Release Controller Documentation¶

Overview¶

The Release controller manages the lifecycle of Release custom resources in SolAr. Its primary responsibility is to validate that a Release's referenced ComponentVersion exists and to reflect the resolution status via status conditions.

Once the ComponentVersion is resolved, the controller also writes status.effectiveUniqueName — the deduplication key the Target controller will use for this Release. This equals spec.uniqueName when set, or the parent Component name derived from the ComponentVersion otherwise.

The Release controller does not trigger rendering — that is handled by the Target controller once a Release is bound to a Target via a ReleaseBinding.

Architecture¶

flowchart TD
    subgraph Kubernetes
        Ctrl[Release Controller]
        Rel[Release]
        CV[ComponentVersion]
    end

    Ctrl -->|reconciles| Rel
    Rel -->|resolves| CV
    CV -->|ComponentRef.Name| Ctrl
    Ctrl -->|writes status.effectiveUniqueName| Rel
    Ctrl -->|adds/removes componentversion-ref| CV

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Finalizers¶

The Release controller manages two finalizers:

Finalizer	On resource	Purpose
`solar.opendefense.cloud/release-finalizer`	Release	Allows the controller to observe deletion and run cleanup logic before the object is garbage-collected
`solar.opendefense.cloud/componentversion-ref`	ComponentVersion	Prevents deletion of the referenced ComponentVersion while any Release references it

On deletion, the controller:

Checks whether any other active Release still references the same ComponentVersion.
If none remain, removes solar.opendefense.cloud/componentversion-ref from the ComponentVersion.
Removes solar.opendefense.cloud/release-finalizer from the Release, allowing it to be garbage-collected.

Cross-namespace references (resolved via ReferenceGrant) are considered when counting active references.

Status Conditions¶

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> Unresolved: Release created
    Unresolved --> ComponentVersionResolved: ComponentVersion found
    Unresolved --> Unresolved: ComponentVersion missing (requeues on CV change)
    ComponentVersionResolved --> Unresolved: ReferenceGrant revoked
    ComponentVersionResolved --> [*]

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Condition	Status	Reason	Description
`ComponentVersionResolved`	`True`	`Resolved`	ComponentVersion exists
`ComponentVersionResolved`	`False`	`NotFound`	ComponentVersion does not exist
`ComponentVersionResolved`	`False`	`NotGranted`	Cross-namespace access not permitted by ReferenceGrant

Status Fields¶

Field	Description
`effectiveUniqueName`	The deduplication key used by the Target controller. Equals `spec.uniqueName` when set, otherwise the parent Component name from the referenced ComponentVersion. `spec.uniqueName` itself is not modified — this field exists purely for operator visibility.

Watch Triggers¶

The Release controller is triggered when:

A Release resource is created, updated, or deleted.
A ComponentVersion that is referenced by one or more Releases changes.
A ReferenceGrant that covers a cross-namespace ComponentVersion reference changes.

Relationship to Other Controllers¶

The Release controller is intentionally minimal. Rendering logic is delegated to the Target controller:

flowchart LR
    Release -->|validated by| ReleaseCtrl[Release Controller]
    Release -->|referenced by| ReleaseBinding
    ReleaseBinding -->|bound by| Target
    Target -->|creates RenderTasks via| TargetCtrl[Target Controller]

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