27 ms·

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Beta

130 points by palebluedot 13y ago

keithpeter 13y ago
"Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 beta includes three desktops to match different work styles and preferences: GNOME 3, GNOME Classic, and KDE." I know that RHEL is mainly used on servers, but this development looks significant to me. I look forward to an eventual CentOS 7 release with a choice of desktops.
- csmuk 13y ago
  As someone who uses CentOS 6 on the desktop, people really should take a look at this. For me, it's the only Linux desktop which I can find which is reliable and works out of the box with all my hardware.
  - agibsonccc 13y ago
    Watch it with wifi on newer hardware though. It's rock solid 90% of the time, but I've had issues in the past (especially with Atheros cards) I usually prefer that. I'm actually using fedora with MATE to get a similar UX.
  - keithpeter 13y ago
    Yes, I have CentOS 6 on a Thinkpad x200s with hard drive encryption enabled as my work machine. I find it stable and quite fast. I may leave that machine on CentOS 6 and put 7 on the 'play' laptop. My point was giving a choice of desktops is a new departure for Red Hat. Remember that they employ, or have employed, a number of the Gnome developers, and that I gather Red Hat has been a major sponsor of Gnome in the past.
    - TallGuyShort 13y ago
      >> giving a choice of desktops is a new departure for Red Hat Is it? I've only used RHEL on servers but I've used CentOS on my desktops and laptops for a long time with many re-installs - I've always seen the choice to use KDE as part of the base install.
      - kbenson 13y ago
        Yeah, coming from the RH/Fedora world, it seemed weird when other distros starting spinning specialized versions for a different window manager on the desktop, such as kubuntu. I guess that's because they wanted to have more control over the "experience". RHEL is about getting shit done when you know what you are doing, not holding your hand and making you feel comfortable, so I guess with those different expectations it's a bit easier.
        keypusher 13y ago
        Fedora ships a whole bunch of different spins, including desktop flavors. http://spins.fedoraproject.org/ http://spins.fedoraproject.org/
        kbenson 13y ago
        Did they always? I remember it usually being as simple as installing the RPMs, and running the switchdesk utility. I always had to do that (or generally something more involved because of my choice) to run FVWM2.
        Shish2k 13y ago
        Ubuntu also allows you to just install the packages for a different desktop; the differently branded install CDs are mostly for people who come from windows or OSX and thus believe that the desktop == the OS and it's impossible to change once installed :P
      - keithpeter 13y ago
        Then I must be mistaken, thanks. I've tended to associate CentOS with Gnome, and I installed from live CD with a reduced package set. I still think it is significant that Red Hat are publicising the choices.
        TallGuyShort 13y ago
        Yeah - Gnome was definitely the subtle default. IIRC correctly, the Gnome option is called "Desktop", and the KDE option was called "KDE" (or something like this). So unless you had a known preference, you'd end up with Gnome. Contrast this with openSuSE that has 2 specifically-named download options.
rch 13y ago
"All Java 7 packages (java-1.7.0-openjdk, java-1.7.0-oracle, java-1.7.0-ibm) in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 beta let you install multiple versions in parallel, similarly to the kernel." This sounds pretty convenient to me.
- catinsocks 13y ago
  I don't think that this is new (other than 1.7 being the default now) unless they are using something other than alternatives: https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/JBoss_Enterprise_Web_Platform/5/html/Installation_Guide/sect-use_alternatives_to_set_default_JDK.html https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/JBoss_Ent...
  - rch 13y ago
    New to me :) What I recall from a while ago is finding systems with just openjdk and having to install the 'official' version manually. That could have been Fedora though.
rdtsc 13y ago
This is very exciting. I know until it gets all the government certs and rubber stamps I won't be able to use it at work but if it is out the ball can start rolling as they say. Here is the list of all the detail (tech notes): https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/7-Beta/html-single/7.0_Release_Notes/index.html https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_E... You can see updated and deprecated packages as well as issues so far in beta.
- pantalaimon 13y ago
  I'm surprised by their removal of all these wifi drivers.
  - ldng 13y ago
    Well, it is a server product so WiFi support isn't very relevant. The wire is still easier to secure so it might help for certification (speculating here).
- Zoomla 13y ago
  Does government certs mean backdoors?
  - jlas 13y ago
    No. The government has to certify the system before it can be used on government networks. This is so companies can sell compliant RHEL7-based solutions to military and other government organizations.
