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The tragedy (from wikipedia): On 21 July 2011, Oracle announced they acquired Ksplice, Inc. At the time the company was acquired, Ksplice, Inc. claimed to have

The tragedy (from wikipedia): On 21 July 2011, Oracle announced they acquired Ksplice, Inc. At the time the company was acquired, Ksplice, Inc. claimed to have over 700 companies using the service to protect over 100,000 servers. While the service had been available for multiple Linux distributions, it was stated at the time of acquisition that "Oracle believes it will be the only enterprise Linux provider that can offer zero downtime updates." More explicitly, "Oracle does not plan to support the use of Ksplice technology with Red Hat Enterprise Linux."[5] Existing legacy customers continue to be supported by Ksplice, but no new customers are being accepted for other platforms.[11] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ksplice https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ksplice

tedks 12y ago
The Uptrack service was obviously proprietary, but the Ksplice software itself (everything to actually make and install the patches) was open source. There are plenty of mirrors on github: https://github.com/linux-kernel-live-patching/ksplice https://github.com/linux-kernel-live-patching/ksplice But there's also kgraft and kpatch.
amalag 12y ago
I thought they merged this in with their Oracle Linux http://www.oracle.com/us/technologies/linux/ksplice-datasheet-487388.pdf http://www.oracle.com/us/technologies/linux/ksplice-datashee... http://www.ksplice.com/uptrack/using http://www.ksplice.com/uptrack/using
tshtf 12y ago
Not exactly the case: Ubuntu, Fedora and Debian are supported for free, and RHEL for a fee: Ksplice Uptrack is available for Oracle Linux, free of charge, for Oracle Linux customers with a Premier support subscription. Additionally, anyone can use Ksplice Uptrack for free on Ubuntu Desktop and Fedora. http://www.ksplice.com/pricing http://www.ksplice.com/pricing
- vertex-four 12y ago
  Thing is, while Oracle Linux is pretty much rebranded RHEL last time I checked, the KSplice commercial license won't let you use it with RHEL, and that won't be supported.
  - fragmede 12y ago
    It is, you just have to buy an Oracle Premier Support License for your machine(s) and switch them from Red Hat to Oracle Linux (which requires switching yum repos, removing some packages, and installing a few others), but does not require a reboot - which means you can keep using the official Red Hat kernel (until you do reboot). Disclaimer: I work there.
    - ryan-c 12y ago
      You forgot the part where you give Oracle your balls on a silver platter so they can hold them for you. We've all seen what Oracle likes to do with nice things.
    - deleted 12y ago
      [deleted]
  - dmourati 12y ago
    Fairly sure Oracle Linux was at least in its initial incarnation a rebranded CentOS, which itself is of course a rebranded RHEL.
- e40 12y ago
  That "pricing" page is strangely devoid of pricing information. EDIT: so, how much does it cost?
  - SoftwareMaven 12y ago
    For Ubuntu, Fedora and Debian, nothing. For Oracle Linux, you need an Oracle support contract. Those don't come with a standard price tag. Unfortunately, the website hasn't been fully updated since the acquisition, so there is some confusing verbiage. It's on my list (near the top, no less; sorry about the confusion).
    - e40 12y ago
      I'm interested in CentOS.
fragmede 12y ago
I won't mince words, the cost of Ksplice these days is much higher than pre-acquisition, however you can get Ksplice for Enterprise Linux 5, 6 and 7, with the Redhat kernel without rebooting, as well as the Red Hat Compatible Kernel that Oracle recompiles, as well as Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) r1, r2 and r3. https://www.ksplice.com/uptrack/supported-kernels https://www.ksplice.com/uptrack/supported-kernels
lambda 12y ago
Note that since Oracle basically closed ksplice, RedHat has developed kpatch and SuSE has developed kgraft, which are both similar ways of doing the same kind of thing, and there is some discussion going on about whether they can be merged or a better general purpose kernel patching method developed: http://wiki.linuxplumbersconf.org/2014:live_kernel_patching http://wiki.linuxplumbersconf.org/2014:live_kernel_patching
rasz_pl 12y ago
dont worry, no reboot updates are thing of the past thanks to systemd
- xorcist 12y ago
  Care to elaborate?
fafner 12y ago
Red Hat is working on ksplice and SuSE on kGraft. And unlike Ksplice they try to merge it into the mainline kernel.

