Viability of Kubernetes community LTS
summary
Working Group LTS asks whether Kubernetes should extend support windows or enable skip upgrades and finds concrete tradeoffs: upgrades are painful (three releases per year, support window 14 months), backports induce regressions, CI and testing costs rise, and dependencies matter—Go adds two-year compatibility, while containerd 1.6 is LTS and 2.0 is an RC, and Gateway API currently supports the trailing five Kubernetes versions; consensus favors backported security fixes and critical-bug patches, not wholesale feature backports.
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chapters (14)
- 0:00Kubernetes LTS introduction
- 1:03Painful Kubernetes upgrades
- 2:34Kubernetes LTS origins
- 3:59Defining Kubernetes LTS
- 10:47Container D’s LTS support
- 13:42Gateway API LTS challenges
- 23:38LTS costs and dependencies
- 27:37Customer impact of LTS
- 31:51Funding open-source LTS
- 34:21Go upgrades and LTS
- 38:38LTS risks and stagnation
- 41:28In-tree vs LTS balance
- 44:18Kubernetes LTS future
- 51:06Closing remarks
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