  - rdtsc 13y ago
    Those are orthogonal concepts ;-)
- polvi 13y ago
  Which certs are most important these days for govt use? Or does it depend on which department you're going for?
dschiptsov 13y ago
Fedora 18 is already matured?) Or it is based on outdated 17th?
- keithpeter 13y ago
  http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTU0MDk http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTU0MDk Suggests Fedora 19 package set and 3.10 kernel.
  - sturadnidge 13y ago
    If I'm not mistaken nodejs was in that package set, good step forward for enterprise adoption if it's in RHEL7!
    - rodgerd 13y ago
      node.js is already in the Software Collections repo for RHEL 6, so you can get a Red Hat supported, maintained node.js already.
      - sturadnidge 13y ago
        Did not know that, cheers!
- jgillich 13y ago
  At least the installer is a newer version, looks like it's from Fedora 19.
  - chjohnst 13y ago
    uses tmux yay!
- chjohnst 13y ago
  Supposed to be based off F19, with full systemd support (just like fedora).
berkut 13y ago
Anyone know what version of gcc it'll ship with? Couldn't find that in the tech overview PDF...
- nailer 13y ago
  From Chapter 11: Compilers and Tools in release notes: 11.1. GCC Toolchain In Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 Beta, the gcc toolchain is based on the gcc-4.8.x release series, and includes numerous enhancements and bugfixes relative to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 equivalent. Similarly, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 includes binutils-2.23.52.x. These versions correspond to the equivalent tools in Red Hat Developer Toolset 2.0; a detailed comparison of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 gcc and binutils versions can therefore be seen here: https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Developer_Toolset/2/html-single/User_Guide/index.html#sect-Changes_in_Version_2.0-GCC https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_D... https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Developer_Toolset/2/html-single/User_Guide/index.html#sect-Changes_in_Version_2.0-binutils https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_D... Notable highlights of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 Beta toolchain are the following: - Experimental support for building applications compliant with C++11 (including full C++11 language support) and some experimental support for C11 features. - Improved support for programming parallel applications, including OpenMP v3.1, C++11 Types and GCC Built-ins for Atomic Memory Access and experimental support for transactional memory (including Intel RTM/HLE intrinsics, built-ins, and code generation) - A new local register allocator (LRA), improving code performance. - DWARF4 is now used as the default debug format. A variety of new architecture-specific options. - Support for AMD family 15h and 16h processors. - Link-time optimization support. - Enhanced warnings and diagnostics. - A variety of new Fortran features.
- chjohnst 13y ago
  4.8.2 it looks like
- jgillich 13y ago
  It's 4.8.2
WestCoastJustin 13y ago
> Improved Application Performance and Isolation. Run applications in isolated and secure lightweight containers utilizing SELinux and resource management. Linux containers provide a method of isolating a process and simulating its environment inside a single host. It provides application sandboxing technology to run applications in a secure container environment, isolated from other applications running in the same host operating system environment. Linux containers are useful when multiple copies of an application or workload need to be run in isolation, but share environments and resources. [1] Looks like there is a major shift in that they will support containers out of the box now. Hopefully we will see some type of GUI to create containers and manage cgroups. There has also been major effort assigned to getting containers working with OpenStack and Docker. You can manually download/compile LXC today, on RHEL 6.4, but it seems like a bit of a hack, since you need to figure out networking and LVM on your own, never mind building base container images. Should be interesting. [1] https://access.redhat.com/site/sites/default/files/pages/attachments/rhel_whatsnewrhel7beta_techoverview_.pdf https://access.redhat.com/site/sites/default/files/pages/att...
- sharprazor 13y ago
  Sounds a lot like Solaris containers of a decade ago.
  - WestCoastJustin 13y ago
    Yeah, I have been doing some research for an upcoming screencast, and this type of idea is called Operating system-level virtualization [1], and there is a fairly good table with the various OS's and their take on OS-level virtualization. E.g. Solaris Containers, FreeBSD Jail, OpenVZ, HP-UX Containers, etc. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system-level_virtualization http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system-level_virtuali...
    - ghaff 13y ago
      Here's a background piece on containers that I wrote a few months back: http://bitmason.blogspot.com/2013/09/what-are-containers-anyway.html http://bitmason.blogspot.com/2013/09/what-are-containers-any...
