fix(operator): skip no-op VirtualMCPServer Deployment updates

[RaviTharuma]

Cross-links

• Issue: bug(operator): VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeue Updates the Deployment every interval (no rollout) #6340
• Maintainer direction: bug(operator): VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeue Updates the Deployment every interval (no rollout) #6340 (comment)
• Follow-up (CRD default 30s): bug(operator): VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeue Updates the Deployment every interval (no rollout) #6340 (comment)
• PR announcement: bug(operator): VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeue Updates the Deployment every interval (no rollout) #6340 (comment)

Summary

VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeues (including the CRD 30s
default) called Update on the Deployment even when the pod template was
unchanged. That bumped metadata.generation and emitted DeploymentUpdated
with no new ReplicaSet — and only for vMCPs that had a unique
podTemplateSpec.

Root cause: podTemplateMetadataNeedsUpdate used maps.Equal on the full
label/annotation maps. User PodTemplateSpec merge leaves extra keys on the
live template, so every status tick looked like drift.

• Compare pod-template metadata with MapIsSubset (expected ⊆ live)
• Compare container env with equality.Semantic.DeepEqual (K8s defaulting)
• Skip the Deployment write when the computed template, labels, merged
  annotations, and replicas are unchanged

Fixes #6340

Type of change

• Bug fix
• New feature
• Refactoring (no behavior change)
• Dependency update
• Documentation
• Other (describe):

Test plan

• go test -ldflags=-extldflags=-Wl,-w ./cmd/thv-operator/controllers/ -run 'TestVirtualMCPServerEnsureDeployment_PodTemplateSpecSteadyState|TestVirtualMCPServerPodTemplateSpec'
• CI unit / operator tests
• After merge: a VirtualMCPServer with a unique podTemplateSpec should
  not emit DeploymentUpdated on every statusReportingInterval tick

API Compatibility

• This PR does not break the v1beta1 API, OR the api-break-allowed label is applied and the migration guidance is described above.

No CRD schema change.

Does this introduce a user-facing change?

Yes. VirtualMCPServer Deployments no longer get a no-op Update (and a
generation bump) on every status-interval reconcile.

Special notes for reviewers

Matches the suggested fix on #6340: do not treat the status requeue itself as
drift. The subset check is what stops podTemplateSpec extras from looking
like a spec change; the skip-write is a second line of defense if
deploymentNeedsUpdate is still true for a non-template reason.

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[RaviTharuma]

Implements #6340 per maintainer direction.

Cross-links:

• Issue: bug(operator): VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeue Updates the Deployment every interval (no rollout) #6340
• Maintainer comment: bug(operator): VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeue Updates the Deployment every interval (no rollout) #6340 (comment)
• Follow-up (CRD default 30s): bug(operator): VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeue Updates the Deployment every interval (no rollout) #6340 (comment)
• Issue PR note: bug(operator): VirtualMCPServer statusReportingInterval requeue Updates the Deployment every interval (no rollout) #6340 (comment)

[codecov]

Codecov Report

✅ All modified and coverable lines are covered by tests.
✅ Project coverage is 78.03%. Comparing base (0fb54d4) to head (fb3753a).

Additional details and impacted files

@@           Coverage Diff           @@
##             main    #6377   +/-   ##
=======================================
  Coverage   78.02%   78.03%           
=======================================
  Files         767      767           
  Lines       74273    74273           
=======================================
+ Hits        57955    57959    +4     
+ Misses      16313    16309    -4     
  Partials        5        5           

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[reyortiz3]

Nice fix for the root cause — the subset check + semantic env comparison directly address the drift false-positive from #6340, and the regression test follows the reconcile-twice/assert-ResourceVersion-unchanged pattern well.

One question on the "second line of defense" skip-write gate added in syncExistingVirtualMCPServerDeployment:

if equality.Semantic.DeepEqual(deployment.Spec.Template, newDeployment.Spec.Template) &&
    maps.Equal(deployment.Labels, newDeployment.Labels) &&
    maps.Equal(deployment.Annotations, mergedAnnotations) &&
    replicasUnchanged {
    return ctrl.Result{}, nil
}

newDeployment comes from deploymentForVirtualMCPServer, which never sets RestartPolicy, DNSPolicy, SchedulerName, etc. on the PodSpec. On a real cluster the live deployment.Spec.Template.Spec will have those API-server-defaulted, so this full-template DeepEqual will differ from newDeployment's essentially every time — meaning this gate won't actually fire in production once deploymentNeedsUpdate is true for any reason. The fake client used in TestVirtualMCPServerEnsureDeployment_PodTemplateSpecSteadyState doesn't apply that defaulting, so the test can pass without this path ever proving itself against real API-server behavior.

Since the actual fix already lives in podTemplateMetadataNeedsUpdate (subset check) and containerNeedsUpdate (semantic env compare) — both of which gate the call into this function in the first place — is this extra check pulling its weight? If it's meant as genuine defense-in-depth, could we validate it with an envtest (real API server, real defaulting) instead of/in addition to the fake-client test? Otherwise I'd lean toward dropping it to keep syncExistingVirtualMCPServerDeployment simpler, since as written it's effectively unreachable.

[reyortiz3]

Hi @RaviTharuma , can you please solve the conflicts?

[RaviTharuma]

Hi @RaviTharuma , can you please solve the conflicts?

will do it, this weekend 👍

[RaviTharuma]

@reyortiz3 Conflicts are resolved — the branch is MERGEABLE and CI is green.

On the extra skip-write gate: dropped it, as you suggested. The production path is deploymentNeedsUpdate → subset metadata checks + equality.Semantic.DeepEqual on env. A full-template DeepEqual against deploymentForVirtualMCPServer would keep missing API-server defaults, so it was not earning its keep as defense-in-depth. Happy to add an envtest later if you still want that coverage.