Month: 2026-07 - Delivered automated upgrade-testing scaffolding for the FAR Operator in openshift/release, establishing business value by validating OpenShift upgrade paths and operator behavior early in the release cycle. Implemented a weekly CI job that provisions an OCP 4.21 cluster (N-1), upgrades to the 4.22 nightly payload, and sets the stage for end-to-end FAR validation across upgrades. This accelerates release readiness, improves reliability, and provides measurable coverage for upgrade scenarios. Commit: d4f6fb25e4544cf83300390fff23e25d153d3aef; Jira RHWA-1222.

In June 2026, the release repo delivered substantial improvements to testing fidelity, CI reliability, and operator coverage, with a strong focus on air-gapped environments and scalable validation workflows. A new medik8s-disconnected-catalogsource step enables CatalogSource mirroring for air-gapped testing (while retaining connected-mode behavior via the existing medik8s catalogsource flow), including IDMS-based image mappings and preflight checks. Weekly E2E tests were added for multiple medik8s operators (FAR, SBR, MDR, NHC, NMO) to boost coverage and stability, complemented by optional on-demand E2E presubmits for all six medik8s operators to accelerate feedback. CI reliability was improved via a refactor that extracts shared shell functions into a reusable library and introduces a medik8s-setup chain to standardize the order of catalog source provisioning and operator subscriptions, reducing duplication and maintenance overhead. AWS testing support was expanded with a new medik8s-aws-credentials step for FAR destructive tests, and Gangway API tokens RBAC was added to enable triggering periodic tests from the CI dashboard. Two notable bug fixes improved CI stability and install reliability: SSL verification for internal GitLab endpoints was relaxed with --insecure on curl calls, and the CSV readiness timeout was extended from 5 to 15 minutes to accommodate Konflux FBC catalogs with IDMS-based mirrors. Overall, these changes reduce testing fragility, accelerate feedback loops, and deliver measurable business value through safer air-gapped testing and broader validation coverage.

May 2026 monthly summary for openshift/release focusing on medik8s operators CI/validation and deployment improvements. Key features delivered: - Onboarded medik8s/system-tests into OpenShift CI with presubmit lint and unit test jobs to streamline end-to-end testing for medik8s operators (SBR, FAR, SNR, NHC, MDR, NMO). - Introduced medik8s-konflux-catalogsource Prow step supporting dual catalog modes (konflux and direct) with dynamic catalog resolution and robust checks, ensuring IDMS/catalog image sync from the dragonfly/rhwa-fbc source and enhanced debug output. - Added medik8s-operator-subscribe Prow step to install multiple medik8s/RHWA operators via OLM Subscription from a shared CatalogSource, including precondition checks, Namespace/OperatorGroup/Subscription creation, and CSV readiness wait with detailed failures. Major bugs fixed: - Improved CI metadata handling and consistency (e.g., removal of trailing newlines in registry metadata). - Strengthened version/ref validation for OCP versions and GIT_REF handling to catch invalid inputs early. - Hardened wait_for_csv logic with fast-fail checks and clearer errors to reduce long-running tests. Overall impact and accomplishments: - Significantly increased CI reliability and end-to-end test coverage for medik8s operators, enabling faster feedback and safer releases. - Streamlined onboarding of new medik8s repositories and automated, multi-operator deployments via a single reusable Prow step. - Reduced manual steps and debugging effort in CI, improving release readiness and operator quality. Technologies/skills demonstrated: - Prow, OpenShift CI, and OLM-based operator installation - CatalogSource management, Konflux integration, and dynamic catalog resolution - Go tooling/CI: golangci-lint, Go unit tests, YAML-based CI steps - Debugging, observability, and metadata handling in CI workflows