feat(cluster-api)!: update Cluster API to v1.14.4 - #4902

Actionable comments posted: 5

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Inline comments:
Review comments at
@packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/_helpers.tpl:
- Around line 30-32: Reverse the `default` argument order for both
`configSecret.name` and `configSecret.namespace` so provider-specific values
take precedence over global values. Apply the same precedence in the provider
templates’ inclusion guards.

Review comments at
@packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/core.yaml:
- Line 31: Update the provider-spec guards so `spec:` is rendered whenever
`fetchConfig` is the only configured spec field. In
packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/core.yaml,
line 31, include `$core.fetchConfig`; in
packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/addon.yaml,
line 31, include `$addon.fetchConfig`; in
packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/bootstrap.yaml,
line 31, include `$bootstrap.fetchConfig`; in
packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/control-plane.yaml,
line 31, include `$controlPlane.fetchConfig`; in
packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/infra.yaml,
line 31, include `$infra.fetchConfig` and the matching global fetch
configuration; and in
packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/ipam.yaml,
line 31, include `$ipam.fetchConfig` and the matching global fetch
configuration.

Review comments at
@packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/deployment.yaml:
- Around line 91-95: Move the profilerAddress and contentionProfiling argument
conditions outside the leaderElection with block in the deployment template, so
configured profiling options are rendered even when leaderElection is absent or
null.
- Line 140: Update the health-port parsing around $healthPort and the profiler
and diagnostics containerPort values to extract the port from host-and-port
addresses such as localhost:9440 before integer conversion; alternatively,
validate and reject host-and-port values if these chart settings are intended to
accept port-only addresses. Ensure both probes and all three container ports use
the intended port.

Review comments at
@packages/system/capi-operator/charts/cluster-api-operator/templates/infra.yaml:
- Around line 80-82: Update the `fetchConfig` rendering in `infra.yaml` and
`ipam.yaml` so each provider emits only one value, using explicit precedence
between the provider-specific `$infra.fetchConfig` or `$ipam.fetchConfig` and
its matching global entry. Apply the same precedence rule at both sites to
prevent duplicate `fetchConfig` keys.

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I looked at the Proxmox side (I own capi-providers-infraprovider-proxmox).

I knew these changes were coming and was ready for them. I was waiting for the Cluster API core bump to land here, or I would have proposed it myself. I've now started testing this branch on a live Proxmox management cluster (capmox v0.7.7, IPAM v1.0.3, Kubernetes 1.35, three Talos pools). The upgrade there is not simple, so it may take one or two rounds. I hope to post the results by tomorrow. Until then this is a comment rather than an approval.

What I checked without a cluster:

• The pinned sums match the v1.13.7 and CABPT v0.6.13 release assets. The vendored YAML differs from them only by patches/, and each blob decompresses to its YAML byte for byte.
• On the Proxmox path, kubernetes-nodes, kubernetes and run-proxmox.sh read only metadata, status.phase, status.nodeRef.name and spec.providerID. All of these keep their meaning in v1beta2.
• The in-cluster IPAM CRDs have no contract label. That is fine: core never looks up the pool CRD, and the IPAddress webhook compares poolRef by group, kind and name.

Two notes inline. The first is a capmox behaviour change I'd add to Known risk, and the second is about the reason in the pin comment. Neither blocks the merge.

I ran this branch (0a1bc0d) on a live Proxmox management cluster.

Starting point: Cozystack on Kubernetes 1.35.2 / Talos 1.12.6, with Cluster API v1.10.1, cluster-api-operator v0.19.0, CABPT v0.6.12, Kamaji v0.19.0-cozystack.0, capmox v0.7.7 and in-cluster IPAM v1.0.3. Two tenant clusters on Kamaji, with Talos pools on Proxmox: one pool with one machine and the autoscaler at 1..2, and two fixed pools with one machine each. I upgraded capi-operator, capi-providers-core and capi-providers-bootstrap with helm upgrade, one at a time. The second tenant cluster stayed paused until the first one passed.

