Andrew Lukoshko, benny Vasquez and Jack Aboutboul update Jonni Bidwell on the latest AlmaLinux developments.

Back in 2014 Red Hat partnered with CentOS, which for years had been rebuilding and repackaging the sources for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and distributing them under a free licence. Some pundits were curiously optimistic by this odd alliance. A RedMonk writer wrote, “This move by Red Hat represents the logical embrace of an adjacent ecosystem.” Most were puzzled and some were deeply cynical. Erstwhile Linux Format regular columnist Doc Brown, never one to mince his words, suggested replacing “embrace” by “stranglehold” in the previous quote, and suggested that “adjacent ecosystem” was “Dilbert-speak for competitor”. Brown’s words were borne out when Red Hat announced in 2020 that it would be sunsetting CentOS in favour of its own CentOS Stream, which would track ahead, not behind, RHEL.

In response to this, a number of RHEL downstreams were established. One was Rocky Linux, set up by CentOS co-founder Greg Kurtzer. Another was AlmaLinux, which aims to be a community-owned and governed, forever-free enterprise Linux distribution. We’ve covered AlmaLinux before (see LXF282), but much has happened since then. It’s got a new release, a new build system and a new project (ELevate) to enable migrations between major versions of the various enterprise Linuxes. And AlmaLinux OS foundation chair benny Vasquez, architect Andrew Lukoshko and community manager Jack Aboutboul were kind enough to tell us all about them. Read on to find out how the AlmaLinux project continues to bring soul to the enterprise Linux sphere.

AlmaLinux 9.0 was released at the end of May 2022, just a few days after its upstream, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.0, hit the mirrors. That’s an impressive achievement for a project whose first stable release took place around a year ago.

You may have missed our previous coverage or be unfamiliar with AlmaLinux, so here’s what the project is about in the words of AlmaLinux OS foundation chair benny Vasquez (lowercase intentional): “AlmaLinux OS is an open-source Linux operating system that stepped into the gap left by the discontinuation of the CentOS Linux stable release. AlmaLinux is community-owned and governed, forever-free and focused on long-term stability. The distribution provides a robust productiongrade platform and is 1:1 binary compatible with RHEL and pre-Stream CentOS Linux.

“The distribution is called AlmaLinux because ‘Alma’ means ‘soul’ in Spanish, and ‘nourishing’ in Latin; two things that we believe are critical to providing AlmaLinux. Quite simply, it’s a homage to the best parts of what the entire Linux ecosystem has achieved. Having a soul is critical to the future of open source everywhere. Open source software development isn’t the same as other ways of making a product; it relies on people wanting to collaborate to be successful. That’s hard to manufacture and hard work to do right, but it’s also incredibly rewarding.”