OpenStack, the widely deployed open-source cloud infrastructure software within the global cloud industry, has released Antelope, the 27th version of its software. The latest release comes with a host of enhancements to support the rapidly expanding user base of OpenStack, including new release cadence, stronger integration with Kubernetes, and expanded support for advanced hardware.
Antelope is the first release in a new cadence designed to ease demands on operators to upgrade every six months. Deployments can opt into a once-a-year upgrade cycle, upgrading with every Skip Level Upgrade Release Process or ‘SLURP’ release. The non-SLURP release, OpenStack Bobcat, is scheduled for release in October 2023.
In addition to the new cadence, OpenStack has strengthened its integration with Kubernetes. According to the 2022 OpenStack User Survey, Kubernetes is now deployed on over 85% of OpenStack deployments. Magnum, the OpenStack service for container orchestration, has been updated in Antelope to support Kubernetes v1.24 running on Fedora CoreOS 36 and 37. Magnum has also been recertified as a Kubernetes orchestrator, passing the software conformance testing hosted by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF).
The latest release of OpenStack also includes expanded support for new hardware, including new backend drivers and features to existing vendor drivers. For example, Cinder has added HPE XP iSCSI and FC, Fungible NVMe-TCP, and NetApp NVMe-TCP storage drivers, and Ironic can now export application metrics from the ironic-conductor service into Prometheus, alongside hardware metrics.
Linux, OpenStack, Kubernetes
“Our community has provided in the Antelope release not only the maintenance required to uphold OpenStack’s reputation for stability but also expanded support for new hardware and software integrations,” Kendall Nelson, Senior Upstream Developer Advocate at the OpenInfra Foundation
Antelope includes 9,794 changes authored by over 601 contributors from more than 110 organizations and over 40 countries. Other new features in the release include shared Designate zones across multiple projects, support for sharding Ironic nodes, and the ability to manage the power consumption of dedicated CPUs. Additionally, PCI devices can now be scheduled by Nova using the Placement API on an opt-in basis, and Horizon has added port forwarding support for Floating IPs.
The OpenStack community is central to the LOKI trifecta (Linux, OpenStack, and Kubernetes Infrastructure), the open-source standard for running modern cloud infrastructure. The LOKI trifecta is widely deployed globally, with a 166% increase in compute cores since 2020.
Kendall Nelson, Senior Upstream Developer Advocate at the OpenInfra Foundation, said, “With OpenStack deployments growing exponentially, our community has provided in the Antelope release not only the maintenance required to uphold OpenStack’s reputation for stability but also expanded support for new hardware and software integrations.”
OpenStack has seen massive growth in recent years, with a significant increase in compute cores since 2020. According to the OpenStack User Survey, 71% of users report that they have more than 1,000 cores in production, and 33% have more than 10,000 cores. OpenStack is widely used across various industries, including finance, healthcare, telecommunications, and public sector services.
The Antelope release is available for download now. The OpenStack community invites feedback and contributions to continue improving the software.
