Application Real-Time Monitoring Service (ARMS) regularly releases new agent versions for Application Monitoring to improve capabilities and stability. We recommend that you follow the release schedule and keep your agent versions up to date.
Keeping your agent up to date provides the following benefits:
Support for new ARMS features. Advanced ARMS capabilities, such as Continuous Profiling and code hot spot analysis, require the latest agent version.
Support for new versions of open source components. Java-based open source components are updated frequently. ARMS continuously improves support for new versions of these components in new agent releases.
Bug fixes. ARMS releases new agent versions to fix known bugs in the agent.
Improved performance and stability. ARMS continuously optimizes the agent in new versions to minimize its impact on application performance and improve its operational stability.
Improved security. ARMS regularly releases new agent versions to address security risks in agent components based on the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) database.
To encourage timely upgrades, ARMS Application Monitoring introduced an agent support lifecycle policy on September 1, 2023.
Support lifecycle
Each officially released agent has a fixed support period of 6 months, starting from its release date.
ARMS displays an upgrade reminder in the console starting 2 months before an agent expires.
An expired agent does not affect your use of ARMS. However, if you request technical support, you must upgrade the agent version first. Expired agent versions are not covered by the SLA.
The agent support lifecycle policy takes effect on September 1, 2023. A 6-month grace period is provided. All agent versions released before September 1, 2023, will expire on March 1, 2024.
Non-LTS versions, such as expired, temporary, or custom versions, may cause unexpected risks due to compatibility issues. If you need to specify an agent version, we strongly recommend that you use an LTS version.
Upgrade methods
For applications in container environments or applications where the agent was installed automatically from the console, the agent upgrades automatically. No manual action is required.
For applications where you installed the ARMS agent manually, check the agent version at least once a month and upgrade it to the latest version. For more information, see Upgrade the ARMS agent.