Releases

Upgrade instructions#

For VM Squared deployments running the GA Release v2.3.4 or later, or either Partner Beta version 3 or 4, use the upgrade bundle to upgrade to the current release. 

To upgrade deployments on the Partner Beta version 1 or 2, begin by wiping all existing nodes before performing a clean install of the current release. Partner Beta version 1 or 2 may be identified simply by logging into the Web console where a bright banner will report that the license key expired on 27-MAY-2024.

VM Squared 2.4.2#

Released Nov 9, 2024

Common#

New Features:

• Added support for post-quantum key exchange for SSH endpoints. Supports the hybrid ML-KEM 768 + X25519 + SHA-256 key exchange algorithm as well as traditional SSH key exchange algorithms as a fallback.
• Added support for managing marketplaces in Glasshouse, the next-generation web UI.
• Added support for cryptographically signed kernel code. All code loaded into the kernel is now required to be signed. Per-version, ephemeral build keys are used for this purpose. Kernel-mode code is now immutable once a version of software is released.

Enhancements:

• Updated Glasshouse web UI to support setting cache mode “none”.
• Updated the kernel to support FIPS mode. Booting the system in FIPS mode (setting fips=1 on the boot line) applies to the kernel operating mode in addition to the previous behavior.

Bug Remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs):

• Resolved issue where storage services may not come online in the event the cluster is running in an unsupported, 2 monitor configuration.
• Resolved issue where cluster control facts may get out of sync in the event facts are changed very quickly.

External Library Security Remediations: (Fixed or verified inapplicability)

• CVE-2024-9143

VM Squared#

New Features:

• Added support for Broadcom NetXtreme-E 10Gb/25Gb NICs.
• Added support for NFSv2/NFSv3 in addition to existing NFSv4 support for external datastores.

Bug Remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs):

• Resolved issue where iSCSI event triggers may not be processed.

VM Squared 2.4.1#

Released Oct 10, 2024

Common#

Enhancements:

• Updated cURL to support displaying whether post-quantum curves are being used in its verbose output.

External Library Security Remediations: (Fixed or verified inapplicability)

• CVE-2024-6197
• CVE-2024-7264

VM Squared 2.4.0#

Released Oct 7, 2024

Common#

New Features:

• Added support for post-quantum cryptography for data-in-transit. TLS endpoints for web GUI (Glasshouse and Legacy (where applicable)), APIs (RESTful, Legacy (where applicable), and Metadata), and S3 object storage (where applicable) are supported. They support key-exchange using hybrid KEMs supported by many clients today (X25519+ML-KEM 768, NIST P-Curve+ML-KEM 768 (FIPS 186+203), and X25519+Kyber768), pure PQC KEMs that are FIPS 203 compliant (ML-KEM 1024 and ML-KEM 768), as well as traditional ECC (X25519 and NIST P-Curve) as a legacy fallback.
• Added support for monitoring global storage health via the next-generation web GUI, Glasshouse.
• Next-generation GUI, Glasshouse, is now marked as “Stable” in HyperCloud.
• Added support for running on devices with up to 8192 CPU threads.
• Added support for resizing existing VMs in the next-generation GUI, Glasshouse.

Bug Remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs):

• Fixed issue where pools created with Glasshouse or the Manifold RESTful API may erroneously have a minimum writable size set to “1”.
• Fixed an issue where non-persistent images in EC datastores end up in the replicated metadata pool rather than the backend EC data pool.
• Fixed an issue where cluster backend floating services may migrate even if a node doesn’t go down.
• Fixed an issue where disks used for object storage may not be completely wiped with decommissioning.
• Fixed an issue where the “sifi” command may erroneously time out before returning data.

Enhancements:

• Updated default NIC to be set to VirtIO.

External Library Security Remediations (Fixed or verified inapplicability):

VM Squared#

New Features:

• Added support for using external NFS storage as a datastore for VM images.
• Updated iSCSI implementation to use unified external networking management added with NFS support.

