Announcing Confluence 7.13 as the next LTS release

[#1]

Hello Confluence community!

We know that many of our enterprise customers are already using the most recent LTS (Long Term Support) release, Confluence 7.4 and are awaiting the next LTS release for all of the great features and functionality that have shipped since. We are excited to announce that Confluence 7.13 will be the next LTS release of the 7.x series when it becomes available (around April - June 2021). We hope that this announcement helps you plan for your next upgrade.

If you plan to upgrade only once this year, we recommend moving to Confluence 7.13 when it becomes available. Confluence 7.13 will be the first LTS release to feature the new bundled apps in Confluence Data Center (Analytics for Confluence and Team Calendars) and will enable your team to take advantage of all the additional features we’ve released since 7.4, as well as hundreds of bug fixes and security improvements that have shipped as well.

As a quick reminder for those customers currently on Confluence 6.13, the end of life (EOL) date for Confluence 6.13 was originally planned for December 4, 2020. However, we decided to extend the support window until Confluence 7.13 is available to accommodate more time to plan your upgrade.

If you work with a Technical Account Manager or Premier Support, consult your contact for a recommendation based on your environment and upgrade cadence.

What can you expect from Enterprise releases?

LTS releases receive backported bug fixes and security updates throughout their two-year support window. If you manage a large, complex Confluence deployment that requires significant effort to upgrade, the ongoing support provided by an Enterprise release ensures you have access to regular bug fix releases, without the risk and overhead of a major version upgrade.

Cheers,
Brian

[Robert Horan]

Thank you - one question.  If the release date for 7.13 is pushed out can we safely assume the EOL date for 6.13 will be as well? 

How much of a window will users have from the time 7.13 is released until 6.13 is truly EOL?  Users will need time to assess their instances, plan the upgrade, schedule downtime, and perform UAT.

[Makisa Appleton]

Hi @Robert Horan thanks for your question. Yes, if 7.13 needs to be pushed out, we will similarly adjust the EOL date for 6.13.

We aim to support two LTS at any one time, three in special cases where the dates require it. While 6.13 will reach EOL when 7.13 is released, if you/customers need assistance to upgrade, our teams will of course provide support. The major change is that we will no longer backport fixes to 6.13, as we will for 7.4 and 7.13.

[Robert Horan]

Is there an updated ETA on 7.13?  

[Ollie Guan]

Hi all, Is there an updated ETA on 7.13?

[Makisa Appleton]

Hi @Robert Horan and @Ollie Guan thanks for your question. Confluence 7.12 is due to ship this week and 7.13 is still within our expected range of April to June (although, 7.13 won't be in April). We generally don't communicate our target dates as there are any number of things that may cause us to delay shipping to ensure that we are confident in a high-quality and stable version.

You may choose to test with 7.12 however, in preparation for the 7.13 LTS, as there will not be any additional feature inclusions. We are looking at resolving some high impact bugs in 7.12.1, which will then also be included in 7.13. Please let me know if you have any additional questions.

[Robert Horan]

Thanks, but please understand that testing with 7.12 is not a realistic scenario - this particular instance is at 6.13 and there are no plans to move to a non-LTS release.  Upgrading this instance at all is going to be a non-trivial effort, and adding in a second upgrade point will only further complicate the process.  Upgrading to the current LTS release seems inadvisable, given its EOL is not that far off.

[Jason Unsworth]

Hi @Makisa Appleton -- Now that Confluence 7.13 will no longer be shipping in April, are there plans to bump Confluence 6.13's advertised EOL date from April 30, 2021 to a later date on the https://confluence.atlassian.com/support/atlassian-support-end-of-life-policy-201851003.html page?

[Robert Horan]

@Jason Unsworth - this was answered above.  I asked the same question.

[Bozó Norbert]

Hi all, Do you know already the date when will be available the 7.13 LTS? We would finalise the Q2-Q3 roadmap. We should have to know the date to we can reserve the test capacity (hardware, human). Regards,

[Makisa Appleton]

Hi everyone

We know you’re all keen to know when the next LTS will be available and we're sorry that we can’t provide an exact date. Our primary concern is to ensure that we ship an LTS that provides stability and quality over the two year support period to our customers. I understand that many of you rely on our delivery window to prepare for this major upgrade but we don’t generally provide dates as there are many reasons that can cause delays.

