Does Hortonworks have EOL dates?

[#1]

Does Hortonworks have End Of Life/Support dates for its HDP releases? If so is there a listing?

[#2]

This is what you are looking for:

http://hortonworks.com/agreements/support-services-policy/

Here is the relevant section from the above link:

POLICY

Hortonworks offers thirty-six (36) months of support from the general availability of a new Major Release. When you purchase Hortonworks Support for the Software, the Support lifecycle will be divided into two distinct phases: Full Support and Technical Guidance.

Full Support – Twenty-four (24) months from general availability of a Major Release

The Full Support phase includes maintenance updates, bug fixes, and security vulnerability resolutions. Maintenance updates and bug fixes will be made to the latest Minor Release only, while security vulnerability resolutions will be made available in all supported Minor Releases. Minor Releases will be supported a minimum of twelve (12) months from the general availability of the Minor Release.

Technical Guidance – Twelve (12) months following the end of Full Support

This Technical Guidance phase supports customers running product releases that have gone beyond the Full Support phase of the lifecycle. Primary assistance is available through the technical support portal where customers can receive support and workarounds. Customer Support may direct customers to upgrade to a more current Major / Minor / Maintenance Release of the product in order to resolve issues. Qualified security vulnerability resolutions may be made available during this phase.

In the event that Full Support for a release would normally expire and no later release has been made generally available, support for the old release will be extended until such a time as a new release is made generally available.

In the event that support for a release would normally expire and no further releases are planned, a product may be end-of-lifed. The decision to end-of-life any product will be announced to customers twelve (12) months ahead of the date that support for all releases of any product will no longer be available.

[#3]

I'm a bit confused with the wording of this policy versus the implications of the HDP 2.4 release post.

The policy seems to imply that HDP 2.3 is a minor release (part of the HDP 2.x major release).

• HortonWorks HDP 2.0 was released in October 2013, so according to the policy its "full support" is already beyond its 24 month "full support" period. The policy does state that, as long as there is no new major release, support is prolonged. However, it doesn't state for how long - when HortonWorks releases HDP 3.0 is the 2.x suddenly not supported anymore?
• HortonWorks HDP 2.3 was released in July 2015. According to the policy, it is supported a minimum of one year, but as HDP 2.4 has been released in March 2016, that seems to imply that there will no longer be any updates on 2.3.

However, the release post seems to imply that 2.3.x and 2.4.x will be supported for some time.

It would be great if the support policy was updated to make things a bit more clear. And if possible, even maintain a table showing the versions, when their full support ends, etc. And if no end date is given, inform the users how long a transitional period will be (for instance, no end date given -> at least 12 months of support still guaranteed).

[#4]

Sven,

Great feedback. I will forward your comments to product management.

[#5 · Accepted solution]

There has been an update to the Support web page. Now the specific Begin and End Dates for Minor Releases (2.3, 2.4, 2.5, etc) are readily available. You can see when Full Support and Technical Guidance periods end. It's in the table at the bottom of this page:

https://hortonworks.com/agreements/support-services-policy/