The release of AlmaLinux 10.2 has been introduced, along with an update for the previous branch — AlmaLinux 9.8. The releases are synchronized with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.8 and 10.2 and include all changes proposed in these releases. Installation images have been prepared for the architectures x86_64_v3, x86_64_v2, ARM64, ppc64le, and s390x in the form of bootable (1 GB), minimal (1.6 GB), and full images (10 GB). Live builds with GNOME, KDE, MATE, and Xfce will be created later, as well as images for Raspberry Pi boards, containers, WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux), and cloud platforms.
The distribution is binary compatible with Red Hat Enterprise Linux whenever possible and can be used as a replacement for RHEL 10.2 and CentOS 10 Stream. Aside from rebranding and the removal of RHEL-specific packages, the following differences from RHEL 10.2 are noted in AlmaLinux 10.2:
- A repository of packages compiled for the i686 architecture has been published, as well as Docker container images for 32-bit x86 systems. Red Hat discontinued the formation of 32-bit builds for x86 architecture with the release of RHEL 7 in 2014. In the CentOS 7 branch, the assembly of 32-bit packages continued by the CentOS Linux AltArch SIG team, but starting with the CentOS 8 branch, the creation of such builds ceased. The revival of i686 architecture builds in AlmaLinux was motivated by the desire to allow the execution of older applications available only as executables for 32-bit systems. These builds may also be useful for creating 32-bit environments for testing code in continuous integration systems and for running containers for 32-bit programs.
- Support for the Btrfs file system has been restored. The ability to partition storage devices using Btrfs has been added to the installer, the kernel module btrfs.ko has been installed, the set of btrfs-progs utilities has been returned, and work has been done to adapt the data storage management stack to work with Btrfs. The functionality of the packages bcc, buildah, cockpit, ignition, libblockdev, libguestfs, osbuild, osbuild-composer, podman, pykickstart, python-blivet, skopeo, udisks2, and virt-v2v in environments with Btrfs has been verified. Red Hat declared the Btrfs file system as deprecated in the release of RHEL 7.4 (2017) and fully ceased its support in the RHEL 8 branch.
- The CRB (CodeReady Builder) package repository is enabled by default, which includes a selection of packages not typically offered in Red Hat Enterprise Linux, such as developer applications, additional libraries and bindings, as well as packages containing debug data, documentation, header files, static builds, and code examples (the "-devel", "-example", "-doc", and "-static" packages). Among other things, CRB contains libraries used as dependencies in packages from the repository.
EPEL (Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux). - Packages for installing NVIDIA drivers and the CUDA stack have been created. The drivers can be used in UEFI Secure Boot configurations. Kernel modules from the official set of proprietary drivers from NVIDIA cannot be loaded in UEFI Secure Boot mode, as they are not signed with a digital signature from the distribution. This limitation has been circumvented by using open kernel modules provided by NVIDIA, based on which a custom package nvidia-open-kmod has been created with modules signed with the digital signature of AlmaLinux. A separate package almalinux-release-nvidia-driver has been prepared with the configuration of the external repository supported by NVIDIA, from which CUDA drivers and proprietary components of the NVIDIA driver operating in user space are downloaded.
The repository is supported. - Separate builds for the second version of the x86-64 microarchitecture (x86-64-v2) have been formed, running parallel to the basic x86-64 builds, which are optimized for the x86-64-v3 microarchitecture used in RHEL 10. Additional support for x86-64-v2 ensures compatibility with CPUs older than Intel Haswell and AMD Excavator, designed before 2013. Besides the standard repositories, x86-64-v2 builds have also been prepared for packages from the EPEL repository.
- Server and client implementations of the SPICE protocol have been reinstated, allowing for remote access to desktops operating in a virtual environment under QEMU/KVM. Unlike VNC and RDP protocols, in SPICE, screen content rendering and audio stream processing are handled on the client side, not on server. In RHEL, SPICE support was discontinued in release 9.0.
- The use of the %rbp processor register has been reinstated as the base pointer for the stack frame, containing return addresses and function variables (frame pointer). Using the frame pointer allows for the use of additional capabilities for system tracing and profiling in the distribution.
- The ability to use a hypervisor KVM on systems with IBM POWER processors has been implemented. In RHEL, such support was dropped in branch 9.0.
- Synergy, which contains packages differing from Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The Synergy repository currently hosts packages with the Pantheon user environment, developed by the Elementary OS project, and the Warpinator utility, designed for encrypted file sharing between two computers.
Support has been reintroduced for over 150 hardware devices not supported in RHEL 10.2. For example, identifiers for older PCI devices have been reinstated in the drivers: - The ability to boot in UEFI Secure Boot mode for systems with Intel/AMD and ARM processors has been implemented.
- The release of the AlmaLinux 10.2 distribution has been announced, as well as an update to the previous branch - AlmaLinux 9.8. The releases are synchronized with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.8 and 10.2, and contain all changes proposed in these releases.
- aacraid — Dell PERC2, 2/SI, 3/SI, 3/DI, Adaptec Advanced Raid Products, HP NetRAID-4M, IBM ServeRAID & ICP SCSI
- be2iscsi — Emulex OneConnectOpen-iSCSI for BladeEngine 2 and 3
- be2net — Emulex BladeEngine 2 and 3 adapters *
- hpsa — HP Smart Array Controller
- lpfc — Emulex LightPulse Fibre Channel SCSI
- megaraid_sas — Broadcom MegaRAID SAS
- mlx4_core — Mellanox Gen2 and ConnectX-2
- mpt3sas — LSI MPT Fusion SAS 3.0
- mptsas — Fusion MPT SAS Host
- qla2xxx — QLogic Fibre Channel HBA
- qla4xxx — QLogic iSCSI HBA.
The AlmaLinux distribution was founded by CloudLinux in response to Red Hat's premature discontinuation of CentOS 8 support (the release of updates for CentOS 8 was halted at the end of 2021, not in 2029 as users had expected). The project is overseen by a separate non-profit organization, the AlmaLinux OS Foundation, which was created to develop it in a neutral environment with community participation and using a management model similar to that of the Fedora project. The distribution is free for all categories of users. All AlmaLinux developments are published under open licenses.
In addition to AlmaLinux, alternatives to the classic CentOS are also positioned as Rocky Linux (developed by the community under the guidance of the CentOS founder), Oracle Linux, SUSE Liberty Linux, and EuroLinux. Furthermore, Red Hat has provided the opportunity for free use of RHEL in organizations developing open-source software and in environments for individual developers with up to 16 virtual or physical systems.
Source: opennet.ru