radoslawc 13y ago
I'm glad to see XFS got some love. Also PTP is nice feature.
- chjohnst 13y ago
  PTP testing so far is looking quite good!
diakritikal 13y ago
> systemd & OpenLMI With the next SLES also going systemd by default, Do you think this will force the hand of the few holdouts left? Going I can't see vendors wanting to support all of systemd, upstart, sysvinit.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- air 13y ago
  Debian seems to feel that way and is choosing between upstart and systemd http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=727708 http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=727708
shmerl 13y ago
How far away do you think is the release?
nailer 13y ago
> The Btrfs file system is now supported. Nice. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Btrfs#Features http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Btrfs#Features
- sharprazor 13y ago
  Is ReiserFS still supported? I've heard that it's a killer filesystem.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- sciurus 13y ago
  From the draft of the new storage administration guide: Btrfs is still being actively evaluated for stability during the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 beta. The following target use cases will only be fully supported if it passes our tests: * The system partition only use case. This will allow btrfs only to get used for system installation, not only for a user's data. Currently it is unclear whether this will be restricted to this single disk or not. * Use btrfs for desktop and laptop users including their data partitions. * Use btrfs as the base file system under scale out "big data" file systems, such as gluster and Ceph. https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/7-Beta/html-single/Storage_Administration_Guide/index.html#ch-btrfs https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_E...
Spiritus 13y ago
Anyone know which Python version will get bundled with RHEL 7?
- yxhuvud 13y ago
  It says in the link, though I suppose it is only a beta still.
- greut 13y ago
  2.7.5 according to Distrowatch (http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=redhat http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=redhat)
- gerjomarty 13y ago
  From the release notes[1], at least the beta version comes with Python 2.7.5. [1]: https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/7-Beta/html-single/7.0_Release_Notes/index.html https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_E...
- emmelaich 13y ago
  Python 3 will be an option.
drinchev 13y ago
Can anyone explain a bit more about what happened to Red Hat? I'm about behind the history of this Distribution. Last time I read about it I found out that is paid and I never considered it, because of that. I'm using Slackware for most of my servers, but I don't know what is the target market or what is more special in Red Hat Enterprise.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- ccoggins 13y ago
  It's been necessary to pay for RHEL for a while now. When you pay your subscription, you do get support from RHEL as well. However, if you just want to try the OS, you can go get CentOS. Since RHEL is open source, the CentOS team removes the RHEL name from everywhere and recompiles it. One market that it seems to be strong in is the defense world, since RHEL is one of the few OS' that get various certifications for safety and security.
- mhurron 13y ago
  > I don't know what is the target market or what is more special in Red Hat Enterprise. Enterprise. You kind of answered your own question. > Slackware for most of my servers Ya, you're not the target market. Also, you might be a masochist.
- mdmarra 13y ago
  There are some misconceptions here. RHEL does not cost a cent. Support for RHEL, which includes security fixes through the package manager costs money. Security fixes and other patches and updates are still released as source by RHEL, as required by the GPL. If you really wanted, you could run RHEL with no subscription and compile your own updates from the source that they release. In practice, this is next to impossible to maintain as an individual, but it is exactly what CentOS, Scientific Linux, and other related EL distributions do. They remove the RHEL trademarked logos, compile the code released by RHEL, and make it available through a generic yum repository that doesn't require a RHEL subscription. So, in short, RHEL doesn't cost money, support and packaged patches do. CentOS gives you binary and version compatibility of RHEL without the cost.
tirant 13y ago
For Desktop users (RHEL is also used in workstation environments): "Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 beta includes three desktops to match different work styles and preferences: GNOME 3, GNOME Classic, and KDE"
svennek 13y ago
Has anyone found the root password for the kvm qcow2?
- kinneyd81 13y ago
  I had to boot from an .iso and mount up the filesystem to reset it. Also disabled selinux on reboot. If you find it out, please post, I'm curious myself.
  - svennek 13y ago
    I mounted it (by the ways of qemu-nbd and so forth) and chrooted into it. It seems like there are no accounts with a valid password in it..
