Octopus 2.6 - Cannot update variable snapshot if process has been updated (this is not a problem in Octopus 1.6)

Hi, we’ve recently found a problem in Octopus 2.6 which prevents us to update variable snapshot if process has been updated. This is not an issue in Octopus 1.6. Here is the scenario:

We have set up an Octopus project initially with 20 steps in Process (each step is 1 deployable item, so 20 items to be deployed altogether).
A Release v1.0.0 on 2nd-Feb has been created to deploy the latest version of the 20 items from DEV to PROD back then. (We have 4 environments - DEV, SIT, UAT, PROD).
Since the project is running on Agile, so development continues while deployments and testing are happening for Release v1.0.0.
Some time in mid-Feb, Release v1.0.0 has been deployed to UAT, and at around the same period of time, 7 more steps have been added to the Process by development (so that’s 27 deployable items altogether).
Now after passing UAT testing, we want to deploy Release v1.0.0 to PROD and we have updated some PROD variables for that. When we try to update variable snapshot before the deployment, it returns this error:

The project’s deployment process has changed since this release was created. A new release must be created in order to ensure accurate variable snapshots.

Because of this error, we cannot deploy Release v1.0.0 to PROD. And creating a new release will incur extra testing in both SIT and UAT, so that will impact our project schedule.

This problem did not occur in Octopus 1.6. Can you please investigate asap because this is a show-stopper for our project?

Thanks,
Canny

Hi, can anyone please look into this problem as soon as possible? Our projects are currently blocked, so we need a solution urgently.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Canny

Hi Canny,

Thanks for getting in touch, and I’m sorry for the late reply.

You’re right. In 2.0, we added some extra rules around variable updates - if the deployment process changes, we felt that it might not always be safe to allow the variables to be updated. We didn’t do this in Octopus 1.6.

We’ve reviewed this decision today, and realised that while there might be issues (specifically, if you delete a step, we might also delete variables scoped to that step, and when you update you’ll then lose those variables even though the step still existed in your old deployment process used by the release), on balance it’s better for us to show this as a warning, rather than block it.

We’re going to make the change today, and it will be included in the 2.5.4 release. We expect to release that early next week.

Sorry once again for the delay, and hope this helps.

Paul

Hi Paul,

Thanks for the update and help.

I’ve recently discovered that for projects that we migrated from Octopus 1.6, updating variable snapshot for an existing release also gets blocked, even though nothing has been changed in the Process.

This may be a bug, but the update in release 2.6.4 next week will help to work around it.

Thanks,
Canny

Hi Paul,

Do you have any updates of v2.6.4? Our projects have been stuck for more than a week, and the situation is worst now as all our Octopus 1.6 migrated projects are blocked due to the bug that I’ve mentioned in my last reply. So we really need a fix urgently.

Can you please help?

Thanks,
Canny

Hi Canny,

Sorry for the delay, we were waiting to put a few extra fixes into 2.6.4. We will release it today or Wednesday at the latest.

Paul

Hi Canny,

2.6.4 is now released! Sorry once again for the delay in getting it out.

Paul

Hi Paul,

Thanks heaps for the update.

Canny