Release NativeLink v1.8.0

[MarcusSorealheis]

What and why

Cuts v1.8.0, following "Creating releases" in CONTRIBUTING.md. There are 33 commits since v1.7.7. This is a minor bump rather than a patch because the release adds backward-compatible features: new opt-in configuration fields and new metrics. Nothing is removed or renamed. Every new field defaults to the existing behavior, except one new default limit noted under Risk.

• New configuration: read-only bind mounts for cached input directories, experimental_readonly_input_mounts (worker: add option to mount cached input directories as read-only #2751). A per-worker bound on concurrent input fetches, max_concurrent_input_downloads, default 64 (Bound a worker's input fetches with one pool across the actions it stages #2952). An adaptive bound on object store reads, max_concurrent_reads / adaptive_read_concurrency / min_concurrent_reads, off by default (Bound object store reads with an adaptive permit pool, Azure first #2941). Opt-in repair removal through CacheMetricsStore, allow_remove, default false (Forward cache removal through CacheMetricsStore #2968).
• New metrics: worker.input_mount.{cache_hits,cache_misses,fallbacks,prepare_failures}, store.object.read_limit and store.object.read_waits.
• CAS upload integrity: incomplete uploads are rejected before a blob is published (Reject incomplete CAS uploads before publishing blobs #2974). Retryable upload failures stay retryable (Preserve retryable failures in CAS uploads #2966). Resuming an active ByteStream upload returns Unavailable (Return Unavailable when resuming an active ByteStream upload #2889). Every upload is written through the existence cache (Write every upload through the existence cache instead of discarding one it believes present #2951).
• Store fixes: staged blocks from a failed Azure upload are discarded (Discard the blocks a failed Azure upload left staged #2969). The Redis length check reconnects after a failover (Reconnect and retry the Redis length check after a failover #2961). The compression store reports the uncompressed size (Report the digest size from the compression store has, not the compressed one #2960). Fast-store presence counts when the slow store is read-only (Count the fast store toward presence when the slow store is read-only #2959). Completeness-check backend errors propagate (CompletenessCheckingStore: propagate backend errors instead of serving them as misses #2815). A has() batch no longer cascades evictions (EvictingMap: a batch size/existence query must not cascade-evict every resident entry #2840). Redis subscription gaps that dropped events are closed (Redis: don't silently lose pubsub subscriptions on reconnect or a transient init error #2839).
• Scheduler and errors: less matcher contention after lost assignments (Reduce scheduler contention after lost assignments #2954). Transport-originated Unknown maps to retryable Unavailable (Map transport-originated Unknown to retryable Unavailable #2816). Throttle waits grow and jitter (Grow and jitter consecutive throttle waits in the retrier #2939). Remote-execution scheduling edge cases and output flush are handled (fix(remote-exec): handle scheduling edge cases and output flush (#1533) #2963).
• Security bumps: zip v9 (Update Rust crate zip to v9 [SECURITY] #2956), rustls 0.23.46 (Update Rust crate rustls to v0.23.46 [SECURITY] #2938), curl (Upgrade curl to 8.5.0-2ubuntu10.16 #2942), and fuzzing/Azurite/web tooling dependencies (Fix vulnerable dependencies in fuzzing, Azurite, and web tooling #2965).

#2881 and its revert #2953 cancel out, so neither appears in the changelog.

How was this verified?

• The branch is cut from main at f66c65c. git describe confirms v1.7.7 is the latest tag on that history.
• For the version choice, git diff v1.7.7 origin/main over nativelink-config/src and nativelink-util/src/metrics.rs shows only additions, apart from one doc-comment formatting change in schedulers.rs. No commit in the range is marked breaking.
• The version is bumped in MODULE.bazel, the root Cargo.toml and all 13 crate manifests, including nativelink-metric-macro-derive. No Cargo.toml or MODULE.bazel still says 1.7.7.
• Both lock files were regenerated with cargo update --workspace --offline. The only changes are the 18 nativelink-* version entries (13 in Cargo.lock, 5 in the fuzz lock). cargo metadata --offline --locked passes in both workspaces.
• CHANGELOG.md was prepended with git cliff --unreleased --tag=v1.8.0 --prepend CHANGELOG.md (git-cliff 2.13.1 from the Nix shell). The diff adds 47 lines and removes none, so earlier releases are untouched.
• The commit touches the same 18 files as the v1.7.6 and v1.7.7 release commits.
• Pre-commit passed on every changed file, including buildifier, generate-bazel-rc, machete, taplo, typos and vale.

This change adds no runtime code. No build, test suite or deployment was run against the release candidate beyond CI.

Risk

Low for this change itself: it touches only version strings, lock files, the changelog and cliff.toml grouping rules.

The release carries behavior changes that operators should know about before upgrading:

• New worker default: a worker now fetches at most 64 input blobs at once in total, shared across all the actions it stages (max_concurrent_input_downloads). Before this release, the limit was 64 per action. A worker staging several cold actions at once may stage more slowly until the value is raised.
• Stricter CAS uploads: incomplete uploads are now rejected rather than published.
• Changed error codes: some errors that clients saw as Unknown now arrive as Unavailable and are retried.

cliff.toml gains a rule per misfiled v1.8.0 commit, pinned by subject as in v1.7.7, plus one skip rule for the #2881/#2953 pair. Taplo sorted the new rules. Each commit matches exactly one of them, and the generated section was checked after sorting.

Signing the tag, publishing images and regenerating the config reference remain post-merge steps; this PR does none of them.

AI assistance

Claude Code chose the version by diffing the config schema and metrics since v1.7.7. At Marcus Eagan's request, it bumped the versions, regenerated the lock files and changelog, added the cliff.toml grouping rules, ran the checks above and drafted this description. A maintainer should review the version choice and the changelog grouping before merge.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

https://claude.ai/code/session_01HBxQtV9S561AzBo7aPCYFj

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Project	Deployment	Actions	Updated
nativelink	Ready	Preview	Oct 20, 2026 1:58pm UTC
nativelink-aidm	Ready	Preview	Oct 20, 2026 1:58pm UTC

[MarcusSorealheis]

/build-image nativelink

[MarcusSorealheis]

/build-image nativelink-worker-init

[github-actions]

Image built and pushed!

ghcr.io/TraceMachina/nativelink-worker-init:2026-10-20-131cda9d74695b9e9e01fe854aebe40cc5131316

[github-actions]

Image built and pushed!

ghcr.io/TraceMachina/nativelink:2026-10-20-131cda9d74695b9e9e01fe854aebe40cc5131316