Summary
Cedar-14, our stack based on Ubuntu 14.04 Long Term Support, reached end-of-life on May 1st, 2019. As of November 2nd, 2020, the building of Cedar-14 apps is no longer supported.
Apps using the Cedar-14 stack will continue to run, but must be upgraded to a more recent stack to restore access to security updates, technical support, and the ability to deploy new code.
Why is the Cedar-14 End-of-Life occurring?
Support for Heroku stacks is synchronized with the release lifecycle of the Ubuntu Long Term Support release on which they are based. Cedar-14 is based upon Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, for which Canonical's standard five-year support (including availability of bug and security fixes) ended on April 30th, 2019.
As such in accordance with our stack update policy and documented stack support dates, the Cedar-14 stack reached end-of-life on May 1st, 2019.
What is the Cedar-14 end-of-life timetable?
- May 3, 2018: Heroku announced deprecation of Cedar-14 for April 2019.
- May 1, 2019: EOL window for Cedar-14 began. Apps on Cedar-14 will continue to run, build, and receive security updates. Apps and builds running on later stacks will not be affected.
- April 3, 2020: Postponed the Cedar-14 Build EOL to November 2nd, 2020.
- October 1, 2020: Announced Cedar-14 build disablement schedule and use of temporary build disablement "previews".
- October 19, 2020: The ability to create new apps using the Cedar-14 stack was disabled.
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October 19, 2020: First build disablement preview for Cedar-14 apps at the following time:
- UTC: 17:00 - 21:00
- EDT: 13:00 - 17:00
- PDT: 10:00 - 14:00
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October 26, 2020: Second build disablement preview for Cedar-14 apps at the following time:
- UTC: 14:00 - 18:00
- EDT: 10:00 - 14:00
- PDT: 7:00 - 11:00
- November 2, 2020: Announced that Cedar-14 builds are disabled as the end-of-life window has closed. Apps on Cedar-14 will continue to run, but will not build or receive security updates. Apps running on later stacks are not affected.
Which of my apps are affected?
To list all apps that are using the Cedar-14 stack, you can run the following Heroku CLI commands:
$ heroku plugins:install @heroku-cli/plugin-apps-table
$ heroku apps:table --filter="STACK=cedar-14"
You can also show apps by team:
$ heroku apps:table --filter="STACK=cedar-14" --team=my-team-name
Listing apps using the Heroku CLI will show all apps, including those that might otherwise be hidden in the Heroku dashboard (such as the ephemeral apps created by Heroku CI).
What resources are available to assist with upgrading your apps?
Step-by-step documentation is available to assist you with upgrading. Additionally, Heroku Enterprise customers can engage with the Customer Solutions Architecture (CSA) team.
Will Cedar-14 apps stop running? Will my app be shut down?
No. Existing Cedar-14 apps have not been shut down.
The apps will continue to run for the foreseeable future, and all non-build functionality will continue to work, such as:
- Adjusting app settings
- Adjusting app environment variables
- Scaling app processes
- Running one-off dynos
- Creating/managing addons
However we highly encourage you to upgrade to a supported stack to restore access to security updates, technical support, and the ability to perform builds (deploy new code).
Do apps on the Cedar-14 stack receive technical support?
The Cedar-14 stack is no longer a supported stack and will receive limited technical support.
Can apps on the Cedar-14 stack continue to build?
No. As of as of November 2nd 2020, the building (code deployments) of Cedar-14 apps is no longer supported since the Cedar-14 build system has been decommissioned. Upgrade apps still using Cedar-14 to a newer stack in order to continue building (it is not necessary to create a new app to do this).
What breaking changes are known when upgrading from Cedar-14?
- heroku-buildpack-xvfb-google-chrome is no longer supported. Use the headless equivalent, heroku-buildpack-google-chrome, instead.
- Newer stacks have updated sets of libraries in the stack image.
- End-of-life language versions may not be supported by buildpacks run on newer stacks. For example Ruby 1.9 is not available on stacks newer than Cedar-14 (see Ruby oldest available runtimes).
I upgraded my app to a supported stack but my app no longer works as expected, can I rollback to Cedar-14?
Yes, you can rollback an app that has been upgraded to a newer stack - see this Dev Center article. Rolling back to a previous release that's based on Cedar-14 is still possible even though Cedar-14 builds are no longer allowed, however downgrading must be performed via the rollback feature and not heroku stack:set.
My app does not have any dynos, since it's only used to hold addons. What effect will upgrading stack have on the addons?
The stack is only used by dynos run on an app, so upgrading the app's stack will not affect the addons themselves. However, we recommended that the stack be upgraded regardless, in order to suppress the dashboard warning banners. For apps where code has never been deployed, setting a new stack on the app will take immediate effect and not require a code deployment.