RIP CentOS

ComputerBox34

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With IBM killing CentOS, what will the IT professionals here be moving to as a replacement?

FYI - IBM unilaterally changed End of Support for CentOS8 from 2029 to 2021. End of Support for CentOS7 remains at 2024 but for all we know, they could change that to.

Thinking of evaluating openSUSE to replace my CentOS7 boxes. Will probably start with my home servers and see how it goes.
 
I've always been pretty agnostic to centos vs ubuntu so if they want to force our hand fine with me ubuntu 2020.
 
CentOS was always my goto solution. I don't trust ubuntu for anything but a desktop os, and I Outright hate debian.
 
I'm quite happy with Ubuntu Server here at the house and at work for certain things.

The way to go though would be Rocky Linux which is heir apparent to CentOS once it's released. https://rockylinux.org/
 
CentOS was always my goto solution. I don't trust ubuntu for anything but a desktop os, and I Outright hate debian.
Agree with you on Ubuntu. Problem with Debian is that it is a community supported OS.

That's why I think SUSE is the next logical choice. Uses RPM packages and uses the same binaries as SUSE enterprise linux. If you need to switch from openSUSE to SUSE enterprise, it should be as painless as going from CentOS to RHEL. Same goes for support.
 
Well that sucks. I'm not a big Linux guy but for the few Linux servers I have to run they are all CentOS.
 
We've been 50/50 between CentOS and Ubuntu Server. We'll be going Ubuntu exclusively now.
 
There's an immediate choice that even has a migration tool, and that's to migrate to Oracle Linux, which is also built from Red Hat sources (like CentOs).

However, that requires swallowing the "Oracle" pill, and if anyone is going to kill your puppy and eat your children, it's Oracle (they love their customers).

The "not there yet" solution is Rocky Linux, which is where some of the CentOs folks will "want" to go. I figure, "we" have a year. So this might be the better choice unless Red Hat regains their sanity (there's a ton of pride at Red Hat that prevents them from listening though).
 
There's an immediate choice that even has a migration tool, and that's to migrate to Oracle Linux, which is also built from Red Hat sources (like CentOs).

However, that requires swallowing the "Oracle" pill, and if anyone is going to kill your puppy and eat your children, it's Oracle (they love their customers).

The "not there yet" solution is Rocky Linux, which is where some of the CentOs folks will "want" to go. I figure, "we" have a year. So this might be the better choice unless Red Hat regains their sanity (there's a ton of pride at Red Hat that prevents them from listening though).
Agreed on Oracle. I'd have no problem running Rocky on personal servers but selling it as an enterprise solution to internal stakeholders is going to be challenging to say the least. That's why I think SUSE may be the better way to go.

I looked at RHEL's advertised pricing and licensing model for posterity and it definitely would not be insignificant. I run everything in AWS and checked their marketplace but all of the official RHEL images are showing $0/hr software cost which made me think it must be BYOL but when I look at redhat's site, it says all billing is handled via Amazon. Confusing to say the least.
 
Why wouldn't you 'trust' Ubuntu? I trust Ubuntu a vast magnatude more than I trust Apple or Microsoft, especially when I'm paying for Ubuntu support.
 
We already have plans in place to move our CentOS servers to Ubuntu. Support and stability are king and Ubuntu is the best choice for us.
 
Agreed on Oracle. I'd have no problem running Rocky on personal servers but selling it as an enterprise solution to internal stakeholders is going to be challenging to say the least. That's why I think SUSE may be the better way to go.

I looked at RHEL's advertised pricing and licensing model for posterity and it definitely would not be insignificant. I run everything in AWS and checked their marketplace but all of the official RHEL images are showing $0/hr software cost which made me think it must be BYOL but when I look at redhat's site, it says all billing is handled via Amazon. Confusing to say the least.
RHEL's pricing (IMHO) dates back to days when PAE mode Window Server would run you $15K. As weird as it sounds, Windows is now price competitive with Red Hat pricing, which is a sure "no deal" for many companies. Red Hat needs a bit of work.
 
I've run Ubuntu servers for years with great success.
We have a couple but not really in production yet. Its mostly just servers I use for personal tasks like RMAN backups. We are migrating our entire phone system to Ubuntu Server after Christmas, but lucky for me that's a vendor's job, not mine. I do like that we are actually looking at Ubuntu instead of just saying screw it, and putting up another Windows server box. My boss is very Microsoft oriented.
 
On the Linux Unplugged podcast, they had a guest from Red Hat who discussed this. Apparently there are going to be expanded free versions of RHEL made available early next year. I'm sure this will be more for personal use type situations, but there also might be options for SMB customers as well. That being said, I agree with you all that this is a stupid move. I was wondering how long it would take for IBM to drag Red Hat into the gutter. Not long is the apparent answer to that question. Personally I'm unaffected because all of the servers I run are Ubuntu based, but I really feel for everyone who is standardized on CentOS, and especially for those who just migrated to 8 from 7 thinking they'd have years of support. Really bad move on IBM/Red Hat's part. Strikes me as if they are trying to force people to pay as IBM probably over payed for Red Hat and now are desperate to make an ROI. Of course, the opposite is what I see happening. People are just going to go elsewhere.
 
At first I wanted to blame IBM for this, but was lambasted by a Red Hat manager. That is, the decision to nuke CentOs was purely a Red Hat subsidiary decision and not driven at all by IBM. Red Hat, and Red Hat alone acted to kill off CentOs. All damage to their customer base was done solely by managers within Red Hat and had nothing to do with IBM.
 
