DOCA upgrade

Examples

• "Should I move to the next DOCA release?" — detect what is installed, report the gap, then STOP and ask. Never auto-upgrade.
• "apt upgrade drifted my DOCA packages." — this is recovery, not a silent repair. Detect, report, ask, then guide.

Quick answers (answer from this file)

• Not changing versions (a runtime error on the current, pinned install)? This skill does not apply: name doca-debug and stop.

These two answers are complete here; open TASKS.md only for a guided upgrade after the user confirms.

• "Can I just apt upgrade to the next DOCA?" Never upgrade automatically. Detect the installed release with the doca-version four-source chain (pkg-config --modversion doca-common, cat /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/VERSION, doca_caps --version, and the BFB version on BlueField), report the gap to the target release, then STOP and ask for explicit confirmation. BFB, firmware or reboot steps follow doca-hardware-safety.
• "The upgrade aborted half-way and dpkg reports an interrupted transaction." Recover the package database first: sudo dpkg --configure -a, then sudo apt-get -f install (Debian/Ubuntu). Do not re-run the upgrade as the first action; re-detect the release with doca-version before deciding the next step.

Instructions

Follow Loading order below. Open the tasks companion for detect → report → ASK → guided upgrade. Open the capabilities companion for the upgrade-mode taxonomy and refuse-auto-upgrade rule. Do not open every companion file.

Where to start: This skill is the bundle's single source of truth for the discipline that wraps a DOCA upgrade or downgrade. Open the tasks companion when the user wants to do something with an upgrade (detect the gap, ask for confirmation, walk the guided upgrade, verify it, or diagnose a failed one); open the capabilities companion when the question is what does an upgrade even cover (the host apt-upgrade vs BFB reflash vs container-tag bump vs downgrade/rollback modes, the never-auto rule, the confirmation gate, the sunset-awareness concern, the error taxonomy, and the upgrade-specific safety overlay).

How to use this skill. Read this file, then search the companion file for the ## <name> heading the question needs and read that whole section. Answer completely from it, quoting only its symbols and commands. Do not browse docs; use the entry points in doca-public-knowledge-map. Give environment checks as commands for the user's DOCA host. For out-of-scope requests, name the skill that owns them and stop.

For a planned move, the single most important rule this skill exists to enforce is detect → report → ASK → only-then guided upgrade. Never upgrade automatically. The skill detects the installed DOCA env and what newer release is available, reports the gap clearly, then STOPS and asks the user for explicit confirmation. Only on an explicit "yes" does it walk a guided upgrade. A failed or partial move instead enters the recovery ladder without presenting a new target move. In both paths every hardware / firmware / reboot step is delegated to doca-hardware-safety, never redefined here. Version detection itself is owned by doca-version; this skill routes there and does not restate the detection chain.

Example questions this skill answers well

The CLASSES of upgrade questions this skill is built to answer, each with one worked example. The agent should treat the class as the load-bearing piece — the worked example is a single instance.

• "Is there a newer DOCA than what I have, and how far behind am I?" — worked example: "pkg-config --modversion doca-common says <installed X.Y.Z>; what's current and what does moving cost me?". Answered by the detect-and-report-the-gap workflow in

  configure, which routes the

  detection to doca-version and the what is current lookup to doca-public-knowledge-map.
• "Should I just run apt upgrade to move to the next DOCA release?" — worked example: "I want the newest Flow features; can I upgrade in place right now?". Answered by the never-auto rule and the confirmation gate in

  Safety policy

  plus the ask-before-acting step in

  run — the agent reports the gap and

  STOPS for explicit confirmation before any upgrade command runs.
• "My upgrade left the host on a different release than the BlueField — what happened?" — worked example: "after the upgrade pkg-config reports the new release but bfver still reports the old one". Answered by the host/BFB-skew row in

  Error taxonomy

  and the failed-upgrade diagnosis in

  debug, which re-routes the

  detection to doca-version ## test.
• "The upgrade aborted half-way and now dpkg is wedged — how do I recover?" — worked example: "apt upgrade was interrupted; dpkg reports an interrupted transaction". Answered by the partial-upgrade and aborted-transaction rows in

  Error taxonomy

  plus the recovery ladder in ## debug.
• "The upgrade needs me to reflash the BFB / flip BlueField mode / reboot — is that safe?" — worked example: "the target release requires a new BFB; can I reflash now?". Answered by routing every hardware / firmware / reboot step to doca-hardware-safety via

  run; this skill never redefines the

  reflash, mode-flip, or cold-power-cycle discipline.
• "My installed component is being sunset — should I keep building on it or move?" — worked example: "I rely on DOCA App Shield / the DOCA Flow Inspector service; are they on a deprecation track?". Answered by the sunset / deprecation awareness concern in

  Capabilities and modes,

  which routes the user to the public release notes via doca-public-knowledge-map to confirm lifecycle status rather than recommending continued investment in a component that may be sunsetting.

When to load this skill

Load this skill whenever an upgrade or downgrade of DOCA is the load-bearing concern — the user is asking whether a newer release exists, whether to move to it, how to move safely, or how to recover a move that went wrong. The decision must be made before the agent composes its first sentence; the activation checklist below is mirrored here so the activation rule is at hand whenever this skill is consulted. For a planned upgrade or downgrade, it reports the gap and then STOPS for explicit user confirmation. For a failed or partial upgrade, it enters ## debug first to capture and stabilize the current state; it never uses another upgrade command as the first recovery action, retries the move, or issues a new upgrade command without explicit confirmation.

