This topic describes the release notes for Container Registry and provides links to the relevant references.
June 2022
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
New region | Container Registry is available in the China (Guangzhou) region. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances and Container Registry Personal Edition instances | Guangzhou | |
New region | Container Registry is available in the China (Ulanqab) region. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances and Container Registry Personal Edition instances | Ulanqab | |
Container image building in VPC mode | You can create GitLab services and other internal services, such as Maven repositories, in a virtual private cloud (VPC) without exposing the public endpoint. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
April 2022
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
New region | Container Registry is available in the China (Hohhot) region. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | Hohhot | None |
Enhanced security policies for cloud-native application delivery chains | Specific vulnerabilities in the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) can be blocked, and global vulnerability exemption whitelists are supported. The more convenient and flexible security judgment mechanism improves the DevSecOps delivery efficiency and quality of your containers. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
February 2022
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Improved image deletion performance | Non-blocking garbage collection (GC) is supported. During the deletion process, image pushes and pulls are not affected. Multiple architecture artifacts and accelerated images can be deleted. The deletion rate is increased by five times. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
January 2022
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Optimized password-free component | The password-free component aliyun-acr-acceleration-suite is changed from a default component of the cluster to an optional component. In addition, it takes a shorter time for credentials to take effect, which improves the experience of users in image pulls without the need to use passwords. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
December 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Access to an Enterprise Edition instance by using the endpoint of a Personal Edition instance | Enterprise Edition instances can be accessed by using the endpoints of Personal Edition instances. This makes it easier to migrate images from a Personal Edition instance to an Enterprise Edition instance. After images of a Personal Edition instance are migrated to an Enterprise Edition instance, you can use the endpoint of the Personal Edition instance to access the Enterprise Edition instance. This allows you to access and manage the Enterprise Edition instance without changing the endpoint configurations on the client. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | Use the domain name of a Personal Edition instance to access an Enterprise Edition instance |
Acceleration of cross-border replication | Cross-border replication can be accelerated to improve the global image replication capabilities of Enterprise Edition instances. The image replication success rate is improved to at least 99.9% based on scheduling policies and network link optimization. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | None |
November 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
New region | Container Registry is available in the Philippines (Manila) region. | Container Registry Personal Edition instances | Philippines (Manila) | |
New region | Container Registry is available in the Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur) region. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur) | |
Event notification | The event notification feature is supported after Container Registry is integrated with the event bus service EventBridge. You can subscribe to a variety of instance-level events such as image creation, image scan, image replication, image signing, and delivery chain. Then, Container Registry can use methods such as DingTalk, the HTTP Gateway, and the HTTPS Gateway to notify customers of these events. This feature improves the integration experience of customers in DevSecOps processes. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | |
Cloud-native artifact center | The cloud native artifact center is designed for enterprises and individual container developers and provides basic container images certified by Alibaba Cloud, such as Dragonwell, Alibaba Cloud Linux 2, and Alibaba Cloud Linux 3. It improves the efficiency and security of the business containerization process. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | None |
September 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Image import | The images and metadata of a Personal Edition instance can be imported to an Enterprise Edition instance by using the Container Registry console. This accelerates image migration from Personal Edition instances to Enterprise Edition instances. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | Import images from a Personal Edition instance to an Enterprise Edition instance |
Silent GC mode | The silent GC mode is supported. When Object Storage Service (OSS) buckets are being deleted, container images can still be pulled from or pushed to image repositories. This feature improves user experience in artifact management. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
August 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Expansion of P2P distribution scenarios | The ACR@Edge mode is available for edge and data center scenarios. Image cache and P2P distribution are supported to reduce the bandwidth of back-to-origin routing and accelerate image pulls. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
July 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Manual image replication and replication retry | Manual image replication and replication retries are supported. This improves user experience in global image replication. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
June 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Event notification | Events throughout the lifecycle of artifacts can be subscribed to, such as events about security scan, delivery chain, image signing, image replication, and image build. Events can be notified by using EventBridge-based notification methods, such as DingTalk and text messages. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | China (Shanghai), China (Shenzhen), and China (Hong Kong) | This feature is available for minor versions. No documentation is available. |
April 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
OCI artifact management | More types of Open Container Initiative (OCI) artifacts throughout the lifecycle can be managed. OCI artifacts include container images, Helm charts, and Cloud Native Application Bundles (CNAB). Different types of OCI artifacts can be stored and distributed and the versions of the OCI artifacts can be managed. This allows you to use different types of OCI artifacts in a more convenient way. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
March 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
P2P acceleration feature V2.0 | The P2P acceleration feature is updated to V2.0. The following features are supported:
| Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | Use the P2P acceleration feature in ACK Serverless and ACK clusters |
February 2021
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Update of the image build feature | The image build feature is updated from multiple dimensions, such as the diversity of source code repositories, image build speed, and user experience. The following features are supported:
| Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | Use a Container Registry Enterprise Edition instance to build an image |
December 2020
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Image version management and instance-level image deletion | The number of image versions increases as the container-based business develops and iterates. The increasing number leads to complex image maintenance and high cost. Retention policies can be configured to delete image versions for an instance. A specific number of recent images or images that match the specified regular expression can be retained. Other expired image versions are automatically deleted. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | China (Beijing), China (Hangzhou), and China (Shanghai) |
November 2020
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
On-demand image loading | The on-demand image loading feature is provided to accelerate image loading in elastic scaling scenarios that require short cold start time and in AI-based scenarios where large images slow down the distribution. A standard container image can be converted to an accelerated image. Then, the aliyun-acr-acceleration-suite component can be installed on worker nodes of an ACK cluster. Pods that are scheduled to the worker nodes load the resources of images on demand and decompress image packages online. This feature reduces the average amount of time required to start a container by 60% and quadruples the speed of application distribution. This ensures that images are run with high efficiency. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | China (Hangzhou), China (Shanghai), US (Virginia), and US (Silicon Valley) |
October 2020
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Custom domain names | Custom domain names are supported. A custom domain name that has a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate can be bound to an instance. Then, the instance can be accessed over HTTPS by using the custom domain name. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | Use a custom domain name to access a Container Registry Enterprise Edition instance |
Migration from a self-managed Harbor instance to a Container Registry Enterprise Edition instance | Images can be migrated from a self-managed Harbor instance to a Container Registry Enterprise Edition instance. This reduces the cost of creating and maintaining an image registry by yourself. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |
June 2020
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Update of global image replication links | The global image replication links are updated to support automatic image replication across major regions around the world. Container Registry provides a replication success rate higher than 99% and ensures efficient image distribution and iteration on a global scale. Replication rules can be configured for Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances to replicate images by namespace or repository. In addition, Internet access is not required to replicate images in Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances. This improves the convenience and security of image replication. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All | None |
April 2020
Feature | Description | Applicable scope | Region | References |
Image signing | Image signing is supported. This prevents man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks and unauthorized image updates or deployments. This way, image consistency and security from distribution to deployment are ensured. Automatic image signing by namespace is supported. Every time an image is pushed to Container Registry, Container Registry automatically signs the image based on the matched signature rule. This ensures that container images are trustworthy. | Container Registry Enterprise Edition instances | All |