Auto-Upgrade the AKS Control Plane Patch Version in the Console

Cloud service provider relevance: AKS

You can immediately run an auto-upgrade of an AKS patch version or schedule an auto-upgrade once a day (recommended) or at a specific time. For both immediate or scheduled auto-upgrade, you can set one of these options:

• Control plane upgrade: Upgrade the control plane patch version only.
• Control plane upgrade and Ocean roll: Upgrade the control plane patch version and the nodes in the data plane managed by Ocean. After the upgrade, you must roll the cluster to align the cluster infrastructure with the updated version.

Spot recommends you schedule once daily and let Ocean manage your upgrades.

Check if you need to Upgrade

To check if your Control Plane version needs upgrading, access the cluster overview tab:

1. Click Ocean > Cloud Clusters in the left main menu.
2. Select a cluster from the list of clusters.
3. View the installed version number of the control plane at the bottom of the tab.

The version can have one of the following statuses:

• Green: The control plane is upgraded to the latest patch version.
• Yellow: The control plane patch version can be upgraded to the latest available version.
• Red: The control plane patch version needs an immediate upgrade. Otherwise, you will not be able to launch a new node. Spot does not provide support updates for Kubernetes minor version upgrades.
• Gray: The Ocean controller is not valid or is not reporting, so there is no indication of the control plane patch version. See Troubleshoot the Ocean Controller.

View the Auto-Upgrades History and Schedules

• Click Auto Upgrade at the bottom of the cluster overview screen (next to the control plane version), or click the Auto Upgrade tab.

  note

  If you have not run or scheduled an auto-upgrade in this cluster, the Auto-Upgrades tab appears with a Scheduled Update button in the center of the screen. Otherwise, lists are displayed as shown below.

The auto-upgrades history list for completed runs is displayed at the top of the screen with these attributes:

• Execution Time: Format MM/DD/YYYY, hh: mm: ss.
• Old Version number (before the run).
• New Version number (after the run).
• Roll ID: Listed if the cluster was rolled after auto-update. Click the Roll ID link on the list entry to view roll attributes.
• Run Statuses:
  • Completed (green): The control plane patch version was successfully updated.
  • Partly completed (orange): The control plane was successfully updated but could not create a roll, start a replacement for the roll, or only partly complete the roll.
  • Failed (red): The control plane patch version could not be updated. Review the logs tab for more details.
  • Stopped (black): The roll was stopped.

tip

Search for auto-update runs by Status using the Updates History filter.

The configured schedules are displayed at the bottom of the screen with these attributes:

• Schedule: for example, at 11:00 PM only on Sunday.
• Roll: Whether to roll the cluster (true or false).

Create or Edit an Auto-Upgrade Schedule

To schedule an auto-upgrade:

1. Ensure that the Azure Kubernetes upgrades feature is not enabled for your cluster. You cannot enable Ocean and Azure Kubernetes auto-upgrades simultaneously.

2. In the Auto Upgrade tab, click Scheduled Auto-Upgrade (or to edit an existing auto-update schedule, click Edit in the schedule entry).

   note

   If the following message appears at the top of the dialog box, click to turn off the Azure Kubernetes upgrades feature.

   

3. Select whether to auto-upgrade the Control Plane or to auto-upgrade the Control Plane and Roll.

   
   note

   • Ocean will roll all virtual node groups applicable to the available control-plane patch upgrade version if you select to roll.
   • You can only roll if an upgrade version for the virtual node groups is available. If an upgrade version is unavailable, a record will only appear in the logs, not the auto-upgrades history.
   • If an option appears grayed, you have already run it and cannot select it again.

4. If you selected to roll, set the roll parameters.

   
   • Select the Batch size percentage (1 - 100%).
   • Select the Batch size healthy percentage (20-100%).
   • Optionally, turn on the Pod Disruption Budget (PDB) option.
   • Optionally, turn on the Restrict Scale-Down option.

5. Select whether to schedule the auto upgrade once a day or at a specific time.

   note

   Once you schedule the auto-upgrade once a day, you cannot add a schedule for a specific time, and the Scheduled Auto-Upgrade button is grayed.

   

6. If you selected to schedule at a specific time, set the time using the day/week/month/time controls or type a Cron expression.

   

7. Click Schedule.

   • The created schedule is turned on by default. To turn off the schedule, move the slider at the right of the entry for the schedule to the turned-off position.
   • After the update is run, an entry will appear in the auto-upgrades history list.

Auto-Upgrade Now

Use this option if you want to auto-upgrade immediately (rather than schedule an upgrade).

1. First check if you need to upgrade.

2. See Create or Edit an Auto-Upgrade Schedule steps 1 to 4 (in Step 2, click Configure and Update Now).

   
   note

   The first time you upgrade immediately, the screen appears as shown above. The next time, a Configure & Update Now link appears on the top-right of the screen.

3. Click Update Now.

   important

   This operation cannot be undone. If no upgrade version is available, this operation will time out.

After the update is complete, a new entry is added to the auto-upgrades history list.

Delete an Auto-Upgrade Schedule

To delete an auto-upgrade schedule:

1. Click the garbage bin icon to the right of the entry for the schedule.
2. In the confirmation window, type Delete in the field provided and then click Delete.
3. Click Schedule. The schedule will appear at the bottom of the screen in the auto-upgrades schedules list.