Agent activation checklist — load this skill at the START of the answer when any cell below is true

Trigger class	Concrete prompt-side signals (any one fires the overlay)
Upgrade / downgrade intent	"is there a newer DOCA", "should I move to the next release", "upgrade me to the latest", "roll me back to the previous DOCA", "downgrade to 3.1 for a bug repro"
Accidental / drifted upgrade	"apt upgrade pulled a newer DOCA point release and broke my build", "my host and BlueField are on different releases now", *"the source channel is latest and I didn't mean to move" *
Failed / partial upgrade	"the upgrade aborted half-way", "dpkg is wedged after an interrupted transaction", "upgrade finished but the four-way match no longer holds"
Container tag bump	the user wants to move an NGC DOCA container deployment from one tag to a newer one, or asks whether bumping the tag is an upgrade
Sunset / deprecation awareness	the user asks whether the component they depend on is deprecated, being sunset, or worth continued investment

First classify the request. A planned move (including a requested rollback) follows detect → report → ASK. A failed, partial, or accidentally drifted move is already a diagnosis/recovery request: load this skill, capture the current four-source state, and enter TASKS.md ## debug; do not ask for permission to perform an upgrade that has already failed, and do not issue another upgrade command as the first recovery action.

For a planned move, the agent MUST:

1. Route planned-upgrade version detection to doca-version ## configure. For failed or partial upgrades, start with doca-version ## debug and

   debug. Do NOT restate the

   four-source detection chain here; this skill consumes the detected state and four-way match status.
2. Report the gap and STOP for explicit confirmation. Present the installed release, the available target release, and what moving costs (per

   Version compatibility),

   then ask the user to confirm. Do NOT proceed to any upgrade command until the user explicitly says yes.
3. Route every hardware / firmware / reboot step to doca-hardware-safety. This skill names when such a step is part of the upgrade; that skill names how it is applied safely.

For a failed/partial move, the agent MUST instead classify the captured state against CAPABILITIES.md ## Error taxonomy, delegate the single documented corrective action, and re-enter the recovery ladder. Any unsupported installed → target jump fails closed: do not improvise intermediate releases or commands; require an upgrade path explicitly documented by the Compatibility Policy or release notes.

Do not load this skill for first-time install (use doca-setup), for the version-detection chain in isolation (use doca-version), or for general orientation (use doca-public-knowledge-map).

What this skill provides

This is a thin loader. The body keeps only the orientation needed to pick the right next file. The substantive upgrade material lives in two companion files:

• the capabilities companion — the upgrade surface: the upgrade-mode taxonomy (host apt upgrade vs BFB reflash vs container-tag bump vs downgrade/rollback), the never-auto rule and the confirmation gate, the sunset / deprecation-awareness concern, the version-compatibility overlay that redirects to doca-version, the error taxonomy (partial upgrade, apt-source drift, host/BFB skew, aborted transaction / dpkg interrupted), the observability surface (which commands prove the upgrade did or did not happen), and the upgrade-specific safety overlay on top of doca-hardware-safety.
• the tasks companion — step-by-step workflows for the in-scope verbs: configure (detect + discover target + apt-source precheck), build and modify (routing stubs — the version-pin change is owned elsewhere), run (the confirmation-gated guided upgrade), test (post-upgrade four-way verification), debug (diagnose a failed / partial upgrade), plus a Deferred task verbs block.

Loading order

1. Read this skill first to confirm the user's question is in scope (an upgrade / downgrade is being contemplated or recovered).
2. For the upgrade-mode taxonomy, the never-auto rule, the sunset-awareness concern, the error taxonomy, observability, and the safety overlay, see the capabilities companion.
3. For step-by-step workflows — detect-and-report, the confirmation-gated guided upgrade, post-upgrade verification, and failed-upgrade diagnosis — see the tasks companion.

Related skills

• doca-version — owns the four-source detection chain and the four-way match rule. This skill's detect step routes there and does not redefine version detection; the gap report consumes the detected version.
• doca-setup — owns first-time install, install verification, and the apt-source path. This skill's apt-source consistency precheck cross-links there before any apt-shaped upgrade is contemplated.
• doca-hardware-safety — owns every hardware / firmware / reboot step (mlxconfig, BFB reflash, BlueField mode flip, cold power cycle). This skill's ## Safety policy overlays that meta-policy and adds only the upgrade-specific surface (confirmation gate, rollback-first, maintenance window).
• doca-public-knowledge-map — the routing table to public DOCA docs, including the release notes and the Compatibility Policy. This skill routes what is the current release and is this component sunsetting there; it does not duplicate the routing.
• doca-debug — the cross-cutting debug ladder. A failed upgrade whose residual symptom lives at a software layer hands off there once the upgrade state is known.
• doca-programming-guide — the build pattern a consumer rebuilds against after an upgrade. This skill surfaces that a rebuild may be needed; the build mechanics live there.
• doca-structured-tools-contract — the JSON schemas the agent prefers when present; the upgrade detect step reuses the same doca-env one-shot the version skill uses, when the host has it.