Upgrading Automation Suite on EKS/AKS

Automation Suite on AKS/EKS consists of multiple components. Both you as a customer and UiPath® share responsibility of these components. For details, see Compatibility matrix.

You are responsible for upgrading:

• Kubernetes infrastructure where Automation Suite is deployed (AKS or EKS)
• Components that you choese to bring as part of Automation Suite (e.g., Gatekeeper, FluentD, etc.)

UiPath® is responsible for upgrading:

• UiPath® services (e.g., Orchestrator)
• Components deployed as part of Automation Suite (e.g., ArgoCD)

Upgrading UiPath® services and components

Preparation

Note:

If you upgrade to Automation Suite 2024.10 and want to use Document Understanding modern projects, you must meet the additional hardware requirements we specify in Additional Document Understanding recommendations.

Note:

There is a known issue with the backup logic in Automation Suite for AKS/EKS. Specifically, this defect excludes the backup of Insights dashboards. However, all historical data is successfully backed up.

We are working diligently to resolve this issue. We aim to develop and implement a mitigation approach as early as possible.

If you are using Automation Suite on AKS/EKS along with UiPath Insights, this defect may affect your operations. While we address this issue, we suggest manually exporting your dashboards as a preventive measure.

Note that backups are mainly used as a recovery method in the event of a disaster-level incident or in preparation for an Automation Suite upgrade. This is essential if an upgrade fails and stored data needs to be restored to its previous state.

To prepare for the upgrade, take the following steps:

1. Check the compatibility matrix to determine the supported versions for each available upgrade scenario. If you brought your own components, make sure the versions of your components are compatabile with the version you plan to upgrade to. For details, see Compatibility matrix.
2. Download versions.json and uipathctl for the version you want to upgrade to, on your management machine. For download instructions, see .
3. Generate the latest input.json file as follows:
   • Option A: To get the latest revision of your input.json file, run the following command:

     uipathctl manifest get-revision

   • Option B: To list all the past input.json files and determine the one you want to choose, run the following command:

     uipathctl manifest list-revisions

Execution

To perform an upgrade of UiPath® services and component, take the following steps:

1. Confirm that your cluster is healthy:

   uipathctl health check

2. Put the cluster in maintenance mode to guarantee a consistent backup:

   uipathctl cluster maintenance enable

   Important:

   This operation causes downtime, and your business automation is suspended while maintenance mode is enabled.

3. Verify that the cluster is in maintenance mode:

   uipathctl cluster maintenance is-enabled

4. Back up the cluster and the SQL database, then check that the backup completed successfully.
   Important:

   It is strongly recommended to create a backup of the cluster and the SQL database before upgrading Automation Suite. This is to ensure you can restore the cluster if something goes wrong during the upgrade operation.

   Make sure to copy the value of global.userInputs.identity.krb5KeytabSecret to global.kerberosAuthConfig.userKeytab, if you simultaneously meet the following requirements:

   • you configured the Active Directory integration using username and password
   • you have Windows authentication enabled
   • you do not use SQL integrated authentication
5. Disable the maintenance mode:

   uipathctl cluster maintenance disable

   Note: You must disable maintenance mode before upgrade. The Automation Suite on AKS/EKS upgrade process does not support having maintenance mode enabled.
6. Perform the upgrade of UiPath® services and components:

   uipathctl cluster upgrade input.json --versions versions.json

   Important:

   This operation causes downtime, and your business automation is suspended during the upgrade process. It is important that you perform the upgrade only during your maintenance window.

7. Check that the cluster is healthy after the upgrade:

   uipathctl health check

Upgrading Kubernetes infrastructure

Note: Automation Suite supports upstream N-1 to N-3 versions of Kubernetes irrespective of the cloud provider. For instance, if upstream is 1.27, we support versions 1.26, 1.25, and 1.24. For supported versions, see the Compatibility matrix.

You are responsible for upgrading the Kubernetes infrastructure hosting Automation Suite. You should follow the standard practices of your company to upgrade Kubernetes infrastructure.