Chapter 5. Release Information
These release notes highlight technology preview items, recommended practices, known issues, and deprecated functionality you must take into consideration when deploying this release of Red Hat Satellite 6. Notes for updates released during the support lifecycle of this Red Hat Satellite 6 release will appear in the advisory text associated with each update.
5.1. Major Changes
This release of Red Hat Satellite 6 features the following major changes:
- Registry and port changes
- Previously, the Satellite server used two registries, one on port 5000 and another on port 443. With 6.10, the registry on port 5000 is no longer used. The registry used on port 443 continues to apply for both Satellite and Capsule.
For a complete list of supported ports and firewall requirements, see:
- Ports and Firewalls Requirements in Installing Satellite Server from a Connected Network
- Ports and Firewalls Requirements in Installing Satellite Server from a Disconnected Network
Ports and Firewalls Requirements in Installing Capsule Server
- Change from Pulp 2 to Pulp 3
- At Satellite 6.10 Pulp 2 is replaced by Pulp 3. Upgrading Satellite from 6.9 to 6.10 also migrates Pulp content, however this can take some considerable time. Preparing to Migrate Content to Pulp 3 supplies a procedure to pre-migrate Pulp content from Pulp 2 to Pulp 3 to save time before you upgrade.
- Command Line Interface (CLI) Change
- Satellite 6.10 upgrades the content management backend from Pulp-2 to Pulp-3. A new CLI now supports content export and import, which is often used to support air-gapped disconnected Satellite environments.
- Mapping to the New CLI
- Due to the CLI update in this release, Satellite 6.10 and Satellite 6.9 and lower are incompatible for export and import as export in Satellite 6.10 is no longer in the CDN format. You must run the same version of Satellite on all servers to use the new CLI, and if you want to sync exported content, you need to use the import equivalents.
Since the export-default and export-legacy commands are no longer available, there are export commands that simulate those commands.
The tables below map the available export and import commands:
| Command | Sat 6.9 and before | Sat 6.10 and after |
|---|---|---|
| Complete Export of a content view version |
|
|
| Incremental Export of a content view version |
* |
* |
| Complete Export of a repository |
|
|
| Incremental Export of a repository |
|
|
| Complete export of the default content-view version (library) of an org | N/A |
|
| Incremental export of the default content-view version (library) of an org | N/A |
|
| Complete export of all content across all orgs. |
| N/A |
| Command | Sat 6.9 and before | Sat 6.10 and after |
|---|---|---|
| Import a content view version |
|
|
| Import a repository | N/A (can only sync) |
|
| Import library version | N/A |
|
5.2. Enhancements
This release of Red Hat Satellite 6 features the following enhancements:
- Ability to support Azure GovCloud
- Support has been added for client management using Azure GovCloud for isolated environments.
- Satellite Air-Gapped and Disconnected
Satellite provides command-line utilities to support users in disconnected environments. Typically, this involves a Satellite at an internet-connected site and a Satellite at a disconnected site with no internet connectivity.
Satellite 6.10 provides a new command line to support moving content from the connected site to the disconnected site. The new interface provides several enhancements and improvements over previous support. The new command line continues to provide the ability to export content from a Satellite and then import it into another Satellite.
When exporting content, you can export the Library, a Content View Version, or a single repository and choose to export either fully or incrementally. The incremental option only exports content not previously exported. In addition, you can choose to have the content exported to a single file or multiple files of a limited size.
When importing content, the CLI also creates missing resources and associations based upon the exported content. This includes creation of repositories and content views.
- Expose Ansible Collections for Sync Only on Connected Satellite
Satellite 6.10 introduces management of Ansible Collections in disconnected environments, where a Red Hat Automation Hub is also deployed.
In this deployment configuration, both a connected and disconnected site exist. Both sites have Satellite and an Automation Hub deployed. The connected site has internet connectivity and the disconnected site does not.
Satellite Ansible Collections support enables a user at the connected site to create a repository pointing to the Automation Hub at that site. They can then synchronize their collections to this repository. When synchronized, use the Satellite command-line interface to export the content in a format that can then be taken to the disconnected site. When at the disconnected site, use the Satellite command-line interface to import content into the disconnected Satellite. The Automation Hub at the disconnected site can then consume the content.
- Foreman_webhooks replaces foreman_hooks
- Satellite 6.10 replaces the foreman_hooks plugin with foreman_webhooks to simplify integration with external systems to Satellite through their APIs. When specific events occur in Satellite, a user-defined webhook is triggered. An example would be the use of a webhook to populate the Ansible Automation Platform (AAP) inventory on completion of host provisioning, or triggering an Ansible job in AAP, after the repository has been synchronized in Satellite.