Bug Remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs):

• Fixed an issue where iSCSI LUNs may not properly be registered on storage nodes as object storage devices.
• Fixed an issue where VM Metadata services were not reachable from within VMs.
• Fixed an issue where ISO may be unbootable on UEFI systems without CDROM emulation support.
• Fixed an issue where the default password may not be set properly for the Storage Management UI, if entered during install.
• Fixed an issue where backend software defined storage may consume too much host RAM.

VM Squared 2.3.5#

Released June 10, 2024

Common#

New Features:

• Added support for HTTP to HTTPS redirection by default.

Bug Remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs):

• Resolved misspelling of certain backend nodes after the “si-*” node name transition in a prior release.
• Resolved an issue where cluster control facts (such as license or authorized SSH keys) may be overwritten when the dashboard is rebooted.
• Resolved issue where changing dashboard network details without NTP configured may result in losing connectivity to the dashboard.
• Resolved issue where the dashboard backend database may not be able to handle more connection requests on a very large, busy cluster.
• Resolved Manifold API CLI client timeout issues.
• Resolved an issue where unsupported reboot scripts were bundled in the distribution. While undocumented, users may find this inclusion confusing.

Enhancements:

• Updated full disk encryption service to support longer key lengths. RSA keys of 1024, 2048, 3072, and 4096 may be used.
• Updated compression library for xz, improving performance of some daemons such as the dashboard startup.
• Updated cluster reboot process to check for and resolve stray storage devices, in the event stray devices were added to the cluster be a previously resolved bug.
• Updated back-end hypervisor orchestration to more quickly boot virtual machines. Previously, the deploy and boot process may take up to two minutes. This has been reduced to 30 seconds or less.

VM Squared#

New Features:

• Added support for Mellanox mlx5-based NICs.
• Added support for Microchip Smart Storage (smartpqi)-based storage HBAs.
• Added support for checking license expiration via the CLI.
• Added support for using a portion of the boot drive as a storage device for the cluster in the installation phase. This allows for a small amount of storage for backend use, while all VM data could live on external storage.
• Added link to documentation from the Glasshouse Web UI.

Enhancements:

• Updated external iSCSI integration to have a more robust configuration and network mechanisms.
• Updated SMART database to latest release, improving support for more local storage devices.
• Updated the cluster upgrade process to have more pre-flight checks before beginning such that the process does not hang forever.

Bug Remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs):

• Resolved issues with migration of backend floating services. This may also have impacted upgrades from previous releases.
• Resolved an issue where stray storage devices may be erroneously added to the cluster, while not backed by a real physical storage device.
• Resolved an issue where duplicate compute nodes may be erroneously added to the cluster, despite the node already existing in the node database.
• Resolved an issue where the cluster may complain about a changed SSH key for nodes during the upgrade process.
• Resolved an issue where the license keys pasted via the web GUI may not be properly parsed.
• Resolved an issue where the restricted shell didn’t properly support job control.

VM Squared 2.3.4#

Released May 18, 2024

This represents the first GENERAL AVAILABILITY release. From Partner Beta 3 or 4, you may upgrade using the upgrade bundle. From Partner Beta 1 or 2 please wipe existing nodes and reinstall. The baked-in license key expires on 27-MAY-2024.

Common#

Bug Remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs)

• Resolved issue where the next-generation UI, Glasshouse, would report your session expired when an incorrect password is entered.
• Resolved an issue where some erroneous text may be printed to the console during a cluster-wide reboot.
• Resolved an issue where downloading a marketplace appliance may erroneously report the incorrect product name.
• Resolved an issue in the next-generation UI, Glasshouse, where some functions would be non-functional due to expiring back-end authentication tokens without any user feedback.

VM Squared#

New Features:

• Added support for up to 1024 nodes in a single unified cluster.
• Added (BETA) support for iSCSI as the back-end storage for the built-in Software Defined Storage.

