This is linked to https://github.com/tektoncd/pipeline/issues/8529

The `KUBERNETES_MIN_VERSION` and `knative.dev/pkg/version` package are setting which minimum kubernetes version that is supported. If we try to run the controller on an older Kubernetes version, it will panic.

As of today, we inherit this value from [knative `version.go` value](https://github.com/knative/pkg/blob/main/version/version.go). Any time we update the version of `knative.dev/pkg` this value can change — Knative updates it depending on Kubernetes maintenance support window — and thus we need to take this into account.

These updates are a bit arbitrary from the `tektoncd/pipeline` point of view as, most of the time, it would still work with older version of Kubernetes. We don't use that much API, most of it is super stable and doesn't change a lot, …

I am creating this issue to discuss if we want to set our own `KUBERNETES_MIN_VERSION` (and test accordingly) in `tektoncd/pipeline`.

• By default `tektoncd/pipeline` would be installable in a wider range of Kubernetes version (and thus distributions)
• We decide when we stop "supporting" a given kubernetes version.

Not matter what happens upstream, we should set this value to a lower version (e.g. the latest OpenShift EUS support by Red Hat) and test against it (and any OCP version above). By testing, I mean running automated tests mainly.

• This would help us reduce the number of version of OpenShift Pipelines we have to support
• This would bring that latest and brightest to our customers, even if they are running EUS

Note that this also applies to all other components.