- Personal Access Tokens
- Personal Access Tokens are a means of authentication introduced in a previous version of Satellite. In this release, a new UI has been added so you can create PATs easily, expire them, or monitor their last use time. You can find the UI in your account settings under the Personal Access Tokens tab.
- Playbook Signatures
- From Satellite 6.10, remediation playbooks originating from console.redhat.com contain additional signatures that are verified by Satellite before their execution. The remediation is not performed if the signature is invalid. This provides an additional layer of security.
- Satellite Convert2RHEL support
- Satellite adds support to automate the Convert2RHEL operation for non-Red Hat Enterprise Linux hosts that you want to convert to a supported version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
- Satellite 6.10 Server works with Satellite 6.9 Capsules
- Satellite 6.10 can function with Satellite 6.9 Capsules. However, customers are encouraged to upgrade their Capsules as soon as possible to ensure the best performance and scale.
- Ability to visually represent systems registered and in sync with Insights
- Satellite now has user interface indicators to show when your hosts are both registered and in sync with Red Hat Insights.
- Ability to configure Pulp timeouts
- Satellite now has the ability to define how long it will hold a connection to a URL during synchronization of content before timing out. If users experience timeout errors while syncing content they can increase this value in the settings to match the availability of remote resources. Setting the value too high can prevent Satellite from automatically detecting when a remote resource is not releasing the connection. If this occurs the synchronization can take a considerable time.
- Red Hat Insights Plugin removed
- Functionality that was available under the Insights menu option has now been directly integrated into the Hosts > All Hosts user interface to unify the experience of recommending and remediating actions for the hosts managed in Satellite.
- Ability to verify if required packages are installed as part of the pre-upgrade check
-
Satellite can now verify if the
satelliteorsatellite-capsulepackages are present on the server during the pre-upgrade check. - Ability to unset environmental variables when the installer is running
-
Satellite now unsets the
http_proxyenvironmental variables within the installer environment for the duration of the installation process. - Ability to turn backups on and off when cleaning up tasks from database
Satellite no longer backs up tasks by default. You can now enable or disable tasks backup by setting
satellite-installer --foreman-plugin-tasks-backuptotrueorfalse.NoteFor upgrades, task backups are enabled by default. You can disable the task backups with the following command:
# satellite-installer --foreman-plugin-tasks-backup false
- Advanced options when registering a host
- Satellite user interface under Hosts > Register Host now allows more fine-grained settings for the host registration command and displays inherited values.
5.3. Known Issues
These known issues exist in Red Hat Satellite 6 at this time:
- Information from host group is not completely inherited when provisioning a discovered host in the Satellite web UI
When you provision a discovered host, after selecting a host group and trying to customize the host entry, many critical pieces of information are missing. This results in a failed deployment attempt.
As a workaround, perform one of the following actions:
Provision the host using hammer:
# hammer discovery provision --name discovered_host_name \ --hostgroup-id your_hostgroup_id \ --organization-id your_organization_id \ --location-id your_location_id \ --new-name new_host_name\ --build true
For more information, see hammer discovery provision in Hammer CLI Guide.
- Configure discovery rules and enable auto-provisioning so that no manual intervention is required to provision a discovered host. For more information, see Creating Discovery Rules in Provisioning Guide.
BZ#(2069324)
- Upgrade considerations concerning Pulp migration and future RHEL
- See Upgrade paths in the Upgrading and Updating Red Hat Satellite guide.
- RHEL8 systems with OSPP applied cannot install the katello-ca_consumer package from Satellite 6.5
When you apply the OSPP security policy to a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 system during provisioning, the
katello-ca-consumerpackage cannot be installed from Satellite Server. As a result, the system cannot be registered as a content host. As a workaround, after the system is provisioned, installkatello-ca-consumerwith the following command and then register the system manually:# rpm -Uvh --nodigest --nofiledigest http://satellite.example.com/pub/katello-ca-consumer-latest.noarch.rpm
BZ#1713401
- Increased use of memory by Pulp 3 workers during repository synchronization
During repository synchronization, Pulp 3 workers exhibit higher memory use when compared to Pulp 2 workers. As a result, Out of Memory or heavy swapping can occur when syncing several large repositories concurrently.
BZ#1994397
- Pulp - Syncing repositories with HTTPS proxy set ends with warning
Syncing repositories with HTTPS proxy set ends with warning
Katello::Errors::Pulp3 Error Only HTTP proxies are supported. A workaround is to use plain HTTP proxy or an HTTP proxy that is upgraded to HTTPS using the HTTP CONNECT method.BZ#1993917
- Content View promotion performance
Promoting a Content View with filters for a large repository may take noticeably longer than under Pulp 2.
BZ#1995232
5.4. Deprecated Functionality
The items in this section are either no longer supported, or will no longer be supported in a future release.
- Foreman Hooks
- Foreman Hooks functionality has been deprecated and will be removed in a future release. The functionality will be replaced by the new Foreman Webhooks feature that will be documented with its release.
