Given that the bug Kirk reported seems to exist since AK 3.0 release, I
don't think it's a blocker.
My understanding is (Kirk, please correct me if I am wrong) that it does
not effects metrics, but only the actual API call, which might keep
returning `Optional.empty()` (ie, "unknown lag") not providing any lag
information, if the bug is encountered.
Given that this bug exists for such a long time and was never reported,
it doesn't seem to be critical or a blocker for the release.
-Matthias
On 2/11/26 4:58 AM, Christo Lolov wrote:
Hello,
Thanks Paolo for running Strimzi's tests!
As promised the system test results for RC4 can be found at
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1mFO6S1EvwMeTrM8w-ePTiRj6ko97Sv3A
The two consistently failing tests in my environment are:
*
'tests/kafkatest/tests/core/network_degrade_test.py::NetworkDegradeTest.test_rate@
{"task_name":"rate-1000-latency-50","device_name":"eth0","latency_ms":50,"rate_limit_kbit":1000000,"metadata_quorum":"COMBINED_KRAFT"}'
*
tests/kafkatest/tests/tools/replica_verification_test.py::ReplicaVerificationToolTest.test_replica_lags@
{"metadata_quorum":"ISOLATED_KRAFT"}
Best,
Christo
On Wed, 11 Feb 2026 at 10:53, Paolo Patierno <[email protected]>
wrote:
Hi,
I downloaded the binaries and check the signature.
I also ran all tests within the Strimzi project (Apache Kafka on
Kubernetes) by using such binaries to build the container images.
From regression to upgrade testing everything looks fine.
+1 (non binding)
Thanks,
Paolo.
On Tue, 10 Feb 2026 at 16:28, Christo Lolov <[email protected]>
wrote:
Hello Kafka users, developers and client-developers,
This is the RC4 candidate for release of Apache Kafka 4.2.0.
This release has many exciting changes:
* Kafka Queues (Share Groups) is now production-ready with new
features like the RENEW acknowledgement type for extended processing
times, adaptive batching for coordinators, and comprehensive lag
metrics.
* Kafka Streams brings the server-side rebalance protocol to GA with a
limited feature set, adds dead letter queue support in exception
handlers, introduces anchored wall-clock punctuation for deterministic
scheduling, and gives users full control over whether to send a leave
group request on closing.
* This release also delivers significant improvements to consistency
and observability: CLI tools now feature standardized arguments like
--bootstrap-server across all tools, metric naming has been corrected
to follow the kafka.COMPONENT convention, and new idle ratio metrics
provide better visibility into controller and MetadataLoader
performance.
* Security is enhanced with a new allowlist connector client
configuration override policy, while thread-safety improvements to
RecordHeader eliminate concurrency risks.
* Additional highlights include external schema support in
JsonConverter for reduced message sizes, dynamic configuration for
remote log manager thread pools, and rack ID exposure in the Admin API
for consumer and share group members.
Release notes for the 4.2.0 release:
https://dist.apache.org/repos/dist/dev/kafka/4.2.0-rc4/RELEASE_NOTES.html
*** Please download, test and vote by Friday, February 13, 5pm UTC
Kafka's KEYS file containing PGP keys we use to sign the release:
https://kafka.apache.org/KEYS
* Release artifacts to be voted upon (source and binary):
https://dist.apache.org/repos/dist/dev/kafka/4.2.0-rc4/
* Docker release artifacts to be voted upon:
apache/kafka:4.2.0-rc4
apache/kafka-native:4.2.0-rc4
* Maven artifacts to be voted upon:
https://repository.apache.org/content/groups/staging/org/apache/kafka/
* Javadoc:
https://dist.apache.org/repos/dist/dev/kafka/4.2.0-rc4/javadoc/index.html
* Tag to be voted upon (off 4.2 branch) is the 4.2.0 tag:
https://github.com/apache/kafka/releases/tag/4.2.0-rc4
* Documentation:
* Protocol:
https://github.com/apache/kafka-site/pull/785
* Successful CI builds for the 4.2 branch:
Unit/integration tests:
https://github.com/apache/kafka/actions/runs/21860071096
System tests: I have started the tests in my environment and will share
test results in the next ~24 hours.
* Successful Docker Image Github Actions Pipeline for 4.2 branch:
Docker Build Test Pipeline (JVM):
https://github.com/apache/kafka/actions/runs/21861574007
Docker Build Test Pipeline (Native):
https://github.com/apache/kafka/actions/runs/21861786570
Thanks,
Christo
--
Paolo Patierno
*Senior Principal Software Engineer @ IBM**CNCF Ambassador*
Twitter : @ppatierno <http://twitter.com/ppatierno>
Linkedin : paolopatierno <http://it.linkedin.com/in/paolopatierno>
GitHub : ppatierno <https://github.com/ppatierno>