    - hvs2 13y ago
      Based on https://access.redhat.com/site/solutions/641193 https://access.redhat.com/site/solutions/641193 the root account is disabled but sudo is granted to the uid 'cloud-user'. Basically, it is configured to use cloud-init and be provisioned ssh keys. If a root password is required, the KB recommends using 'guestfish --rw -a <image>', mounting the filesystem, and running vi against /etc/shadow.
- rwmj 13y ago
  No idea, but virt-edit will let you remove the root password from any disk image: http://libguestfs.org/guestfs-recipes.1.html#remove-root-password-linux http://libguestfs.org/guestfs-recipes.1.html#remove-root-pas...
vondur 13y ago
Wow, XFS by default, is there any other distro that uses it by default? Makes me miss my old SGI machines...
- chjohnst 13y ago
  Not sure actually, pretty bold of RH but they have put a ton of dev time behind it with gluster so I guess it only makes sense.
- zx2c4 13y ago
  I was struck by that too, and came here to make the same comment. Why do you suppose they went with XFS? Ext4 seems like the defacto file system these days, but I know a lot of people seem to prefer XFS for one reason or another. It's a surprise to me that RHEL decided to default too it. Anybody care to shed some light?
  - JSno 13y ago
    http://lwn.net/Articles/573690/ http://lwn.net/Articles/573690/ Dave is a redhat employee.
  - rwmj 13y ago
    It's all about expected disk sizes in 10 years time (when RHEL 7 main support ends). Ext4 scales up to around 16 TB -- I know it theoretically can support a much larger volume size, but in practice it doesn't work so well. XFS handles tens of terabytes without a problem and Red Hat has been supporting huge XFS volumes for years with many customers (who in earlier versions of RHEL paid extra for that support).
  - justin66 13y ago
    Dave Chinner's talk is great: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FegjLbCnoBw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FegjLbCnoBw
  - conception 13y ago
    Their gluster server offering also uses XFS, so probably for support reasons, they saw XFS had better long term support for both sets of users.
jlgaddis 13y ago
I'm happy that MariaDB 5.5 is replacing MySQL but not so happy that Thunderbird is being removed in favor of Evolution. XFS is the default filesystem. "Multiple required authentications" in OpenSSH. Nifty.
- oofabz 13y ago
  It's probably because Mozilla announced that Thunderbird is now in maintenance mode. They do not plan to add features or make major changes anymore. To some that may mean Thunderbird is complete and mature, but RedHat must believe that Thunderbird is now a dead end. https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird/New_Release_and_Governance_Model https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird/New_Release_and_Governa...
jlgaddis 13y ago
64-bit ISO: ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/redhat/rhel/beta/7/x86_64/iso/rhel-everything-7.0-beta-1-x86_64-dvd.iso
- keithpeter 13y ago
  Is this an 'open' beta or do you need a subscriber key? Just curious, I usually wait for CentOS for a desktop installation on a laptop
  - rodgerd 13y ago
    Their betas are open, but you may not receive much in the way of updates (including security updates) if my experience with the RHEL 6 beta was anything to go by. You should be able to flip into CentOS 7 fairly easily when they release, though.
    - keithpeter 13y ago
      I'll install it on an external hard drive and have a play. Thanks.
thyrsus 13y ago
How long were the beta periods for RHEL 4, 5, 6? I know there's no commitment, but I'd like to tighten my vague idea of how long the beta period will be. Right now, I guess more than a day and less than a year.
- derekp7 13y ago
  Typically about 6 months, judging from the press releases announcing the public betas of 4, 5, and 6, and comparing to the GA release dates. RHEL 4 beta: Sep 27, 2004 / GA: Feb 15, 2005 RHEL 5 beta: Sep 7, 2006 / GA: Mar 15, 2007 RHEL 6 beta: Apr 21, 2010 / GA: Nov 9, 2010
ts4z 13y ago
Anybody know if they have the new C++ toolchain that will allow Chrome to start working again?
e40 13y ago
I'm glad I can stay on 6.x until all the kinks are worked out with systemd. I was on whatever Fedora made the switch to systemd and it was pretty painful.
rodgerd 13y ago
Performance Co-Pilot being bundled as part of the monitoring tools is pretty interesting; I see one of the devs has been blogging about it in the last month or so: http://developerblog.redhat.com/2013/11/19/exploratory-performance-pcp/ http://developerblog.redhat.com/2013/11/19/exploratory-perfo... and http://developerblog.redhat.com/2013/11/26/performance-regression-pcp/ http://developerblog.redhat.com/2013/11/26/performance-regre...
- Game_Ender 13y ago
  That is a very awesome tool, I am really wondering why I have not seen it before.
  - rodgerd 13y ago
    I saw at at linux.conf.au in 2010 and it looked good, but also as though it hadn't been worked on for a while. It looks like it's had a lot of neat stuff added in the last 3 years.
rob22 13y ago
I am looking forward work with XFS....how is possible to migrate XFS from ext4 if i want to update RHEL 6.x to RHEL 7....