• No Machine, MachineDeployment or ProxmoxMachine was recreated, and no VM was cloned again. UIDs, generations and VMIDs match the snapshot taken before the upgrade. The only objects that went away are old MachineSets with zero replicas, one per pool that had an earlier rollout. v1.13 deletes those as "cleanup of old MachineSets".
• All providers are Ready on the new versions. CRD storage moved to v1beta2, and the CRD migrator dropped v1beta1 from storedVersions within 15 minutes for every kind it migrates (see below). Kamaji, capmox and IPAM stay on v1beta1 and Ready. None of the seven controllers logged an error in the 15 minutes after the upgrade.
• In the v1beta2 view a capmox machine shows initialization.infrastructureProvisioned: true and is Ready and Available, so core reads status.ready from the v1beta1-contract provider.
• The tenant control plane pods were not restarted, and the KamajiControlPlanes kept reconciling.
• Scale 1→2: in 82 s a new VM was cloned, it got an IP from the InClusterIPPool and bootstrap data from CABPT v0.6.13, and the node joined with a proxmox:// providerID. Scale 2→1 with delete-machine: the VM was destroyed and the IPAddress released.
• MHC on a pool with two machines and the default maxUnhealthy: 50%: I cut the network of one VM. The node went Unknown after about a minute, MHC marked the machine after its 5 minute timeout, drain was skipped because the node was unreachable, and the replacement was Ready 80 s later. So remediation under the default threshold on a pool with more than one machine works here.
• Autoscaler with the pin: it logs Using version "v1beta1" for API group "cluster.x-k8s.io" and the deprecation warnings, with no errors. I did not drive a scale-up through it.
• After 90 minutes capi-controller-manager uses 47Mi of its 256Mi limit. No controller pod restarted after its rollout, and none was OOMKilled. In those 90 minutes the only errors came during the scale and remediation tests, and each cleared on the next retry. They were a VM not yet initialized right after the clone, a destroy tried while the VM was still running, and an IPAddressClaim that was already gone. Two more came from the core controller starting before its cluster cache had connected.

One thing for the v1beta1 removal later: two CRDs keep their old version in storedVersions. They are clusterclasses with ["v1beta1","v1beta2"] and extensionconfigs with ["v1alpha1","v1beta2"]. The CRD migrator in v1.13.7 adds ClusterClass only when ClusterTopology is on and ExtensionConfig only when RuntimeSDK is on (main.go#L458-L463). Both gates are off by default here, and there are no objects of either kind, so this changes nothing today. Before Cluster API stops serving v1beta1 in v1.16, those entries have to go, or the CRD update will be rejected. I expect a default install on KubeVirt to look the same.

A Proxmox note that is not about this PR: stopping the VM does not exercise MHC with capmox. capmox v0.7.7 starts a stopped VM and resumes a paused one on its next reconcile (power.go), so the node is back in about 30 s and MHC never fires. I used link_down on the VM's NIC instead.

Not tested here: a new pool created after the upgrade, scale from zero, and the failureReason path (missing template, no free VMID).

Approving, but needs rebase before merge.

I checked the pinned sha256 sums in both Makefiles against upstream release assets for core, kubeadm bootstrap and CABPT, all match, and vendored files are the downloads plus patches/.

I added --sync-period=1m workaround to main in #4939 (patch, syncPeriod value and hack/capi-operator_test.bats) and I ask you to drop it with this operator bump, after the rebase here or as a follow-up. Nothing breaks if it stays (checked in a local merge), but I haven't measured operator restarts on v0.29, so I'd test that before dropping it.

Do we want guard for management cluster older than 1.32? Now only release note and cozystack/website#751 cover it, capi charts have no kubeVersion.

Minor, v1.13.8 is out (2026-11-03) so pin is one patch behind, can wait for v1.14 PR.