In preparation for 7.13, we have been investigating a number of regressions/bugs that we would like to see resolved for the LTS. These issues have been complex in nature and difficult to reproduce; several examples are:

• CONFSERVER-60526 Confluence generates attachment xml with <ri:content-entity content-id="..."> that renders as an unknown attachment
• CONFSERVER-55928 Attachments become 'Unknown Attachment' in the page editor with Collaborative Editing turned on
• CONFSERVER-59227 Duplicate content shown when editing a page

We are continuing to work through a list of these high priority issues. Without yet knowing what fix may be needed for some of these, we are not yet able to provide an updated timeframe for the release. We will update the EOL date for 6.13 to be “after 7.13 is released”.

I’ll provide a further update once beta is available, which would provide you with around two weeks’ notice of the final release. Thank you.

[Robert Horan]

Hello - it's been 3 weeks or so since the last update and I was just wondering if there was any news?

[Faisal Shamim]

Hello , Is there any update if LTS 7.13 has been released? Thanks

[Ollie Guan]

Hi @Brian Keough @Makisa Appleton ,any update? Thanks!

[Marco Palumbo]

@Ollie Guan @Faisal Shamim 

I guess you already know this info but here
Confluence development releases 
and here 
Preparing for confluence 7.13 
you can get some useful informations.

I guess that since no RC has been published and not even Beta, probably the Beta will be out on June 14 and the RC on June 21. If everything will be smooth enough we will see the 7.13.0 out on Monday June 28

If any big issue comes up (hopefully not) there's the possibility that the release will be postponed in July

[Naman Mandli]

When will the latest LTS available?

[Makisa Appleton]

Hi folks @Robert Horan @Faisal Shamim @Ollie Guan @Marco Palumbo @Naman Mandli @Joe Pursel 

Thanks for your patience. We are continuing to work through issues that will affect the stability and quality of the 7.13 LTS. If you are following previously mentioned issues, we’ve made good progress with unknown attachments and duplicate content. On CONFSERVER-59227 Duplicate content shown when editing a page you may have noticed an update that we have identified a potential solution and are working through a fix at present. We’d like to thank all those that provided data/reports that allowed us to understand and narrow in on the problem. The fix and associated testing will take time, as we need to ensure we have resolved this thoroughly and aren’t affecting other editor processes. 

We are continuing to work through release-blocking issues and the necessary testing. We are unable to provide an updated timeframe for release and I will provide an update when beta is available. Thank you.

[Todd Alden]

Any update on tentative release date? I see that the referenced blocking bug is now closed.  Can we expect by the end of July?  End of August?

[Praneeth LV]

Any update on the availability?

[Marco Palumbo]

Hi  @Todd Alden @Praneeth LV 

If you see at issues labeled blocking-7.13 you will find that there are still a couple of issues (CONFSERVER-66450 and CONFSERVER-66547) not yet solved.

As my best wishes, if these are going to be solved today, since versions are usually (not mandatory) released on monday we would probably see the Beta on July 19, the RC on July 26 and finally the GA on the first week od august. 

BTW this are just my ideas about a possible release date, my counsel is to keep an eye on the previously mentioned blocking-7.13 issues and as soon as you will see it in "WAITING FOR RELEASE" status is reasonable to think that the 3rd monday from that moment, you will possibly see 7.13 on GA.

[Robert Horan]

Looking forward to this.  It would be great if there were official tentative dates - I'm sure there are a lot of upgrades on hold for this, given the very short time to EOL for the current LTS.

[Robert Horan]

I was just looking at https://confluence.atlassian.com/doc/preparing-for-confluence-7-13-1044114061.html

If they had just waited one more day, the last 7.13 milestone could have been released on 7/13.

I'll see myself out.

[Mark Johnson]

@Marco Palumbo - The two issues you mention above are still listed as "In Progress".  Is anyone truly working on these?   I am waiting for the 7.13 LTS to do my upgrade.

[Robert Horan]

Echoing what Mark wrote, and like many others, we have been holding off on an upgrade for a long time since 7.13 was announced, and at the time, sounded like it could be ready as early as April.  Please bear in mind that for many, this upgrade will not happen on its own - other tools will likely be upgraded at the same time, and the EOLs for the tools are not in sync.

[Praneeth LV]

We are in the same boat as well!! Waiting to upgrade for 2 months now!!

[MadelineBarr]

We are also looking to upgrade to an LTS version. We're on a non-LTS version now, v 6.15.10. We were going to upgrade to 7.4.9 but there is a note on the page that says they "recommend to you don't upgrade to 7.4.x just yet." 

With 7.13 being so close to being ready, it doesn't make sense now to go to 7.4.x.

Is there and ETA on 7.13? If we can't wait for it, is there a 'safe' LTS version to upgrade to?