Release Notes for Confluent Platform 7.9

7.9 is a major release of Confluent Platform that provides you with Apache Kafka® 3.9, the latest stable version of Kafka.

The technical details of this release are summarized below.

Kafka brokers

Confluent Platform 7.9 features Kafka 3.9.

Confluent Community / Kafka

In Confluent Platform 7.9, new features include:

KRaft mode enhancements

This version of Confluent Platform includes KRaft controller membership changes. This feature:

  • Makes quorum membership dynamic.
  • Enables controller nodes to be added and removed by using the kafka-metadata-quorum.sh tool or the associated AdminClient API.
  • Does not currently support converting static metadata quorums to dynamic ones.

In addition:

  • Effective with Confluent Platform 8.0, Confluent Platform, Community version will transition to follow the Kafka release cycle more closely. The Kafka community provides about one year of patch support for a Kafka version, from the minor version release date, and Confluent Community software will soon follow a similar support schedule. Confluent customers using Confluent Enterprise will continue to receive patch updates for three years following minor version release. For more details, see Confluent Platform and Apache Kafka compatibility.

For a full list of the KIPs, features, and bug fixes, see the Apache Kafka release notes, Introducing Apache Kafka 3.9 on the Confluent blog.

Clients

  • Confluent JavaScript Client

    • The JavaScript client is now generally available and fully supported by Confluent.
    • This client includes client-side field level encryption (CSFLE) and Schema Registry support.

  • Librdkafka and supported clients (Python/Go/.NET) version 2.8.0 release includes the following updates:

    All clients:

    • Socket options are now all set before connection (#4893).
    • Fixes to allow to migrate partitions to leaders with same leader epoch or NULL leader epoch (#4901).
    • Support versions of OpenSSL without the ENGINE component (#3535 and #4911).

    .NET client only

    • Add retry logic to RestService for Schema Registry (#2353)
    • Add config for validating payloads against JSON Schema (#2350)
    • Add ability to override disable flag and actions on a rule (#2377)

    Python client only

    • Ensure algorithm query param is passed for CSFLE (#1889)
    • DGS-19492 Handle records nested in arrays/maps when searching for tags (#1890)

    Go client only

    • Add retry logic to RestService for Schema Registry (#1337)
    • Add ability to override disable flag and actions on a rule (#1356)
    • Add AWS AssumeRole support to AWS KMS (#1359)

Confluent Platform for Apache Flink

OAuth-based authentication is now available for Confluent Platform for Apache Flink.

To get started with Confluent Platform for Apache Flink, see Get Started with Confluent Platform for Apache Flink.

Confluent Control Center

You can now use Control Center to reset offsets for generic consumer groups.

For more information, see Reset offsets for consumer groups.

Cluster Management

Confluent for Kubernetes

For Confluent for Kubernetes release notes, see Confluent for Kubernetes Release Notes.

Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform

For Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform release notes, see the Ansible Playbooks for Confluent Platform.

ksqlDB

ksqlDB Server OAuth support has been added, which includes the Client Credentials grant flow for various ksqlDB clients, including the migrations tool and REST clients.

Kafka Connect

  • RBAC can now be enabled without requiring an identity provider by using mTLS identity for RBAC authorization for Kafka Connect in Confluent Platform 7.9. For more information, see Use mTLS Authentication with RBAC Authorization in Confluent Platform.
  • The new support policy for self-managed connectors and connector versions in Confluent Platform is now generally available. The policy outlines the lifecycle phases for self-managed connectors and connector versions, including details on deprecated connectors, end of life (EOL) timeframes, minimum version of connectors required for support and migration recommendations by Confluent. To learn more, see Support policy for self-managed connectors.

Schema Registry

Client-side field level encryption (CSFLE) is now available in Early Access. CSFLE provides an additional layer of security on the Confluent Platform for protection of sensitive data, safeguarding data in motion throughout its lifecycle across producers and consumers.

Security

ksqlDB Server OAuth support has been added, which includes the Client Credentials grant flow for various ksqlDB clients, including the migrations tool and REST clients.

Deprecation warnings

  • Effective with Confluent Platform 8.0, monitoring interceptors will be removed. This means that the “% message consumed” and “end-to-end latency” graphs in Confluent Control Center will no longer be available. Client configurations should be updated to disable these interceptors.
  • Confluent Platform 8.0 will remove support for older client protocol API versions. Specifically, client protocol API versions older than those supported by Apache Kafka 2.1 (released Nov 2018) will be removed. This aligns with Kafka KIP 896, which was implemented in Apache Kafka 3.7, and marked these older versions as deprecated. Any Java clients older than 2.1.0 are generally affected, and any Kafka client version released before 2021 are likely affected. For complete details on the specific client protocol API versions being removed, see KIP 896.
  • The MQTT Proxy is deprecated in Confluent Platform version 7.9 and will be removed in a future version. As an alternative, you can use the MQTT Source and MQTT Sink connectors.
  • Confluent Platform 7.9 is the last version of Confluent Platform that supports ZooKeeper for metadata management. To migrate to KRaft for cluster metadata management, see Migrate from ZooKeeper to KRaft on Confluent Platform.

Supported versions and interoperability

For the supported versions and interoperability of Confluent Platform and its components, see Supported Versions and Interoperability for Confluent Platform.

How to download

Confluent Platform is available for download at https://confluent.io/download/. See the Install Confluent Platform On-Premises section for detailed information.

Important

The Confluent Platform package includes Confluent Server by default and requires a confluent.license key in your server.properties file. The Confluent Server broker checks for a license during start up. You must supply a license string in each broker’s properties file using the confluent.license property as shown in the following code:

confluent.license=LICENCE_STRING_HERE_NO_QUOTES

If you want to use the Kafka broker, download the confluent-community package. The Kafka broker is the default in all Debian or RHEL and CentOS packages.

For more information about migrating to Confluent Server, see Migrate Confluent Platform to Confluent Server.

To upgrade Confluent Platform to a newer version, check the Upgrade Confluent Platform documentation.

Questions?

  • If you have questions regarding this release, feel free to reach out via the community mailing list or community Slack. Confluent customers are encouraged to contact our support directly.
  • To provide feedback on the Confluent documentation, click the Give us feedback button located near the footer of each page.