130 points by palebluedot 13y ago

"Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 beta includes three desktops to match different work styles and preferences: GNOME 3, GNOME Classic, and KDE." I know that RHEL is mainly used on servers, but this development looks significant to me. I look forward to an eventual CentOS 7 release with a choice of desktops.

csmuk 13y ago
As someone who uses CentOS 6 on the desktop, people really should take a look at this. For me, it's the only Linux desktop which I can find which is reliable and works out of the box with all my hardware.
- agibsonccc 13y ago
  Watch it with wifi on newer hardware though. It's rock solid 90% of the time, but I've had issues in the past (especially with Atheros cards) I usually prefer that. I'm actually using fedora with MATE to get a similar UX.
- keithpeter 13y ago
  Yes, I have CentOS 6 on a Thinkpad x200s with hard drive encryption enabled as my work machine. I find it stable and quite fast. I may leave that machine on CentOS 6 and put 7 on the 'play' laptop. My point was giving a choice of desktops is a new departure for Red Hat. Remember that they employ, or have employed, a number of the Gnome developers, and that I gather Red Hat has been a major sponsor of Gnome in the past.
  - TallGuyShort 13y ago
    >> giving a choice of desktops is a new departure for Red Hat Is it? I've only used RHEL on servers but I've used CentOS on my desktops and laptops for a long time with many re-installs - I've always seen the choice to use KDE as part of the base install.
    - kbenson 13y ago
      Yeah, coming from the RH/Fedora world, it seemed weird when other distros starting spinning specialized versions for a different window manager on the desktop, such as kubuntu. I guess that's because they wanted to have more control over the "experience". RHEL is about getting shit done when you know what you are doing, not holding your hand and making you feel comfortable, so I guess with those different expectations it's a bit easier.
      - keypusher 13y ago
        Fedora ships a whole bunch of different spins, including desktop flavors. http://spins.fedoraproject.org/ http://spins.fedoraproject.org/
        kbenson 13y ago
        Did they always? I remember it usually being as simple as installing the RPMs, and running the switchdesk utility. I always had to do that (or generally something more involved because of my choice) to run FVWM2.
        Shish2k 13y ago
        Ubuntu also allows you to just install the packages for a different desktop; the differently branded install CDs are mostly for people who come from windows or OSX and thus believe that the desktop == the OS and it's impossible to change once installed :P
    - keithpeter 13y ago
      Then I must be mistaken, thanks. I've tended to associate CentOS with Gnome, and I installed from live CD with a reduced package set. I still think it is significant that Red Hat are publicising the choices.
      - TallGuyShort 13y ago
        Yeah - Gnome was definitely the subtle default. IIRC correctly, the Gnome option is called "Desktop", and the KDE option was called "KDE" (or something like this). So unless you had a known preference, you'd end up with Gnome. Contrast this with openSuSE that has 2 specifically-named download options.

rch 13y ago

"All Java 7 packages (java-1.7.0-openjdk, java-1.7.0-oracle, java-1.7.0-ibm) in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 beta let you install multiple versions in parallel, similarly to the kernel." This sounds pretty convenient to me.

catinsocks 13y ago
I don't think that this is new (other than 1.7 being the default now) unless they are using something other than alternatives: https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/JBoss_Enterprise_Web_Platform/5/html/Installation_Guide/sect-use_alternatives_to_set_default_JDK.html https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/JBoss_Ent...
- rch 13y ago
  New to me :) What I recall from a while ago is finding systems with just openjdk and having to install the 'official' version manually. That could have been Fedora though.

rdtsc 13y ago

This is very exciting. I know until it gets all the government certs and rubber stamps I won't be able to use it at work but if it is out the ball can start rolling as they say. Here is the list of all the detail (tech notes): https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/7-Beta/html-single/7.0_Release_Notes/index.html https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_E... You can see updated and deprecated packages as well as issues so far in beta.

pantalaimon 13y ago
I'm surprised by their removal of all these wifi drivers.
- ldng 13y ago
  Well, it is a server product so WiFi support isn't very relevant. The wire is still easier to secure so it might help for certification (speculating here).
Zoomla 13y ago
Does government certs mean backdoors?
- jlas 13y ago
  No. The government has to certify the system before it can be used on government networks. This is so companies can sell compliant RHEL7-based solutions to military and other government organizations.
- rdtsc 13y ago
  Those are orthogonal concepts ;-)
polvi 13y ago
Which certs are most important these days for govt use? Or does it depend on which department you're going for?