Enhancements:

• Updated the VM Squared installer to restart if installation fails for any reason rather than simply rebooting the node.
• Updated the VM Squared installer to add a preamble screen prior to installation. This will help clarify what we are about to do to the system you are running the installer on prior to any execution.
• Updated the LDAP configuration utility’s text editor to ignore control characters from user input.
• Updated the LDAP configuration utility to validate YAML configuration after editing.
• Updated the cluster reboot process to now notify the user if there are insufficient nodes present for a live reboot. In addition, some service stopping messages have been updated to reduce confusion. Updated the Legacy BIOS installer to remove some legacy boot options that are no longer used.

Bug Remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs):

• Resolved issue where “Infrastructure Management Network” would fail to have the VLAN ID if a tagged network was used for the dashboard rather than the untagged network.
• Resolved an issue where the LDAP configuration utility may not completely wipe a configuration.
• Resolved a number of verbiage inconsistencies in the LDAP configuration utility.
• Resolved a number of issues with decom-node where back-end storage commands would fail.
• Resolved an issue where cluster-reboot may erroneously report that a cluster does not have the minimum number of nodes for a fully-redundant reboot.
• Resolved a number of issues where cluster-reboot would sometimes fail.
• Resolved an issue where the cluster upgrade process would erroneously always pick the first image.
• Resolved an issue where the restricted shell’s glob expansion and tab completion would result in exposing the underlying filesystem. As a result, glob expansion and tab completion are disabled on the restricted shell.
• Resolved an issue where multipathing may not properly find some paths and path recovery may fail without a reboot.

VM Squared 2.3.3 (Partner-available Beta 4)#

Released May 2, 2024

Common#

External library and security remediations: (Fixed or verified inapplicability)

• CVE-2024-2201 (“InSpectre Gadget”)

Bug Remediation: (Including internal SoftIron CVEs)

• Resolved a race condition where an image upload’s temporary files may be cleaned up before the image is actually imported to the datastore via the Glasshouse GUI.
• Resolved an issue where the built-in account passwords could erroneously be changed via the Glasshouse GUI.
• Resolved an issue in the Glasshouse GUI where some graphs were being improperly displayed.
• Resolved an issue where confusing data may be displayed in the Glasshouse GUI for some attributes of marketplaces and datastores.
• Resolved an issue where creation of a blank image may fail in the Glasshouse UI.

VM Squared#

New Features:

• Added support for managing external authentication from the CLI via a new manage-ldap tool.
• Added support for displaying license compliance status via the Glasshouse UI.

Bug Remediation: (Including internal SoftIron CVEs)

• Resolved an issue where cluster-upgrade may attempt an upgrade before a bundle is in the “READY” state.
• Resolved an issue where the CLI may inform the user that the cluster is improperly licensed even when properly licensed.
• Resolved an issue where a user may be able to erroneously see underlying files from the restricted shell via tab completion. This does have the side-effect of disabling tab completion via the CLI.

VM Squared 2.3.2 (Partner-available Beta 3)#

Released April 29, 2024

Common#

External library and security remediations: (Fixed or verified inapplicability)

• CVE-2024-2511

Bug Remediation: (Including internal SoftIron CVEs)

• Resolved an issue with uploading large files in the next-gen Glasshouse GUI.
• Resolved an issue where the reboot command may fail if no virtual machines are running on a node.
• Resolved issue where NTP may fail to properly configure on the Dashboard.
• Resolved multiple issues that may result in automatic reboot of VMs not occurring in the event of a host failure in the cluster.
• Resolved issue where the assigned disk BUS field may be populated with incorrect data when choosing a device prefix (such as vd for VirtIO, sd for SCSI, or hd for IDE).
• Resolved issue where some Dashboard commands may cut off part of the compute node hostnames.

VM Squared#

New Features:

• Adds upgrade command to the Dashboard, adding a supported method for direct upgrades to new releases without a reinstall.
• Adds support for placing the dashboard on a tagged VLAN. This is useful in the event the backend cluster network needs to be protected or segregated from the rest of the LAN.
• Added support for rebooting the entire cluster from the Dashboard’s shell via the cluster-reboot command.
• Added support for built-in multi-pathing (MPIO). Useful for hosts with multiple paths to SAS disks or Fibre Channel LUNs.
• Added support for querying a default admin password of cluster during install. If left blank, an auto-generated password will still be used.
• Added API endpoints for License compliance status. Fields include compliance status, the reason message, and the license expiration date. The beta license has been updated to expire on 27-MAY-2024.
• Added code signing certificates for signature verification of future upgrades.