At first I wanted to blame IBM for this, but was lambasted by a Red Hat manager. That is, the decision to nuke CentOs was purely a Red Hat subsidiary decision and not driven at all by IBM. Red Hat, and Red Hat alone acted to kill off CentOs. All damage to their customer base was done solely by managers within Red Hat and had nothing to do with IBM.
Hahahaha.

How nieve do they think we are?

I'm sure IBM set revenue/margin targets for RedHat as a BU that left them scrambling looking for untapped revenue. Lowest hanging fruit were all of the "freeloaders" using CentOS in production but didn't need official support.

So yeah, I'm sure this was a decision by RedHat management....
 
Hahahaha.

How nieve do they think we are?

I'm sure IBM set revenue/margin targets for RedHat as a BU that left them scrambling looking for untapped revenue. Lowest hanging fruit were all of the "freeloaders" using CentOS in production but didn't need official support.

So yeah, I'm sure this was a decision by RedHat management....
I can only tell you that Red Hat wants all of the blame on themselves. That's all I can tell you.
 
This is going to be interesting and messy. My whole damned industry runs on RHEL/CentOS, and most shops use both. Even the really conservative ones typically use CentOS on dev boxes. I wonder how many different flavors we'll end up supporting. I'm sure we'll get more interest in Ubuntu and likely SUSE.
 
This is going to be interesting and messy. My whole damned industry runs on RHEL/CentOS, and most shops use both. Even the really conservative ones typically use CentOS on dev boxes. I wonder how many different flavors we'll end up supporting. I'm sure we'll get more interest in Ubuntu and likely SUSE.
Well, one thing to keep in mind, is that CentOS Stream isn't a rolling release in the traditional sense. It's only ever going to be one minor point release ahead of RHEL. So if RHEL is at 8.2, then Stream would be at 8.3. So, for dev box purposes that might actually be perfect as you could use it to ensure compatibility with the future minor point release of RHEL before it releases.
 
Well, one thing to keep in mind, is that CentOS Stream isn't a rolling release in the traditional sense. It's only ever going to be one minor point release ahead of RHEL. So if RHEL is at 8.2, then Stream would be at 8.3. So, for dev box purposes that might actually be perfect as you could use it to ensure compatibility with the future minor point release of RHEL before it releases.
I agree with this. For "dev" where being "down" isn't that big of a deal (oops, RH has to fix), or "change" (deprecation, radical feature change) that effectively forces a down in order to adapt, this probably isn't a big deal.
 
Well, one thing to keep in mind, is that CentOS Stream isn't a rolling release in the traditional sense. It's only ever going to be one minor point release ahead of RHEL. So if RHEL is at 8.2, then Stream would be at 8.3. So, for dev box purposes that might actually be perfect as you could use it to ensure compatibility with the future minor point release of RHEL before it releases.
I could see using Stream on QA, test and dev boxes. Being a step ahead would make sense.

The thing I'm worried about is our customers dumping RedHat and going in different directions. I work for a software vendor. We might get a bunch of smaller shops that want Ubuntu, European customers going to SUSE, etc. It could double or triple the number of distributions we have to do builds and QA on.

edit: fix typo
 
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To me it's frustrating when a "rich" company changes things instead of creating what they need. Maybe they aren't nearly as well off as they say they are.
 
To me it's frustrating when a "rich" company changes things instead of creating what they need. Maybe they aren't nearly as well off as they say they are.
You can never be so rich that corporate greed wouldn't come into play.
 
To me it's frustrating when a "rich" company changes things instead of creating what they need. Maybe they aren't nearly as well off as they say they are.
cjcox you are confusing a rich company for a company that actually cares about end users...all they care about are end users who pay for support, not the freeloaders.
 
cjcox you are confusing a rich company for a company that actually cares about end users...all they care about are end users who pay for support, not the freeloaders.
I do believe it was Red Hat who conquered CentOs in order to "maintain control" of it. I don't think customers of FOSS are freeloaders. Just a shame that Red Hat decided to do this.
 
I do believe it was Red Hat who conquered CentOs in order to "maintain control" of it. I don't think customers of FOSS are freeloaders. Just a shame that Red Hat decided to do this.
It's almost like Red Hat has turned into the linux version of 90's Microsoft. Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.
 
It's almost like Red Hat has turned into the linux version of 90's Microsoft. Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.
Ever sat thru one of their open shift or “future of Dev” presentations?
Yes, there is an MS alignment here, but I see it as a hard push away from selling OS licensing to a whole new set of workflow whether you like it or not.....at a high level.
 
I've run Ubuntu servers for years with great success.
Likewise...I really like Ubuntu server, although occasional design choices (eg the constant network config files chaning) are not optimal...
 
Ubuntu is not alone in the changes, many other developers do changes that break existing configs. It's extremely irritating, especially when there's no real need for a change, just their change of mind.
 
Can't say this surprises me at all. Figured it was a matter of time when Red Hat "adopted" Cent. Personally, I been using Ubuntu server for over a decade and am quite happy with it.
 
Anyone seen any leaks on what the "free" or "low cost" options they're supposedly going to announce are? I'm betting on at least free for personal home use RHEL, but haven't seen anything on the details. Free or cheap development licenses wouldn't surprise me either.
 
Anyone seen any leaks on what the "free" or "low cost" options they're supposedly going to announce are? I'm betting on at least free for personal home use RHEL, but haven't seen anything on the details. Free or cheap development licenses wouldn't surprise me either.
My guess is that they they will just modify the terms of their existing development program to allow home use, more simultaneous installs and a more liberal enforcement mechanism however they will still state that for-profit companies will still have to pay I'm sure. Anybody who migrates from Cent to RHEL would still incur a cost or they can choose to use it against EULA depending on what type of shop they are. I doubt it will change the direction of anyone currently looking for alternatives.
 
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