dschiptsov 13y ago

Fedora 18 is already matured?) Or it is based on outdated 17th?

keithpeter 13y ago
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTU0MDk http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTU0MDk Suggests Fedora 19 package set and 3.10 kernel.
- sturadnidge 13y ago
  If I'm not mistaken nodejs was in that package set, good step forward for enterprise adoption if it's in RHEL7!
  - rodgerd 13y ago
    node.js is already in the Software Collections repo for RHEL 6, so you can get a Red Hat supported, maintained node.js already.
    - sturadnidge 13y ago
      Did not know that, cheers!
jgillich 13y ago
At least the installer is a newer version, looks like it's from Fedora 19.
- chjohnst 13y ago
  uses tmux yay!
chjohnst 13y ago
Supposed to be based off F19, with full systemd support (just like fedora).

berkut 13y ago

Anyone know what version of gcc it'll ship with? Couldn't find that in the tech overview PDF...

nailer 13y ago
From Chapter 11: Compilers and Tools in release notes: 11.1. GCC Toolchain In Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 Beta, the gcc toolchain is based on the gcc-4.8.x release series, and includes numerous enhancements and bugfixes relative to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 equivalent. Similarly, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 includes binutils-2.23.52.x. These versions correspond to the equivalent tools in Red Hat Developer Toolset 2.0; a detailed comparison of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 gcc and binutils versions can therefore be seen here: https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Developer_Toolset/2/html-single/User_Guide/index.html#sect-Changes_in_Version_2.0-GCC https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_D... https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Developer_Toolset/2/html-single/User_Guide/index.html#sect-Changes_in_Version_2.0-binutils https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_D... Notable highlights of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 Beta toolchain are the following: - Experimental support for building applications compliant with C++11 (including full C++11 language support) and some experimental support for C11 features. - Improved support for programming parallel applications, including OpenMP v3.1, C++11 Types and GCC Built-ins for Atomic Memory Access and experimental support for transactional memory (including Intel RTM/HLE intrinsics, built-ins, and code generation) - A new local register allocator (LRA), improving code performance. - DWARF4 is now used as the default debug format. A variety of new architecture-specific options. - Support for AMD family 15h and 16h processors. - Link-time optimization support. - Enhanced warnings and diagnostics. - A variety of new Fortran features.
chjohnst 13y ago
4.8.2 it looks like
jgillich 13y ago
It's 4.8.2

WestCoastJustin 13y ago

> Improved Application Performance and Isolation. Run applications in isolated and secure lightweight containers utilizing SELinux and resource management. Linux containers provide a method of isolating a process and simulating its environment inside a single host. It provides application sandboxing technology to run applications in a secure container environment, isolated from other applications running in the same host operating system environment. Linux containers are useful when multiple copies of an application or workload need to be run in isolation, but share environments and resources. [1] Looks like there is a major shift in that they will support containers out of the box now. Hopefully we will see some type of GUI to create containers and manage cgroups. There has also been major effort assigned to getting containers working with OpenStack and Docker. You can manually download/compile LXC today, on RHEL 6.4, but it seems like a bit of a hack, since you need to figure out networking and LVM on your own, never mind building base container images. Should be interesting. [1] https://access.redhat.com/site/sites/default/files/pages/attachments/rhel_whatsnewrhel7beta_techoverview_.pdf https://access.redhat.com/site/sites/default/files/pages/att...

sharprazor 13y ago
Sounds a lot like Solaris containers of a decade ago.
- WestCoastJustin 13y ago
  Yeah, I have been doing some research for an upcoming screencast, and this type of idea is called Operating system-level virtualization [1], and there is a fairly good table with the various OS's and their take on OS-level virtualization. E.g. Solaris Containers, FreeBSD Jail, OpenVZ, HP-UX Containers, etc. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system-level_virtualization http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system-level_virtuali...
  - ghaff 13y ago
    Here's a background piece on containers that I wrote a few months back: http://bitmason.blogspot.com/2013/09/what-are-containers-anyway.html http://bitmason.blogspot.com/2013/09/what-are-containers-any...

radoslawc 13y ago

I'm glad to see XFS got some love. Also PTP is nice feature.

chjohnst 13y ago
PTP testing so far is looking quite good!

