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Two questions pop into my mind: A. How easy will it be for the unlucky people that have installed Centos 8 to convert it to rocky Linux? B. Will rocky Linux f

Two questions pop into my mind: A. How easy will it be for the unlucky people that have installed Centos 8 to convert it to rocky Linux? B. Will rocky Linux fulfill its promises? I mean if I install rocky Linux 8.4 will I still have a supported OS at 2029?

chousuke 5y ago
You can convert between any RHEL-like distro by changing your repos, swapping/removing a few key packages (release, branding, subscription-manager certs if converting from RHEL) and then running distro-sync to make sure your other packages match your repositories. This can be done transactionally via the "shell" subcommand which allows you to run multiple commands in a single transaction. YUM/DNF can do the whole thing without much fuss.
viraptor 5y ago
> I mean if I install rocky Linux 8.4 will I still have a supported OS at 2029? I'm not sure that's a fair question to a new project. If you asked that recently about Windows 10, you'd have a different answer than today. But seriously, Rocky was started by the person doing CentOS before and unhappy with changes. They're at the very least not planning to go away.
- derekp7 5y ago
  Also take a look at their principal sponsors list. It includes AWS and Google cloud. They would both have an invested interest in keeping a supported free RHEL clone around.
  - jaboutboul 5y ago
    AWS is also sponsoring AlmaLinux.
- yjftsjthsd-h 5y ago
  Forget Windows; CentOS 8 was supposed to live that long until RH changed their mind one day.
- jeroenhd 5y ago
  Windows 10 had its sunset date announced back when it launched. Most versions of Windows have only come with a two year support life cycle. The LTSC lifecycle has been halved recently, but the 2019 LTSC release will still get 10 years of support like before. Windows has, before Windows 10, had a support cycle of 5 years for feature updates and another 5 for maintenance. XP was supported past that term for (too) long because people refused to or were unable to switch, and 7 has befallen a similar faith. The news media recently found the support cycle page again after the leaks about the upcoming Windows 11 release, but none of this should be a surprise for people who need to look into long term support for Windows. The difference here, or course, is that a big company like Microsoft is more likely to stick around than a small, open source project. They currently don't have any plans to stop support, but who knows what the future may bring. Covid is a stark reminder of how the world can change in just a few months.
cpach 5y ago
”I mean if I install rocky Linux 8.4 will I still have a supported OS at 2029?“ That question is impossible to answer with 100% certainty. There are no 100% guarantees. It all comes down to how much you trust the Rocky Linux crew and also how much you trust the project’s ability to raise the necessary funds. There is also the option to buy licenses for Red Hat Linux.
spinax 5y ago
> A. How easy will it be for the unlucky people that have installed Centos 8 to convert it to rocky Linux? The AlmaLinux team (another RHEL8 clone created by CloudLinux in the wake of the CentOS news, already released/available) has created a tool to do the conversion. Rocky should have no problem, if Alma can do it Rocky can do it. https://github.com/AlmaLinux/almalinux-deploy https://github.com/AlmaLinux/almalinux-deploy
lbhdc 5y ago
There is a tool, Toolbox, for changing linux environments that could be helpful to test that. https://github.com/containers/toolbox https://github.com/containers/toolbox
tgmux 5y ago
The project provides a tool called migrate2rocky which has been tested successfully on a number of RHEL variants. https://github.com/rocky-linux/rocky-tools/ https://github.com/rocky-linux/rocky-tools/

chousuke 5y ago

You can convert between any RHEL-like distro by changing your repos, swapping/removing a few key packages (release, branding, subscription-manager certs if converting from RHEL) and then running distro-sync to make sure your other packages match your repositories. This can be done transactionally via the "shell" subcommand which allows you to run multiple commands in a single transaction. YUM/DNF can do the whole thing without much fuss.

viraptor 5y ago

> I mean if I install rocky Linux 8.4 will I still have a supported OS at 2029? I'm not sure that's a fair question to a new project. If you asked that recently about Windows 10, you'd have a different answer than today. But seriously, Rocky was started by the person doing CentOS before and unhappy with changes. They're at the very least not planning to go away.

derekp7 5y ago
Also take a look at their principal sponsors list. It includes AWS and Google cloud. They would both have an invested interest in keeping a supported free RHEL clone around.
- jaboutboul 5y ago
  AWS is also sponsoring AlmaLinux.
yjftsjthsd-h 5y ago
Forget Windows; CentOS 8 was supposed to live that long until RH changed their mind one day.
jeroenhd 5y ago
Windows 10 had its sunset date announced back when it launched. Most versions of Windows have only come with a two year support life cycle. The LTSC lifecycle has been halved recently, but the 2019 LTSC release will still get 10 years of support like before. Windows has, before Windows 10, had a support cycle of 5 years for feature updates and another 5 for maintenance. XP was supported past that term for (too) long because people refused to or were unable to switch, and 7 has befallen a similar faith. The news media recently found the support cycle page again after the leaks about the upcoming Windows 11 release, but none of this should be a surprise for people who need to look into long term support for Windows. The difference here, or course, is that a big company like Microsoft is more likely to stick around than a small, open source project. They currently don't have any plans to stop support, but who knows what the future may bring. Covid is a stark reminder of how the world can change in just a few months.

cpach 5y ago

”I mean if I install rocky Linux 8.4 will I still have a supported OS at 2029?“ That question is impossible to answer with 100% certainty. There are no 100% guarantees. It all comes down to how much you trust the Rocky Linux crew and also how much you trust the project’s ability to raise the necessary funds. There is also the option to buy licenses for Red Hat Linux.

spinax 5y ago

> A. How easy will it be for the unlucky people that have installed Centos 8 to convert it to rocky Linux? The AlmaLinux team (another RHEL8 clone created by CloudLinux in the wake of the CentOS news, already released/available) has created a tool to do the conversion. Rocky should have no problem, if Alma can do it Rocky can do it. https://github.com/AlmaLinux/almalinux-deploy https://github.com/AlmaLinux/almalinux-deploy

lbhdc 5y ago

There is a tool, Toolbox, for changing linux environments that could be helpful to test that. https://github.com/containers/toolbox https://github.com/containers/toolbox

tgmux 5y ago

The project provides a tool called migrate2rocky which has been tested successfully on a number of RHEL variants. https://github.com/rocky-linux/rocky-tools/ https://github.com/rocky-linux/rocky-tools/