed from IBM App Connect Operator 12.13.0:
  • 12.0.12-r12

After you upgrade to version 12.13.0 of the Operator, existing App Connect Designer, App Connect Dashboard, switch server, integration server, or integration runtime instances that resolve to a removed version are no longer supported and cannot be reconciled by the Operator.

  • You can upgrade the instance to a supported version by updating the spec.version value and accepting the appropriate license.
  • You can delete the instance if it's no longer required.
  • You cannot save modifications to the custom resource settings if the instance is at an unsupported version. If you require an instance at a version that is unsupported in Operator 12.13.0, you must install an Operator version from the v12.12 or earlier channel, and then create an instance at the version that you require.

More information:

Known issues

Cannot start trace on a switch server

In a cluster-wide deployment of the IBM App Connect Operator, you cannot start trace on a switch server that is deployed in a single namespace.