Skip to content

Commit

Permalink
Enhanced EL Distro Comparison (#414)
Browse files Browse the repository at this point in the history 
* Enhanced EL Distro Comparison

---------
Co-authored-by: benny Vasquez <[email protected]>
  • Loading branch information
@Noam-Alum
Noam-Alum authored Aug 5, 2024
1 parent 09508d9 commit 41ff4e4
Show file tree
Hide file tree
Showing 2 changed files with 40 additions and 18 deletions.
Binary file added docs/.vuepress/public/images/Comparison-relationship_chart.png
View file
Loading
Sorry, something went wrong. Reload?
Sorry, we cannot display this file.
Sorry, this file is invalid so it cannot be displayed.
58 changes: 40 additions & 18 deletions docs/Comparison.md
View file
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
@@ -1,29 +1,51 @@
---
title: "EL Distro Comparison"
title: "Enterprise Linux Comparison"
---

| Benchmarking against RHEL | AlmaLinux | Oracle Linux | Rocky Linux | CentOS Stream | CentOS Linux |
| -------------------------------------------|--------------------------|------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------- |-------------------|-------------------|
|Production Version | Since March 2021 | Since 2006 | Since June 2021 | Since 2019 | Since 2004 |
|RHEL compatibility| [Fully Compatible][almaabi] | [RHEL compatible](oracleabi) | 1:1 compatible | Compatible within the limits of the [ACG][acg] | Binary Compatible |
|Regular updates delay | About 1 business day | About 1 business day | About 1 business day | Upstream of RHEL | About 1 business day |
|Last minor version release delay | [5 days][alma9.4] | [6 days][oracle9.4] | [8 days][rocky9.4] | N/A | N/A |
|Errata | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No |
|Lifecycle | 10 Years | 10 Years | 10 Years | 5-6 Years | EOL on 2021-12-31 |
|Commercial support | 3rd party | Oracle, 3rd parties | 3rd Party | 3rd party | 3rd party |
|Livepatching service | KernelCare | Oracle Ksplice, KernelCare Available | KernelCare Available | Not available | KernelCare, Kpatch |
|FIPS compliance | Yes | Yes | Planned | Not available | Not available |
|ARM support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
|IBM PowerPC support | Yes | No | Yes (versions ≥ 9) | Yes | Yes |
|IBM Z (s390x) support | Yes | No | Yes (versions ≥ 9) | No | No |
|SecureBoot | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
|Owned By: | AlmaLinux OS Foundation | Oracle Inc | Rocky Enterprise Software Foundation | Red Hat Inc | Red Hat Inc |
|Owned by org type: | Non-Profit 501(c)6 | For Profit C-Corp | For Profit, Public Benefit Corp | For Profit C-Corp | For Profit C-Corp |
# Enterprise Linux Comparison

###### Last updated 2024-07-12

When deciding what OS to use, having specifics outlined in a chart can help many people. The enterprise linux ecosystem is vast and has many differentiators that are nuanced and don't fit easily into charts, but we have attempted to capture some of the differentiations below.

## Technical breakdown

|Benchmarking against RHEL |AlmaLinux OS |Oracle Linux |Rocky Linux |CentOS Stream |RHEL |
|:-------------------------------|------------------------------------------|------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------|-------------------------------|-------------------------------|
|First release |[Mar. '21, AlmaLinux 8.3][alma.initial] |Oct. 2006 |[June '21, Rocky Linux 8.4][rocky.initial]|[Sept. '19, Stream 8.0][stream.initial] |Mar. 2002 |
|RHEL compatibility |minor version** |minor version** |minor version** |major version* |n/a |
|Last minor version release delay|[5 days][alma9.4] |[6 days][oracle9.4] |[8 days][rocky9.4] |n/a |n/a |
|Errata |[Yes](https://errata.almalinux.org/) |Yes |Yes |No |Yes |
|Lifecycle |10 Years |10 Years |10 Years |5.5 Years |10-14 years |
|Commercial support |3rd party |Oracle, 3rd parties |3rd party |3rd Party |1st party (Red Hat) |
|Livepatching service |KernelCare |Oracle Ksplice, KernelCare |KernelCare |Not available |kpatch |
|FIPS compliance*** |[140-3 for 9.2, 3rd party][almalinux.fips]| [Many, 1st party][oracle.fips] |[Planned, via 3rd party][rocky.fips] | Not available |[Many, 1st party][RHEL.fips] |
|Architectures (all: x86_64) |x86_64 (at launch) <br /> aarch64 (since [8.4][alma.aarch]) <br /> ppc64le (since [8.5][alma.ppc])<br />s390x (since [8.6][alma.s390x])<br /> | x86_64 <br /> aarch64 | x86_64 <br />aarch64 (versions ≥ 9)<br /> ppc64le (versions ≥ 9)<br /> s390x (versions ≥ 9)|x86_64 <br />aarch64 <br /> ppc64le <br /> s390x |x86_64 <br />aarch64 <br /> ppc64le <br /> s390x |
|Backing organization |AlmaLinux OS Foundation (501c6 non-profit)|[Oracle, Inc.][oracle.link] |Rocky Enterprise Software Foundation|[Red Hat, Inc.][redhat.link]|[Red Hat, Inc.][centos.link] |

\* major version compatible: aims for compatibility with the corresponding major version of RHEL<br />
** minor version compatible: aims for compatibility with the corresponding minor version of RHEL<br />
*** achieving FIPs compliance is a very complex and multi-year process not easily represented here, but links to the most recent information are provided.

**Note:** Previous versions of this table included a row for SecureBoot, but all distros now offer it, so it was removed.

[binary]: https://almalinux.org/blog/future-of-almalinux/
[oracleabi]: https://www.oracle.com/news/announcement/blog/keep-linux-open-and-free-2023-07-10/
[acg]: https://access.redhat.com/articles/rhel8-abi-compatibility
[alma9.4]: https://almalinux.org/blog/2024-05-06-announcing-94-stable/
[oracle9.4]: https://docs.oracle.com/en/operating-systems/oracle-linux/9/relnotes9.4/
[rocky9.4]: https://rockylinux.org/news/rocky-linux-9-4-ga-release
[alma.initial]: https://almalinux.org/blog/almalinux-os-stable-release-is-live/
[rocky.initial]: https://rockylinux.org/news/rocky-linux-8-4-ga-release
[stream.initial]: https://lists.centos.org/pipermail/centos-announce/2019-September/023449.html
[alma.aarch]: https://almalinux.org/blog/almalinux-os-8-4-for-arm-aarch64-now-available/
[alma.ppc]: https://almalinux.org/blog/almalinux-for-powerpc-85-stable-now-available/
[alma.s390x]: https://almalinux.org/blog/how-we-built-almalinux-86-for-s390x/
[oracle.link]: https://www.oracle.com/
[resf.link]: https://www.resf.org/faq/is-resf-nonprofit
[redhat.link]: https://www.redhat.com/
[centos.link]: https://www.centos.org/about/
[almalinux.fips]: https://almalinux.org/blog/2023-09-19-fips-validation-for-almalinux/
[oracle.fips]: https://www.oracle.com/corporate/security-practices/assurance/development/external-security-evaluations/fips/certifications.html
[rocky.fips]: https://rockylinux.org/news/certifications-fips-2022-06-11
[RHEL.fips]: https://access.redhat.com/articles/compliance_activities_and_gov_standards#fips-140-2-and-fips-140-3-2

0 comments on commit 41ff4e4

Please sign in to comment.