The AlmaLinux 9.0 distribution kit has been released, synchronized with the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 distribution kit and containing all the changes proposed to this branch. The AlmaLinux project became the first public distribution based on the RHEL package base, releasing stable builds based on RHEL 9. Installation images are prepared for the x86_64, ARM64, ppc64le and s390x architectures in the form of boot (800 MB), minimum (1.5 GB) and full image ( 8 GB). Live builds with GNOME, KDE and Xfce will be formed later, as well as images for Raspberry Pi boards, containers and cloud platforms.
The distribution is fully binary compatible with Red Hat Enterprise Linux and can be used as a replacement for RHEL 9 and CentOS 9 Stream. Changes come down to rebranding, removal of RHEL-specific packages such as redhat-*, insights-client and subscription-manager-migration*. An overview of the list of changes in RHEL 9 can be found in the text with the announcement of this product.
The AlmaLinux distribution was founded by CloudLinux in response to the premature end of support for CentOS 8 by Red Hat (updates for CentOS 8 were discontinued at the end of 2021, and not in 2029, as users expected). The project is overseen by a separate non-profit organization, the AlmaLinux OS Foundation, which was created to develop in a neutral, community-driven environment using a governance model similar to the Fedora Project. The distribution kit is free for all categories of users. All developments of AlmaLinux are published under free licenses.
In addition to AlmaLinux, Rocky Linux (developed by the community under the guidance of the founder of CentOS with the support of a specially created company Ctrl IQ), VzLinux (prepared by Virtuozzo), Oracle Linux, SUSE Liberty Linux and EuroLinux are also positioned as alternatives to the classic CentOS. In addition, Red Hat has made RHEL available free of charge to open source organizations and individual developer environments of up to 16 virtual or physical systems.
Source: opennet.ru