diakritikal 13y ago

> systemd & OpenLMI With the next SLES also going systemd by default, Do you think this will force the hand of the few holdouts left? Going I can't see vendors wanting to support all of systemd, upstart, sysvinit.

deleted 13y ago
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air 13y ago
Debian seems to feel that way and is choosing between upstart and systemd http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=727708 http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=727708

shmerl 13y ago

How far away do you think is the release?

nailer 13y ago

> The Btrfs file system is now supported. Nice. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Btrfs#Features http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Btrfs#Features

sharprazor 13y ago
Is ReiserFS still supported? I've heard that it's a killer filesystem.
- deleted 13y ago
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sciurus 13y ago
From the draft of the new storage administration guide: Btrfs is still being actively evaluated for stability during the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 beta. The following target use cases will only be fully supported if it passes our tests: * The system partition only use case. This will allow btrfs only to get used for system installation, not only for a user's data. Currently it is unclear whether this will be restricted to this single disk or not. * Use btrfs for desktop and laptop users including their data partitions. * Use btrfs as the base file system under scale out "big data" file systems, such as gluster and Ceph. https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/7-Beta/html-single/Storage_Administration_Guide/index.html#ch-btrfs https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_E...

Spiritus 13y ago

Anyone know which Python version will get bundled with RHEL 7?

yxhuvud 13y ago
It says in the link, though I suppose it is only a beta still.
greut 13y ago
2.7.5 according to Distrowatch (http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=redhat http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=redhat)
gerjomarty 13y ago
From the release notes[1], at least the beta version comes with Python 2.7.5. [1]: https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/7-Beta/html-single/7.0_Release_Notes/index.html https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_E...
emmelaich 13y ago
Python 3 will be an option.

drinchev 13y ago

Can anyone explain a bit more about what happened to Red Hat? I'm about behind the history of this Distribution. Last time I read about it I found out that is paid and I never considered it, because of that. I'm using Slackware for most of my servers, but I don't know what is the target market or what is more special in Red Hat Enterprise.

deleted 13y ago
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ccoggins 13y ago
It's been necessary to pay for RHEL for a while now. When you pay your subscription, you do get support from RHEL as well. However, if you just want to try the OS, you can go get CentOS. Since RHEL is open source, the CentOS team removes the RHEL name from everywhere and recompiles it. One market that it seems to be strong in is the defense world, since RHEL is one of the few OS' that get various certifications for safety and security.
mhurron 13y ago
> I don't know what is the target market or what is more special in Red Hat Enterprise. Enterprise. You kind of answered your own question. > Slackware for most of my servers Ya, you're not the target market. Also, you might be a masochist.
mdmarra 13y ago
There are some misconceptions here. RHEL does not cost a cent. Support for RHEL, which includes security fixes through the package manager costs money. Security fixes and other patches and updates are still released as source by RHEL, as required by the GPL. If you really wanted, you could run RHEL with no subscription and compile your own updates from the source that they release. In practice, this is next to impossible to maintain as an individual, but it is exactly what CentOS, Scientific Linux, and other related EL distributions do. They remove the RHEL trademarked logos, compile the code released by RHEL, and make it available through a generic yum repository that doesn't require a RHEL subscription. So, in short, RHEL doesn't cost money, support and packaged patches do. CentOS gives you binary and version compatibility of RHEL without the cost.

tirant 13y ago

For Desktop users (RHEL is also used in workstation environments): "Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 beta includes three desktops to match different work styles and preferences: GNOME 3, GNOME Classic, and KDE"

svennek 13y ago

Has anyone found the root password for the kvm qcow2?

kinneyd81 13y ago
I had to boot from an .iso and mount up the filesystem to reset it. Also disabled selinux on reboot. If you find it out, please post, I'm curious myself.
- svennek 13y ago
  I mounted it (by the ways of qemu-nbd and so forth) and chrooted into it. It seems like there are no accounts with a valid password in it..
  - hvs2 13y ago
    Based on https://access.redhat.com/site/solutions/641193 https://access.redhat.com/site/solutions/641193 the root account is disabled but sudo is granted to the uid 'cloud-user'. Basically, it is configured to use cloud-init and be provisioned ssh keys. If a root password is required, the KB recommends using 'guestfish --rw -a <image>', mounting the filesystem, and running vi against /etc/shadow.
rwmj 13y ago
No idea, but virt-edit will let you remove the root password from any disk image: http://libguestfs.org/guestfs-recipes.1.html#remove-root-password-linux http://libguestfs.org/guestfs-recipes.1.html#remove-root-pas...

