* Prevent `resourceVersion` updates for custom resources on no-op writes. ([#67562](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/67562), [@nikhita](https://github.com/nikhita))

* Fix a scalability issue where high rates of event writes degraded etcd performance. ([#64539](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/64539), [@ccding](https://github.com/ccding))

* fix smb mount issue ([#65751](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/65751), [@andyzhangx](https://github.com/andyzhangx))
* Fix a scalability issue where high rates of event writes degraded etcd performance. ([#64539](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/64539), [@ccding](https://github.com/ccding))

- Fixes creationTimestamp: null causing unnecessary writes to etcd ([#116865](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/116865), [@alexzielenski](https://github.com/alexzielenski)) [SIG API Machinery and Testing]

  `kubelet_volume_stats_capacity_bytes`
  `kubelet_volume_stats_available_bytes`
  `kubelet_volume_stats_used_bytes`
  `kubelet_volume_stats_inodes`
  `kubelet_volume_stats_inodes_free`
  `kubelet_volume_stats_inodes_used`
  `plugin_manager_total_plugins`
  `volume_manager_total_volumes`
  ([#84907](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/84907), [@RainbowMango](https://github.com/RainbowMango))

- The alpha `Initializers` admission plugin is no longer enabled by default. This matches the off-by-default behavior of the alpha API which drives initializer behavior. ([#66039](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/66039), [@liggitt](https://github.com/liggitt))

* Fix a scalability issue where high rates of event writes degraded etcd performance. ([#64539](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/64539), [@ccding](https://github.com/ccding))

- **Cluster Lifecycle**
  - [alpha] Improved UX and usability for the kubeadm binary that makes it easy to get a new cluster running. ([docs](http://kubernetes.io/docs/getting-started-guides/kubeadm/)) ([changelog](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubeadm/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md)) ([kubernetes/features#11](https://github.com/kubernetes/enhancements/issues/11))
- **Cluster Ops**

* Declare out of disk when there is no free inodes ([#28176](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/28176), [@ronnielai](https://github.com/ronnielai))
* Includes the number of free inodes in stat summary ([#28173](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/28173), [@ronnielai](https://github.com/ronnielai))

* **[alpha]** New Bootstrap Token authentication and management method. Works well with kubeadm. kubeadm now supports managing tokens, including time based expiration, after the cluster...