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GitLab 14.0 Support Readiness - Removal/Deprecation - OpenSUSE Leap 15.1

Summary

The purpose of this issue is to:

  • Assess the impact of the following feature removal or deprecation planned for 14.0.
  • Document what actions customers must/should perform to mitigate the impact of the change.
  • Track findings from support tickets and other sources related to the change.

Links to Change:

Assignee: @bcarranza

Impact Assessment

Organizations that make use of openSUSE Leap for their GitLab hosts or their GitLab Runners may be impacted. Organizations still running openSUSE Leap 15.1 will be impacted. It is important to note that the vendor's general support for this version of openSUSE Leap ended in January 2021.

We say:

Support for 15.1 will be dropped in 14.0. We are now providing support for openSUSE Leap 15.2 packages.

Here's what that means:

Risk Calculation

Let's take a look at the estimated likelihood that someone will be impacted by this change and the associated impact.

  • Likelihood: Low
  • Impact: High

On likelihood: From reviewing tickets and issues, we see that there was demand for openSUSE Leap 15.1 packages but that shifted to a request for 15.2 as time passed. There are a small but non-zero number of tickets 🎫 about customers using this OS, though they trail off in 2021.

On impact: the impact varies depending on an organization's preferences and appetite for risk but at the far end, the impact is high. Organizations running GitLab on openSUSE Leap 15.1 are not using a configuration supported by either the OS vendor or GitLab Support. Remedying this situation involves installing a new operating system and moving the GitLab instance over to it. This is a relatively big change to infrastructure that requires engineering resources to achieve. For organizations who do not care to run a supported OS and are comfortable accepting the risks, the impact is much lower.

Mitigations/Workarounds

I am running GitLab 13.9 (or older) on openSUSE Leap 15.1 and I don't want to upgrade GitLab at this time.

You should consider moving your GitLab instance to a server running a supported Linux distribution. Alternately, you can choose to run an unsupported OS.

You can continue to download packages for openSUSE Leap 15.1 for 13.9.7-ee and older if you need to reinstall on an emergency basis and choose to continue to run an unsupported OS.

Move your GitLab instance to a server running a supported Linux distribution

If you do choose to run GitLab on a supported Linux distribution, an over view of the recommended approach is:

I am running 13.9 (or older) on openSUSE Leap 15.1 and I want to upgrade GitLab.

If you are running openSUSE Leap 15.1 and would like to upgrade GitLab past 13.9.7-ee , you will need to upgrade the underlying OS to a supported Linux distribution. There are no GitLab packages for openSUSE Leap 15.1 for GitLab versions after 13.9.7-ee. openSUSE Leap 15.2 is a reasonable alternative. See our list of supported Linux distributions.

The steps to follow are similar to the ones shown above. Once you have completed these, you'll be ready to upgrade GitLab as normal and you'll be running a supported OS.

  • Back up GitLab
  • Install the new OS
  • Install the version of GitLab that you just backed up on the server running the new OS
  • Restore the backup to the server running the new OS
  • Upgrade GitLab as normal

Alternately, you can choose to run an unsupported OS and upgrade GitLab in-place. Note: With this route, you won't be able to upgrade GitLab past 13.9.7-ee.

Support Notes

See #3544 (closed) , a request for guidance about what it means to run a Linux distribution that is no longer supported.

🕰 Timeline

Date Activity
May 22, 2019 openSUSE Leap 15.1 release date
January 31, 2021 Vendor general support for openSUSE Leap 15.1 ends
June 22, 2021 GitLab 14.0 release date, no more support for openSUSE Leap 15.1

📦 Deliverables

image

⏩ TLDR

  • Safely ignore this if you are not using openSUSE Leap 15.1.
  • If you are using openSUSE Leap 15.1:
    • general support from the vendor for this OS ended in January 2021
    • no GitLab packages from 14.0 and beyond (latest available in PackageCloud is 13.9) If you are impacted by this, you should strongly consider moving to a supported OS.

Q: I am running openSUSE Leap 15.1; what should I do?

A: You should:

  • install a supported Linux distribution
  • backup your GitLab instance on openSUSE Leap 15.1
  • restore that backup onto the new server running a supported Linux distribution
  • upgrade GitLab (optional, recommended)

📓 Notes

According to the lifecycle on suse.com, general support for OpenSUSE Leap 15.1 ended 31 Jan 2021. This operating system is now EOL.

When searching packages.gitlab.com for packages for opensuse/15.1, there are 246 results at the moment. The most recent is gitlab-ee-13.9.7-ee.0.sles15.x86_64.rpm from ~1 month ago.

🌐 Issues

Review and take notes

📋 TODOs

On the installation requirements page, we have information about supported Linux distributions. The Statement of Support does not have any information about what it means to run a supported OS.

  • Does it mean that GitLab Support won't help you at all, even if you are running a supported version of GitLab?
  • Does it mean that GitLab Support will help you to the point that we identify that the unsupported nature of the OS is likely the cause of the problem being encountereed?
  • Does it mean something else?

See #3424 (closed) for notes on deprecating another OS.

⁉ Questions

  • Are packages for previously deprecated OSs still available on packages.gitlab.com? It seems that way. See 242 results for ubuntu/precise.
Edited by Brie Carranza