vondur 13y ago

Wow, XFS by default, is there any other distro that uses it by default? Makes me miss my old SGI machines...

chjohnst 13y ago
Not sure actually, pretty bold of RH but they have put a ton of dev time behind it with gluster so I guess it only makes sense.
zx2c4 13y ago
I was struck by that too, and came here to make the same comment. Why do you suppose they went with XFS? Ext4 seems like the defacto file system these days, but I know a lot of people seem to prefer XFS for one reason or another. It's a surprise to me that RHEL decided to default too it. Anybody care to shed some light?
- JSno 13y ago
  http://lwn.net/Articles/573690/ http://lwn.net/Articles/573690/ Dave is a redhat employee.
- rwmj 13y ago
  It's all about expected disk sizes in 10 years time (when RHEL 7 main support ends). Ext4 scales up to around 16 TB -- I know it theoretically can support a much larger volume size, but in practice it doesn't work so well. XFS handles tens of terabytes without a problem and Red Hat has been supporting huge XFS volumes for years with many customers (who in earlier versions of RHEL paid extra for that support).
- justin66 13y ago
  Dave Chinner's talk is great: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FegjLbCnoBw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FegjLbCnoBw
- conception 13y ago
  Their gluster server offering also uses XFS, so probably for support reasons, they saw XFS had better long term support for both sets of users.

jlgaddis 13y ago

I'm happy that MariaDB 5.5 is replacing MySQL but not so happy that Thunderbird is being removed in favor of Evolution. XFS is the default filesystem. "Multiple required authentications" in OpenSSH. Nifty.

oofabz 13y ago
It's probably because Mozilla announced that Thunderbird is now in maintenance mode. They do not plan to add features or make major changes anymore. To some that may mean Thunderbird is complete and mature, but RedHat must believe that Thunderbird is now a dead end. https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird/New_Release_and_Governance_Model https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird/New_Release_and_Governa...

jlgaddis 13y ago

64-bit ISO: ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/redhat/rhel/beta/7/x86_64/iso/rhel-everything-7.0-beta-1-x86_64-dvd.iso

keithpeter 13y ago
Is this an 'open' beta or do you need a subscriber key? Just curious, I usually wait for CentOS for a desktop installation on a laptop
- rodgerd 13y ago
  Their betas are open, but you may not receive much in the way of updates (including security updates) if my experience with the RHEL 6 beta was anything to go by. You should be able to flip into CentOS 7 fairly easily when they release, though.
  - keithpeter 13y ago
    I'll install it on an external hard drive and have a play. Thanks.

thyrsus 13y ago

How long were the beta periods for RHEL 4, 5, 6? I know there's no commitment, but I'd like to tighten my vague idea of how long the beta period will be. Right now, I guess more than a day and less than a year.

derekp7 13y ago
Typically about 6 months, judging from the press releases announcing the public betas of 4, 5, and 6, and comparing to the GA release dates. RHEL 4 beta: Sep 27, 2004 / GA: Feb 15, 2005 RHEL 5 beta: Sep 7, 2006 / GA: Mar 15, 2007 RHEL 6 beta: Apr 21, 2010 / GA: Nov 9, 2010

ts4z 13y ago

Anybody know if they have the new C++ toolchain that will allow Chrome to start working again?

e40 13y ago

I'm glad I can stay on 6.x until all the kinks are worked out with systemd. I was on whatever Fedora made the switch to systemd and it was pretty painful.

rodgerd 13y ago

Performance Co-Pilot being bundled as part of the monitoring tools is pretty interesting; I see one of the devs has been blogging about it in the last month or so: http://developerblog.redhat.com/2013/11/19/exploratory-performance-pcp/ http://developerblog.redhat.com/2013/11/19/exploratory-perfo... and http://developerblog.redhat.com/2013/11/26/performance-regression-pcp/ http://developerblog.redhat.com/2013/11/26/performance-regre...

Game_Ender 13y ago
That is a very awesome tool, I am really wondering why I have not seen it before.
- rodgerd 13y ago
  I saw at at linux.conf.au in 2010 and it looked good, but also as though it hadn't been worked on for a while. It looks like it's had a lot of neat stuff added in the last 3 years.

rob22 13y ago

I am looking forward work with XFS....how is possible to migrate XFS from ext4 if i want to update RHEL 6.x to RHEL 7....