To keep current with Node.js (Node) releases, we are shipping Node 16 support for Auth0 Rules and Hooks. Auth0 Actions is our flagship extensibility product, and our plan is to support every current and long-term supported Node version in the future through Actions. To get ahead of Node support ending for Rules and Hooks, customers will in the future need to migrate to Auth0 Actions, although you can also start now. You can find documentation on migrating from Rules and Hooks to Actions.
Customers will now see the option to upgrade tenants Extensibility Runtime setting (for Rules and Hooks, and Extensions) from Node 12 to Node 16.
What Does This Mean for Our Developers?
Although Node 12 will still be supported throughout the year, we highly recommend updating your Rules, Hooks, and Extensions to take advantage of Node 16 by updating your global tenant Extensibility Runtime setting to Node 16. Node 12 will, however, remain an option and be supported until required deprecation at an undetermined time in the future. Until then, we highly recommend updating to Node 16.
Although we are allowing developers to upgrade to Node 16 in both Rules and Hooks, this would be a great time to migrate to Actions, which will support future Node LTS versions going forward.
Advantages to Using Actions
By design, Auth0 Actions makes it easier to maintain your custom integrations on your tenant. Actions provides a draft mode and version control, allowing you to easily test your existing Action against a new runtime version before deploying to production.
And because the Node version a customer is using for their Rules and Hooks is a global one-time tenant setting, upgrades across multiple Rules and Hooks can be challenging to the sequence. Actions, however, can be upgraded and tested before deployment, one by one. With Actions, you no longer need to migrate all custom extensibility code to a single, tenant-level Node runtime. Existing Actions can be easily tested and upgraded to a future Node version by deploying a new version of the Action with the desired runtime selected.
Actions Integrations are even easier with less maintenance required. Found in the Auth0 Marketplace, Actions Integrations are no-code options built and maintained by partners using Auth0 Actions, the same extensibility technology for your custom code. Using integrations allows you to connect your tenant with additional services without the expense of maintaining an integration object. For future Node JS updates, Action Integrations will receive updates from the Partner developers directly, allowing your tenant to remain current automatically in the case of minor version updates or with a no-code-required interaction in the case of major version updates.
Developers Using Legacy Extensibility Products
Although we are currently supporting Auth0 Rules and Hooks with Node 16, we strongly encourage developers to migrate to Auth0 Actions. Actions provides a developer experience that includes an industry-standard VS Code style editor, typescript, draft mode, version control, single-Action runtime upgrades, improved secret management, an expanded library of NPM modules, and much more.
Node 16 global tenant setting will affect newly installed extensions and updated extensions. There is no impact on existing extensions.
For developers using Node 12, if there are Rules and Hooks that cannot be immediately migrated to Actions using Node 16, at a minimum, we encourage you to update your tenants' runtime and your Rules or Hooks code to Node 16.
We want to hear from you. Please share any feedback on your experience with our extensibility tools and Actions in our Developer Community.