1.4.0 Release Notes

Functional requirements

• HD-890 Dynamic Routing/Navigation in the DSL (Documentation can be found here and here)
• HD-903 Secure access to database schema
• HD-917 Implement per-app Nagios monitoring for Pay success rates
• HD-937 Create Helium health/performance aggregation service and lib

Non-functional requirements

• HD-1008 Refactor Helium to use Java 8
• HD-902 Support custom data sources on a per-app basis
• HD-545 SMS Service testing, staging deployment and documentation
• HD-995 Integration testing
• HD-904 Upgrade the enterprise persistence library to the latest version of Helium's base libraries

Additional Information - what changes to expect in Helium 1.4.0

Global Instance:

All instance of Helium will be merged with the Global instance. 
This will mean that all "in country" apps will be hosted on Vodacom infrastructure going forward.  A small footprint of infrastructure will remain on "in country" infrastructure to act as proxies and to retain a replicated/slave copy of data(as is required for many of our projects there).

Security: Improvements
Improved management of groups and user credentials

1. Every person will receive his/her own Postgres user from DevOps.  Users must change their passwords by logging into Postgres (Avoid doing this from the shared linux user).

By default:
a. The user will be a member of the team’s group
b. The group will have read/write access to all schemas that belong to apps from the team
c. The group will have no access to the public schema

2. Developers can request additional access to; and example of this might be a request for access to tables within the public schema. These requests must be approved by the CTO after which access will be granted by DevOps to the requesting developer

3. Every person will receive his/her own API user and password from DevOps.  Users must change their passwords by visiting DevOps.

By default:
a. The user will be a member of the team’s group
b. The group will have read/write access to all apps from the team
c. The group will have access to the Helium heart-beat API
d. The group will have no access to other, generic Helium APIs

4. Developers can request additional access to more Helium APIs.  These requests must be approved by the CTO after which access will be granted by DevOps

Considerations:

To avoid a potential issues with the release, in the case where an application has any software running on production that integrates with helium either using the database or via apis e.g. a node script that connects to the database -- that you log a request ticket for migration. This will be affected due to the new security features and changes in credentials.

Also see:  /wiki/spaces/HD/pages/4492910

Features: Being retired
Some of the Helium support portal features for the Helium Android client will be retired in Helium 1.4.

1. Features such as tracking and displaying the last known IP address, online status etc. of the Android clients will need significant work to ensure they remain performant. With the upcoming retirement of Helium Android, we have decided to retire some of these features now, and re-direct the time in further improvements with longer term gains in mind. (The feature data will still be captured and maintained in the database. Teams can be granted access to this data in order to support users who are experiencing problems should the need arise.)