Software End-of-Life policy vs end of support

[firewall-pupil]

How long will a software listed as end of life ( https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/services/support/end-of-life-announcements/end-of-life-summary ) be supported? I have read conflicting information on this.

I suppose support could be defined as:
1) Receive general tech support if a case is opened

2) Receive software updates forissues

I ask as 8.0 is showing an EOL at the first of next year and 8.1 still does not seem to be mainstream.

[BPry]

@firewall-pupil,

From my understanding EOL is when PAN stops sending any updates and you will not recieve any maintenance updates. 

1) You'll receieve support as long as you have a valid support contract. That being said, the first thing TAC is likely to recommend if you call in with an issue is that you upgrade to a newer release. Configuration cases would maintain the same. 

2) While I imagine that PAN could make an exception if a security bug was found and enough people where known to be running the EOL version, I wouldn't count on this. EOL means that Palo is done supporting that version. 

As for support; the base major version releases will all recieve a smaller life cycle then *.1 releases. I fully expect that PAN will have 8.1.* released in a perfectly capable release by the end of this year, and wouldn't worry about not being able to upgrade to 8.1 by Jan 29th 2019. 

[gwesson]

The terms are defined on the EOL policy page (though there are no links to it from the EOL page you supplied):

https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/services/support/end-of-life-announcements/end-of-life-policy

The key terms are defined at the bottom, but for what you're specifically referring to it means:

"Support includes technical support, bug fixes, maintenance releases, workarounds, and patches for critical bugs"

So essentially, when something is end-of-life (or end-of-support), it means you should not expect to even be able to open a case or get configuration help. By extension, it also means no bug fixes (including security fixes). In fact, you'll notice on the Security Advisories page there are no recent updates for any 7.0 release as that version is EOL. 

[vsys_remo]

Hi

As @BPry already wrote, I am also sure that there will be a release that is usable/recommended untill EOL of 8.0 is here. But I also unterstand @firewall-pupil's point and it's kind of true - looking at statistics it's getting close...

So here are some informations about releases since 6.0:

Version	Releasedate	Days since previous Version
6.0.15	17.10.2016	109
6.0.14	30.06.2016	129
6.0.13	22.02.2016	90
6.0.12	24.11.2015	90
6.0.11	26.08.2015	121
6.0.10	27.04.2015	50
6.0.9	08.03.2015	46
6.0.8	21.01.2015	44
6.0.7	08.12.2014	46
6.0.6	23.10.2014	30
6.0.5	23.09.2014	50
6.0.4	04.08.2014	54
6.0.3	11.06.2014	49
6.0.2	23.04.2014	45
6.0.1	09.03.2014	49
6.0.0	19.01.2014
		Average: 66.8
		Days untill x.x.7: 323

Version	Releasedate	Days since previous Version
6.1.21	28.06.2018	113
6.1.20	07.03.2018	96
6.1.19	01.12.2017	135
6.1.18	19.07.2017	83
6.1.17	27.04.2017	90
6.1.16	27.01.2017	91
6.1.15	28.10.2016	59
6.1.14	30.08.2016	42
6.1.13	19.07.2016	40
6.1.12	09.06.2016	57
6.1.11	13.04.2016	50
6.1.10	23.02.2016	42
6.1.9	12.01.2016	53
6.1.8	20.11.2015	60
6.1.7	21.09.2015	55
6.1.6	28.07.2015	28
6.1.5	30.06.2015	50
6.1.4	11.05.2015	54
6.1.3	18.03.2015	48
6.1.2	29.01.2015	43
6.1.1	17.12.2014	53
6.1.0	25.10.2014
		Average: ~63.9
		Days untill x.x.7: 331

Version	Releasedate	Days since previous Version
7.0.19	04.12.2017	87
7.0.18	08.09.2017	56
7.0.17	14.07.2017	38
7.0.16	06.06.2017	48
7.0.15	19.04.2017	53
7.0.14	25.02.2017	43
7.0.13	13.01.2017	36
7.0.12	08.12.2016	43
7.0.11	26.10.2016	47
7.0.10	09.09.2016	39
7.0.9	01.08.2016	42
7.0.8	20.06.2016	38
7.0.7	13.05.2016	52
7.0.6	22.03.2016	42
7.0.5	09.02.2016	50
7.0.4	21.12.2015	69
7.0.3	13.10.2015	48
7.0.2	26.08.2015	38
7.0.1	19.07.2015
		Average: ~48.3
		Days untill x.x.7: 299

Version	Releasedate	Days since previous Version
7.1.19	28.07.2018	50
7.1.18	08.06.2018	46
7.1.17	23.04.2018	46
7.1.16	08.03.2018	50
7.1.15	17.01.2018	57
7.1.14	21.11.2017	40
7.1.13	12.10.2017	43
7.1.12	30.08.2017	55
7.1.11	06.07.2017	45
7.1.10	22.05.2017	45
7.1.9	07.04.2017	49
7.1.8	17.02.2017	49
7.1.7	30.12.2016	43
7.1.6	17.11.2016	46
7.1.5	02.10.2016	52
7.1.4	11.08.2016	43
7.1.3	29.06.2016	48
7.1.2	12.05.2016	24
7.1.1	18.04.2016	20
7.1.0	29.03.2016
		Average: ~44.8
		Days untill x.x.7: 276

Version	Releasedate	Days since previous Version
8.0.12	09.08.2018	35
8.0.11-h1	05.07.2018	52
8.0.10	14.05.2018	41
8.0.9	03.04.2018	51
8.0.8	11.02.2018	45
8.0.7	28.12.2017	45
8.0.6	13.11.2017	54
8.0.5	20.09.2017	56
8.0.4	26.07.2017	38
8.0.3	18.06.2017	52
8.0.2	27.04.2017	48
8.0.1	10.03.2017	40
8.0.0	29.01.2017
		Average: ~46.4
		Days untill x.x.7: 333

Version	Releasedate	Days since previous Version
8.1.3	13.08.2018	61
8.1.2	13.06.2018	43
8.1.1	01.05.2018	61
8.1.0	01.03.2018

For 8.1 there obviously aren't a lot versions yet. So I can only speculate about the future. In the past normally version x.x.7 was installable almost without any risks. So lets assume this will also be the case with 8.1. The overall time between releases since 6.0 was ~54.6 days, but as a release gets older the time between versions increases which is logical as PaloAlto focuses on the newer major versions. So for a (maybe) better prediction I also summed up the days between a new major release till x.x.7. The average for this since 6.0 is 312.4 days.

This means that we get 8.1.7 on the 7th January 2019. Of course this date is only based on average times between releases from the past, but anyway it will be close to EOL of 8.0. Specially for big environments this could mean some work at the end of the year / beginning of 2019 (at least if you want to avoid having a release in production that is EOL).

We'll see 😉

[Gertjan-HFG]

@firewall-pupil

@BPry

 @vsys_remo

End of life date for 8.0 has changed. Its now 31 oktober 2019.

https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/services/support/end-of-life-announcements/end-of-life-summary