tedks 12y ago

The Uptrack service was obviously proprietary, but the Ksplice software itself (everything to actually make and install the patches) was open source. There are plenty of mirrors on github: https://github.com/linux-kernel-live-patching/ksplice https://github.com/linux-kernel-live-patching/ksplice But there's also kgraft and kpatch.

amalag 12y ago

I thought they merged this in with their Oracle Linux http://www.oracle.com/us/technologies/linux/ksplice-datasheet-487388.pdf http://www.oracle.com/us/technologies/linux/ksplice-datashee... http://www.ksplice.com/uptrack/using http://www.ksplice.com/uptrack/using

tshtf 12y ago

Not exactly the case: Ubuntu, Fedora and Debian are supported for free, and RHEL for a fee: Ksplice Uptrack is available for Oracle Linux, free of charge, for Oracle Linux customers with a Premier support subscription. Additionally, anyone can use Ksplice Uptrack for free on Ubuntu Desktop and Fedora. http://www.ksplice.com/pricing http://www.ksplice.com/pricing

vertex-four 12y ago
Thing is, while Oracle Linux is pretty much rebranded RHEL last time I checked, the KSplice commercial license won't let you use it with RHEL, and that won't be supported.
- fragmede 12y ago
  It is, you just have to buy an Oracle Premier Support License for your machine(s) and switch them from Red Hat to Oracle Linux (which requires switching yum repos, removing some packages, and installing a few others), but does not require a reboot - which means you can keep using the official Red Hat kernel (until you do reboot). Disclaimer: I work there.
  - ryan-c 12y ago
    You forgot the part where you give Oracle your balls on a silver platter so they can hold them for you. We've all seen what Oracle likes to do with nice things.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
- dmourati 12y ago
  Fairly sure Oracle Linux was at least in its initial incarnation a rebranded CentOS, which itself is of course a rebranded RHEL.
e40 12y ago
That "pricing" page is strangely devoid of pricing information. EDIT: so, how much does it cost?
- SoftwareMaven 12y ago
  For Ubuntu, Fedora and Debian, nothing. For Oracle Linux, you need an Oracle support contract. Those don't come with a standard price tag. Unfortunately, the website hasn't been fully updated since the acquisition, so there is some confusing verbiage. It's on my list (near the top, no less; sorry about the confusion).
  - e40 12y ago
    I'm interested in CentOS.

fragmede 12y ago

I won't mince words, the cost of Ksplice these days is much higher than pre-acquisition, however you can get Ksplice for Enterprise Linux 5, 6 and 7, with the Redhat kernel without rebooting, as well as the Red Hat Compatible Kernel that Oracle recompiles, as well as Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) r1, r2 and r3. https://www.ksplice.com/uptrack/supported-kernels https://www.ksplice.com/uptrack/supported-kernels

lambda 12y ago

Note that since Oracle basically closed ksplice, RedHat has developed kpatch and SuSE has developed kgraft, which are both similar ways of doing the same kind of thing, and there is some discussion going on about whether they can be merged or a better general purpose kernel patching method developed: http://wiki.linuxplumbersconf.org/2014:live_kernel_patching http://wiki.linuxplumbersconf.org/2014:live_kernel_patching

rasz_pl 12y ago

dont worry, no reboot updates are thing of the past thanks to systemd

xorcist 12y ago
Care to elaborate?

fafner 12y ago

Red Hat is working on ksplice and SuSE on kGraft. And unlike Ksplice they try to merge it into the mainline kernel.