- Kubeadm: relax the validation of kubeconfig server URLs. Allow the user to define custom kubeconfig server URLs without erroring out during validation of existing kubeconfig files (e.g. when using external CA mode). ([#94816](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/94816), [@neolit123](https://github.com/neolit123)) [SIG Cluster Lifecycle]

  In addition, please be careful that:
  - kube-scheduler MUST start with `--authorization-kubeconfig` and `--authentication-kubeconfig` correctly set to get authentication/authorization working.
  - liveness/readiness probes to kube-scheduler MUST use HTTPS now, and the default port has been changed to 10259.

kube-apiserver endpoint for the kubelet when creating a cluster with `kubeadm init` or when joining control plane nodes with `kubeadm join`. Enabling the feature gate also affects the `kubeadm init phase kubeconfig kubelet` phase, where the flag `--control-plane-endpoint` no longer affects the generated kubeconfig `Server` field, but the flag `--apiserver-advertise-address` can now be used for the same purpose. ([#129956](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/129956), [@chrischdi](https://github.com/chrischdi))...

* kubectl commands run inside a pod using a kubeconfig file now use the namespace specified in the kubeconfig file, instead of using the pod namespace. If no kubeconfig file is used, or the kubeconfig does not specify a namespace, the pod namespace is still used as a fallback. ([#44570](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/44570), [@liggitt](https://github.com/liggitt))...

* UDP connections now support graceful termination in IPVS mode ([#71515](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/71515), [@lbernail](https://github.com/lbernail))
* kubeadm: use kubeconfig flag instead of kubeconfig-dir on init phase bootstrap-token ([#71803](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/71803), [@yagonobre](https://github.com/yagonobre))

used in RBAC role bindings. The behavior can be overridden by explicitly specifying the scope values as comma-separated string in the "users[*].config.scopes" field in the KUBECONFIG file.) This way, users can now  set a Google Service Account JSON key in the  GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS environment variable, craft a kubeconfig file with GKE master IP+CA cert, and authenticate to GKE in headless mode without requiring gcloud CLI. ([#58141](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/58141), [...

* client-go: restores behavior of populating the BearerToken field in rest.Config objects constructed from kubeconfig files containing tokenFile config, or from in-cluster configuration. An additional BearerTokenFile field is now populated to enable constructed clients to periodically refresh tokens. ([#71713](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/71713),...

- Kubeadm: graduate the command `kubeadm alpha kubeconfig user` to `kubeadm kubeconfig user`. The `kubeadm alpha kubeconfig user` command is deprecated now. ([#97583](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/97583), [@knight42](https://github.com/knight42)) [SIG Cluster Lifecycle]

- Kubeadm: avoid panicing if the user has malformed the kubeconfig in the cluster-info config map to not include a valid current context. Include proper validation at the appropriate locations and throw errors instead. ([#134723](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/134723), [@neolit123](https://github.com/neolit123))...

- Kubeadm`: modified `--config` flag from required to optional for `kubeadm kubeconfig user` command ([#116074](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/116074), [@SataQiu](https://github.com/SataQiu))