Enhancements:

• Updated dashboard-console command to provide more feedback.
• Updated various Dashboard shell commands to provide more feedback if the Orchestrator service is not yet up, as opposed to simply printing errors to the screen.
• Updated installer to inform the user if there are no disks on which to install the software.

Bug Remediation: (Including internal SoftIron CVEs)

• Resolved issue where manage-admin-password accepts a NULL entry.
• Resolved issues with Catalyst (previously esx2hc or esx2si) tool copying multiple disks in parallel.

VM Squared 2.3.1 (Partner-available Beta 2)#

Released April 14, 2024

Common#

External Library Security Remediations: (Fixed or verified inapplicability)

• CVE-2023-30590

Bug Remediation: (Including internal SoftIron CVEs)

• Resolved data corruption issue with creating template and image from existing VM via “save as” function.
• Resolved version reporting issue with some internal tools.
• Resolved image upload issues with next-generation UI, “Glasshouse”. This includes both “image” and “file” uploads.
• Resolved issue where cluster is temporarily in an unsupported storage state when transitioning from one to three nodes for a fully redundant storage cluster. Now, a second cluster “monitor” daemon does not come online until there are at least three hosts available to avoid potential cluster split-brain, preventing the cluster from coming back up in the event of a failure during this migration.
• Resolved hang on boot, when time synchronization fails due to network unavailability.
• Resolved issue where auto-respawn of workloads, if a compute node fails, would not properly trigger.
• Resolved issue where the syslog data may contain binary data.
• Resolved issue where the storage SMART daemon may log excessive and erroneous temperature data.
• Resolved issue where arguments to hypervisor kernel module would not properly be passed.

Enhancements:

• Removed ability to rename nodes from the next-gen UI. This is not a supported action.
• Removed “automatic VLAN ID” support from next-gen UI. This is not a supported action.
• Updated “halt” and “reboot” commands to print impact of performing these actions on nodes running workloads.
• Updated kernel to no longer panic on first OOPS to aid troubleshooting. Instead, we don’t panic until 10,000 OOPS events.

VM Squared#

Bug Remediation: (Including internal SoftIron CVEs)

• Resolved lockup issue with HP ProLiant Gen7/8/9 servers equipped with iLO 4.
• Updated installer to more verbosely inform the user of disks being wiped.
• Resolved issue bringing up non-LACP networking on some Mellanox NICs.
• Resolved compatibility issue with SoftIron “Catalyst” migration tool (formerly esx2si).
• Updated legacy boot loader boot string to be less confusing to the end user.

VM Squared 2.3.0 (Partner-available Beta 1)#

Released April 1, 2024

Common#

New Features:

• Unified multiple SoftIron products to share a common base of libraries, including:
  • HyperCloud
  • VM Squared
  • Cloud Appliance Images
    • Load Balancer
    • Gateway
    • iSCSI
    • MinIO
• Added next-generation UI from SoftIron, Glasshouse. This is the default UI in VM Squared, but is also available for use in HyperCloud.

Enhancements:

• Enabled per-process accounting to allow for more granular resource utilization tracking.
• Updated user-interactive processes to have higher preemption priority over background tasks to improve user interface responsiveness.
• Improved handling of memory pressure on all node types.

Bug remediation: (including internal SoftIron CVEs)

• Resolved issue where backend storage placement groups may get stuck in a peering state forever.
• Resolved issue with hypercloud and vmsquared CLI wrappers when arguments have spaces.

VM Squared#

New Features:

• Initial release available external to SoftIron
  • License-enforcement enabled by default. Beta key is baked into product with an expiration of 02-MAY-2024. After the license expires, the dashboard will enter into a reboot loop and will get bounced every 30 minutes.
  • SSH access is restricted to the VM Squared CLI. expert mode is available for troubleshooting only! Usage outside of the context of SoftIron support will be logged and the cluster will be in an UNSUPPORTED state!