- Provisioning on Red Hat Virtualization
- The integration of Red Hat Virtualization (RHV) with Satellite is deprecated and will be removed in a future release. All the existing compute resources of RHV type will be removed and the hosts associated with RHV will be disconnected.
- environment_id parameter
-
The
environment_idparameter is deprecated for promoting a content view with API. The newenvironment_idsreplaces it. - Bootstrap.py
-
The
bootstrap.pyscript that was used to register a host to Satellite Server or Capsule Server has been replaced with thecurlcommand created with the global registration template. - Katello-agent
- Katello-agent is deprecated in this version and will be removed in the next release. Transition your workloads to use the remote execution feature.
katello-ca-consumerPackage- The katello-ca-consumer package is deprecated in this version and will be removed in a future release. Use the global registration template for registering a host to Satellite.
- Puppet Run API
-
The puppet run API endpoint
/api/hosts/:id/puppetrun, the built in apidoc, and the CLI command are deprecated in this version of Satellite. They will be removed in the next version. - Content ISOs on the CDN
- Content ISOs previously hosted at redhat.com for import into Satellite Server have been deprecated in this version and will be removed in the next version of Satellite. Export and Import of synchronized content is improved as part of Satellite 6.10. Red Hat recommends that this be used instead of Content ISOs.
5.5. Removed functionality
- RHEV API V3
- The RHEV API v3 was deprecated in Satellite 6.9. It has been removed in this version of Satellite.
pulp-puppet-moduleBuilderPuppet Content Management and
pulp-puppet-modulebuilder were deprecated in Satellite 6.9. They have been removed in this version of Satellite. Existing synchronized Puppet repositories will be removed from Satellite. Upon upgrade to Satellite 6.10, Puppet repositories will be deleted if any of the following conditions are met:- If there are any Puppet repositories in Library lifecycle environment.
- If there are Puppet repositories in unpublished Content Views. For further details, see What will happen to Puppet content on Satellite server after upgrade to Satellite 6.10?
- OSTree and Puppet Content Type
The following management operations of OSTree and Puppet content types were deprecated in Satellite 6.9 and have been removed in this version of Satellite:
- Creating OSTree and Puppet repositories.
- Synchronizing OSTree and Puppet repositories.
- Adding repositories of OSTree and puppet content types to content view.
- Publishing and promoting the content views containing repositories of OSTree and Puppet content types across life cycle environments.
- Delta RPM (drpm) Support
- Delta RPM (drpm) support was deprecated in Satellite 6.9. It has been removed in this version of Satellite.
- Red Hat Access Insights plugin
- The Red Hat Access Insights plugin was deprecated in Satellite 6.9. It has been removed in this version of Satellite.
- Background Download Policy for Repositories
- The option to set Download Policy = Background has been removed in this release. If you use this setting, the upgrade process updates those repositories to Download Policy = Immediate. As a result, repository synchronizations might take longer. This is because a synchronization will not be considered complete until all content has been downloaded.
- Foreman Hooks
- Foreman Hook functionality was deprecated in Satellite 6.9. It has been removed in this version of Satellite.
- Generic and Host Bootdisks
- Generic and host bootdisks were deprecated in Satellite 6.9. They have been removed in this version of Satellite and are disabled in both UI and CLI. Use Full Host Bootdisk, which is based on SYSLINUX/Grub2 bootloaders and works on all RHEL certified hardware. The VMWare auto bootdisk attaching feature now also uses Full Host Disk.
- hammer content-view version export and hammer content-view export-legacy
As part of the Satellite Air Gapped and Disconnected enhancements, there are changes to the Satellite command-line interface, including the removal of commands.
The commands removed are:
hammer content-view version exportIn Satellite 6.10, this command has been replaced with
hammer content-export complete versionandhammer content-export incremental version.hammer content-view version export-legacyIn Satellite 6.10, this command has been removed.
A replacement command to generate exported content in the same format does not exist. However, the command-line enables content export content from a Satellite and import to another Satellite. For more information on functionality provided by Satellite 6.10, see Synchronizing Content Between Satellite Servers
- MongoDB
- In Satellite 6.10, Pulp 2 has been upgraded to Pulp 3 and as a result, MongoDB has been removed from Satellite in favor of PostgreSQL.
- Squid
- Squid has been deprecated and uninstalled in Satellite 6.10, as this functionality is now provided as part of pulpcore-content, a component of Pulp 3.
- Generic & Host Boot Disks
-
The generic and host boot disks have been removed and disabled in both UI and CLI. Instead, use
Full Host Bootdisk, which is based onSYSLINUX/Grub2bootloaders and works on all RHEL certified hardware. Additionally, the VMWare auto bootdisk attaching feature now also usesFull Host Bootdisk.
