The developers of the AlmaLinux distribution, established by CloudLinux in response to the premature end of support for CentOS 8, have introduced the ELevate toolkit, simplifying the migration of existing CentOS 7.x installations to distributions based on the RHEL 8 package base while preserving applications, data, and settings. Currently, the project supports migration to AlmaLinux, Rocky Linux, CentOS Stream, and Oracle Linux.
The migration process is based on the use of the Leapp utility developed by Red Hat, which is supplemented with patches that address the specifics of CentOS and third-party distributions based on the RHEL package base. The project also involves an extensive set of metadata describing the steps for transitioning specific packages from one branch of the distribution to another.
To perform the migration, it is sufficient to connect the repository provided by the project, install the migration script package for the chosen distribution (leapp-data-almalinux, leapp-data-centos, leapp-data-oraclelinux, leapp-data-rocky), and start the "leapp" utility. For example, to switch to Rocky Linux, you can execute the following commands after updating your system to the latest state: sudo yum install -y http://repo.almalinux.org/elevate/elevate-release-latest-el7.noarch.rpm sudo yum install -y leapp-upgrade leapp-data-rocky sudo leapp preupgrade sudo leapp upgrade
Let us remind you that Red Hat has shortened the support period for the classic CentOS 8 distribution — updates for this branch will be released until December 2021, rather than until 2029 as initially planned. In its place, CentOS Stream will be introduced, with the key difference being that traditional CentOS acted as a 'downstream', i.e., it was built from already stable RHEL releases, while CentOS Stream is positioned as an 'upstream' for RHEL, meaning that testing of packages will take place before they are included in RHEL releases (RHEL will be rebuilt based on CentOS Stream).
CentOS Stream will provide earlier access to features of the upcoming RHEL branch, but includes packages that are not yet fully stabilized. With CentOS Stream, third-party participants can oversee the preparation of packages for RHEL, propose their changes, and influence decisions made. Previously, a snapshot of one of the Fedora releases was used as the basis for the new RHEL branch, which was refined and stabilized behind closed doors, without the ability to monitor the development process and decisions made.
The community reacted to the change by creating several alternatives to classic CentOS 8, including VzLinux (prepared by Virtuozzo), AlmaLinux (developed by CloudLinux in collaboration with the community), Rocky Linux (developed by the community under the leadership of the CentOS founder, supported by the newly created Ctrl IQ company), and Oracle Linux. Additionally, Red Hat has provided a free usage option for RHEL in organizations developing open source software and in environments for individual developers with up to 16 virtual or physical systems.
Source: opennet.ru
