- Kube-apiserver: Each unique set of etcd server overrides specified with `--etcd-servers-overrides` surfaced health checks named `etcd-override-<index>` and `etcd-override-readiness-<index>`. These checks were still excluded by the `?exclude=etcd` and `?exclude=etcd-readiness`...

- For Dynamic Resource Allocation, the new "v1beta1" kubelet gPRC was renamed so that the protobuf package name is unique. ([#128764](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/128764), [@pohly](https://github.com/pohly)) [SIG Node and Testing]

* GCE: Fixes ILB sync on legacy networks and auto networks with unique subnet names ([#53410](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/53410), [@nicksardo](https://github.com/nicksardo))

  - `admissionReviewVersions` default value is removed and the field made required for v1 (supported versions for AdmissionReview are `v1` and `v1beta1`)
  - The `name` field for specified webhooks must be unique for `MutatingWebhookConfiguration` and `ValidatingWebhookConfiguration` objects created via `admissionregistration.k8s.io/v1`

- In the course of admitting a single request, the ValidatingAdmissionPolicy plugin will perform no more than one authorization check per unique authorizer expression. All evaluations of identical authorizer expressions will produce the same decision. ([#116443](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/116443), [@benluddy](https://github.com/benluddy)) [SIG API Machinery and Testing]...

- CustomResourceDefinition schemas that use `x-kubernetes-list-type: map` or `x-kubernetes-list-type: set` now enable validation that the list items in the corresponding custom resources are unique. ([#84920](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/84920), [@sttts](https://github.com/sttts)) [SIG API Machinery]
 
#### Configuration file changes:

#### kube-apiserver:

key. func New[H fips140.Hash](h func() H, key []byte) *HMAC { hm := &HMAC{keyLen: len(key)} hm.outer = h() hm.inner = h() unique := true func() { defer func() { // The comparison might panic if the underlying types are not comparable. _ = recover() }() if hm.outer == hm.inner { unique = false } }() if !unique { panic("crypto/hmac: hash generation function does not produce unique values") } blocksize := hm.inner.BlockSize() hm.ipad = make([]byte, blocksize) hm.opad = make([]byte, blocksize) if len(key)...

  * Strategic Merge Patch

    * Reference docs now display the patch type and patch merge key used by `kubectl apply` to merge and identify unique elements in arrays.

      * `kubectl edit` and `kubectl apply` will keep the ordering of elements in merged lists ([#45980](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/45980), [@mengqiy](https://github.com/mengqiy))

* Fix metrics API group name in audit configuration ([#53493](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/53493), [@piosz](https://github.com/piosz))
* GCE: Fixes ILB sync on legacy networks and auto networks with unique subnet names ([#53410](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/53410), [@nicksardo](https://github.com/nicksardo))

* kubelet: resolved hang/timeout issues when running large numbers of pods with unique configmap/secret references ([#74755](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/74755), [@liggitt](https://github.com/liggitt))