Update Alation to 2022.4

Customer Managed Applies to customer-managed instances of Alation

2022.4 Update Version Dependencies

Alation supports a direct update to version 2022.4 from the following previous versions:

  • 2022.3.x

  • 2022.2.x

  • 2022.1.x

Version 2021.4.x and Older

Direct update to 2022.4 is not supported from version 2021.4 and older versions. First, update Alation to a version that supports the update to 2022.4 and then perform a second update to 2022.4. Use the update instructions specific to your release.

2022.4 Release-Specific Information

Note

The full list of new features is available in Release Notes 2022.4 (General Availability).

Elasticsearch Upgrade

The Elasticsearch component of the Alation application was updated to a newer minor version of version 7.17. This upgrade does not cause rebuilding of the search index. No action is required from Alation admins as the version upgrade happens automatically during the Alation update.

Event Bus Upgrade

The Event Bus component was upgraded to a new minor version of Kafka 3.3 to take advantage of improvements, bug fixes, and the removal of the Log4j 1 library that was previously reported to contain a security flaw. The newest version of Kafka uses an alternative Log4j library.

Note

ZooKeeper has been upgraded to a new minor version of version 3.6 as part of the Kafka upgrade.

Lineage V3 is Default

From this release, Lineage V3 becomes the default Lineage service in Alation:

  • New installations of Alation version 2022.4 have Lineage V3 enabled by default (alation_conf parameter lineage-service.enabled is set to True by default).

  • The upgrade to 2022.4 does not automatically enable Lineage V3 as this process involves migration of lineage data. Customers currently using Lineage V2 will remain on V2 after the upgrade to 2022.4.

Higher Version of Docker Compose Required for Alation Analytics

From this release, Alation Analytics requires Docker Compose version 1.27.0. If using Alation Analytics, you’ll need to upgrade Docker Compose before upgrading the Alation Analytics application. The steps are included into the upgrade instructions below.

Update of the Source Field for Dataflow Objects

On instances that use Lineage V3, additional action is required after the update to 2022.4 to add the Source field to dataflow objects. This action will enable correct filtering by the Source field on Lineage diagrams for dataflow objects created on versions prior to 2022.4. The corresponding step is included into the update instructions below.

Encryption Security Fix

Version 2022.4.2 includes a security fix that removes a risk identified in the current encryption mechanism. Information about this risk is available in November 3, 2022 - Encryption Key Reuse Security Advisory available on Alation Community (requires Community login). On customer-managed instances, additional action is required after the update as existing data needs to be re-encrypted. The step to perform re-encryption is included in the update instructions below.

Update Alation to 2022.4

Use the steps in this section to update Alation to 2022.4.x from 2022.3.x, 2022.2.x, and 2022.1.x.

Note

If you are updating from releases 2022.1.x or 2022.2.x and skipping releases 2022.2.x and 2022.3.x, review the information specific to the releases you skip in the corresponding release notes.

Step 1: Scan Postgres

We recommend using the scan_postgres action to validate that the internal Postgres database is in a healthy state before the update. For steps, see How to Scan Postgres for Corrupted Indexes.

Note

If in your instance the Postgres scan runs on a schedule, you can check the scan-postgres.log file in /opt/alation/site/logs inside the Alation shell to check the Postgres state.

Step 2: Update the Alation Application

Update instructions:

Step 3: Update Alation Analytics

This step applies if you are using the Alation Analytics application. To update:

  1. On the Alation Analytics host, check your Docker Compose version.

    docker-compose version

    If you are on version below 1.27.0, upgrade Docker Compose. If you already are on version 1.27.0 or newer, you can proceed to upgrading Alation Analytics.

  2. To upgrade Docker Compose:

    sudo curl -SL "https://github.com/docker/compose/releases/download/1.27.0/docker-compose-$(uname -s)-$(uname -m)" -o /usr/local/bin/docker-compose

sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/docker-compose

sudo ln -sf /usr/local/bin/docker-compose /usr/bin/docker-compose

  3. Use the steps in Update Alation Analytics V2 to update Alation Analytics.

    Note

    The Alation Analytics installer will quit automatically with the message below if Docker Compose version is older than 1.27.0 and requires an update.

    [ ✖ Failed  ] Checking docker-compose Version.
Failure Reason => You need to have
at least docker-compose version 1.27 or higher to continue

Step 4: Update Alation Connector Manager

This step applies if you are using Open Connector Framework (OCF) and OCF connectors.

Update Alation Connector Manager using the steps in Update Alation Connector Manager.

Step 5: De-duplicate Mixed Case Usernames

This step applies if you have updated Alation from version 2022.1.x or 2022.2.x skipping release 2022.3.

After updating the Alation application, validate that your instance does not have mixed case duplicate usernames. From 2022.3, usernames in Alation are treated as case insensitive. To check for duplicates, run a one-off script on the Alation server. For information on how to run the script, refer to De-duplicate Mixed Case Usernames.

Step 6: Run Script to Update Source Field for Dataflow Objects

This step applies if:

  • You began using Lineage V3 on a previous version before updating to 2022.4. If you are still using Lineage V2, you don’t need to perform this step.

In order to enable correct filtering of dataflow objects on Lineage diagrams using the Source filter, Alation provides a script that populates the Source field for dataflow objects created on previous versions. The script does not require a downtime or affect user activity in the catalog. You can run it any time after the update to 2022.4. For detailed information on how to run this script, refer to Update Source Field for Dataflow Objects.

Step 7: Perform Re-encryption

This step applies if you updated Alation from a previous version where the encryption security fix was not available. If you already performed re-encryption on a previous version, there is no need to do it again and you can skip this step.

After the update to 2022.4.2 or a later version of 2022.4, the existing data on your updated instance needs to be re-encrypted. Re-encryption will run as a background process and no separate downtime is required. Users can work in Alation while the re-encryption job is in progress. For re-encryption steps, refer to Re-Encrypt Existing Data.