<!-- Title suggestion: [Feature flag] Enable description of feature --> ## Summary This issue is to rollout [performance improvements](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/issues/351703) on production, that is currently behind the `group_releases_finder_inoperator` feature flag. <!-- Short description of what the feature is about and link to relevant other issues. --> ## Owners - Team: Release - Most appropriate slack channel to reach out to: `#g_release` - Best individual to reach out to: Allen Cook - PM: Chris Balane ## Stakeholders <!-- Are there any other stages or teams involved that need to be kept in the loop? - Name of a PM - The Support Team - The Delivery Team --> Allen Cook ## Expectations ### What are we expecting to happen? The group releases endpoint affected will perform better and more predictably ### What might happen if this goes wrong? Possible DB performance issues? ### What can we monitor to detect problems with this? Any infra performance metrics should show it for database as it's simply changing the DB query. ### What can we check for monitoring production after rollouts? _Consider adding links to check for Sentry errors, Production logs for 5xx, 302s, etc._ ## Rollout Steps ### Rollout on non-production environments - Ensure that the feature MRs have been deployed to non-production environments. - [x] `/chatops run auto_deploy status <merge-commit-of-your-feature>` - [x] Enable the feature globally on non-production environments. - [x] `/chatops run feature set group_releases_finder_inoperator true --dev` - [x] `/chatops run feature set group_releases_finder_inoperator true --staging` - [x] Verify that the feature works as expected. Posting the QA result in this issue is preferable. ### Specific rollout on production - Ensure that the feature MRs have been deployed to both production and canary. - [x] `/chatops run auto_deploy status <merge-commit-of-your-feature>` - [x] Verify that the feature works on the specific entries. Posting the QA result in this issue is preferable. ### Preparation before global rollout - [x] Ensure that you or a representative in development can be available for at least 2 hours after feature flag updates in production. If a different developer will be covering, or an exception is needed, please inform the oncall SRE by using the `@sre-oncall` Slack alias. ### Global rollout on production For visibility, all `/chatops` commands that target production should be executed in the `#production` slack channel and cross-posted (with the command results) to the responsible team's slack channel (`#g_TEAM_NAME`). - [ ] [Incrementally roll out](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/feature_flags/controls.html#process) the feature. - If the feature flag in code does **NOT** have [an actor](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/feature_flags/#feature-actors), perform time-based rollout (**random** rollout). - [x] `/chatops run feature set group_releases_finder_inoperator 20` - Enable the feature globally on production environment. - [ ] `/chatops run feature set group_releases_finder_inoperator true` - [ ] Announce on [the feature issue](ISSUE LINK) that the feature has been globally enabled. - [ ] Wait for [at least one day for the verification term](https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/product-development-flow/feature-flag-lifecycle/#including-a-feature-behind-feature-flag-in-the-final-release). ### (Optional) Release the feature with the feature flag If you're still unsure whether the feature is [deemed stable](https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/product-development-flow/feature-flag-lifecycle/#including-a-feature-behind-feature-flag-in-the-final-release) but want to release it in the current milestone, you can change the default state of the feature flag to be enabled. To do so, follow these steps: - [ ] Create a merge request with the following changes. Ask for review and merge it. - [ ] Set the `default_enabled` attribute in [the feature flag definition](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/feature_flags/#feature-flag-definition-and-validation) to `true`. - [ ] Create [a changelog entry](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/feature_flags/#changelog). - [ ] Ensure that the default-enabling MR has been deployed to both production and canary. If the merge request was deployed before [the code cutoff](https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/engineering/releases/#self-managed-releases-1), the feature can be officially announced in a release blog post. - [ ] `/chatops run auto_deploy status <merge-commit-of-default-enabling-mr>` - [ ] Close [the feature issue](ISSUE LINK) to indicate the feature will be released in the current milestone. - [ ] Set the next milestone to this rollout issue for scheduling [the flag removal](#release-the-feature). - [ ] (Optional) You can [create a separate issue](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/issues/new?issuable_template=Feature%20Flag%20Cleanup) for scheduling the steps below to [Release the feature](#release-the-feature). - [ ] Set the title to "[Feature flag] Cleanup `group_releases_finder_inoperator`". - [ ] Execute the `/copy_metadata <this-rollout-issue-link>` quick action to copy the labels from this rollout issue. - [ ] Link this rollout issue as a related issue. - [ ] Close this rollout issue. **WARNING:** This approach has the downside that it makes it difficult for us to [clean up](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/feature_flags/controls.html#cleaning-up) the flag. For example, on-premise users could disable the feature on their GitLab instance. But when you remove the flag at some point, they suddenly see the feature as enabled and they can't roll it back to the previous behavior. To avoid this potential breaking change, use this approach only for urgent matters. ### Release the feature After the feature has been [deemed stable](https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/product-development-flow/feature-flag-lifecycle/#including-a-feature-behind-feature-flag-in-the-final-release), the [clean up](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/feature_flags/controls.html#cleaning-up) should be done as soon as possible to permanently enable the feature and reduce complexity in the codebase. You can either [create a follow-up issue for Feature Flag Cleanup](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/issues/new?issuable_template=Feature%20Flag%20Cleanup) or use the checklist below in this same issue. <!-- The checklist here is to help stakeholders keep track of the feature flag status --> - [x] Create a merge request to remove `group_releases_finder_inoperator` feature flag. Ask for review and merge it. - [x] Remove all references to the feature flag from the codebase. - [x] Remove the YAML definitions for the feature from the repository. - [x] Create [a changelog entry](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/feature_flags/#changelog). - [x] Ensure that the cleanup MR has been deployed to both production and canary. If the merge request was deployed before [the code cutoff](https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/engineering/releases/#self-managed-releases-1), the feature can be officially announced in a release blog post. - [x] `/chatops run auto_deploy status <merge-commit-of-cleanup-mr>` - [x] Close [the feature issue](ISSUE LINK) to indicate the feature will be released in the current milestone. - [x] Clean up the feature flag from all environments by running these chatops command in `#production` channel: - [x] `/chatops run feature delete group_releases_finder_inoperator --dev` - [x] `/chatops run feature delete group_releases_finder_inoperator --staging` - [x] `/chatops run feature delete group_releases_finder_inoperator` - [x] Close this rollout issue. ## Rollback Steps - [ ] This feature can be disabled by running the following Chatops command: ``` /chatops run feature set <feature-flag-name> false ```