## Changelog since v1.8.12

### Other notable changes

* Add MAX_PODS_PER_NODE env so that user can use it to specify the default max pods per node for the cluster. IP_ALIAS_SIZE will be changed accordingly. Must have ip alias enabled. ([#63466](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/63466), [@grayluck](https://github.com/grayluck))

- Kubernetes components that perform leader election now only support using `Leases` for this. ([#114055](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/114055), [@aimuz](https://github.com/aimuz))

  name of controllers that can be turned on/off that are passed to the `--controllers`
  flag (e.g., `pod-garbage-collector-controller`). The old names (eg `podgc`) are
  also accepted and aliased to the new names. ([#115813](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/115813), [@atiratree](https://github.com/atiratree))
- `kubeadm`: Introduced a new feature gate `UpgradeAddonsBeforeControlPlane` to

- Cleanup: removed `getStorageAccountName` warning messages.
   ([#121983](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/121983), [@andyzhangx](https://github.com/andyzhangx))
- Client-go: Optimized leaders renewing leases by updating leader lock optimistically without getting the record from the API server first. Also, a new metric `leader_election_slowpath_total` was added to allow users to monitor how many leader elections are updated non-optimistically.