This Bugzilla instance is a read-only archive of historic NetBeans bug reports. To report a bug in NetBeans please follow the project's instructions for reporting issues.
For 6.8 release major version update notifications are implemented. But it's crystal clear that there should be functionality that allows IDE _upgrade_ when new release is available.
what is missing?
Nothing is missing. An extract from the wiki that is linked from this issue: The Upgrade wizard is capable to choose the best-fit installer bit of appropriate release, download it and launch the IDE installer. Rest of installation executes the IDE installer.