SUSE has released the first prototype of the ALP (Adaptable Linux Platform), positioned as the continuation of the development of the SUSE Linux Enterprise distribution. A key difference of the new system is the division of the distribution's core foundation into two parts: a stripped-down 'host OS' for operation on hardware and a layer for application support, aimed at running in containers and virtual machines. Builds are prepared for the x86_64 architecture.
The idea is to develop a minimal environment in the 'host OS', necessary for supporting and managing hardware, while all applications and user space components run not in a mixed environment but in separate containers or in. virtual machines, executed on top of the 'host OS' and isolated from each other. This organization will allow users to focus on applications and abstract workflows, separating them from the low-level system environment and hardware.
The SLE Micro product, based on the MicroOS project, serves as the foundation for the 'host OS'. For centralized management, configuration management systems Salt (pre-installed) and Ansible (optional) are offered. For launching isolated containers, tools such as Podman and K3s (Kubernetes) are available. Among the system components moved into containers are yast2, podman, k3s, cockpit, GDM (GNOME Display Manager), and KVM.
Among the features of the system environment is the default use of disk encryption (FDE, Full Disk Encryption) with the option to store keys in TPM. The root partition is mounted in read-only mode and is not modified during operation. An atomic update installation mechanism is used in the environment. Unlike atomic updates based on ostree and snap used in Fedora and Ubuntu, ALP utilizes the standard package manager and snapshot mechanism in Btrfs instead of building separate atomic images and deploying additional delivery infrastructure.
Core concepts of ALP:
- Minimization of user intervention (zero-touch), implying the automation of basic maintenance, deployment, and configuration processes.
- Automatic maintenance of security and keeping the system up-to-date (self-updating). A configurable mode of automatic updates is provided (for example, one can enable auto-installation of only critical vulnerability patches or revert to manual confirmation of updates installation). Live patches are supported for updating the Linux kernel without rebooting or pausing operation.
- Automatic application of optimizations (self-tuning) and system resilience (self-healing). The system records the last stable state, and after applying updates or changing settings, in the case of detecting anomalies, problems, or behavioral disruptions, it automatically reverts to the previous state using Btrfs snapshots.
- Multi-version software stack. Isolation of components in containers allows for the simultaneous use of different versions of tools and applications. For example, applications can run with different versions of Python, Java, and Node.js dependencies, separating incompatible dependencies. Base dependencies are provided in the form of BCI (Base Container Images). The user can create, update, and delete software stacks without affecting other environments.
Unlike SUSE Linux Enterprise, the development of ALP is initially conducted using an open development process, which makes intermediate builds and testing results publicly available to everyone. This allows interested parties to track the ongoing work and participate in the development.
Source: opennet.ru
