Red Hat Advanced Server Gets DoD COE Certification

DaveAtFraud writes "CNET is reporting that Red Hat Advanced server has been certified as a 'Common Operating Environment' (COE) when running on an IBM server by the U.S. Department of Defense. Red Hat Advanced Server is the first version of Linux to receive this certification. The certification clears the way for broader use of Linux in governement computer systems. Its interesting to note that the certification effort was made for the more proprietary (and costlier) Red Hat Advanced Server and not the basic Red Hat distribution." This despite the best efforts of certain lobbyists.

Comments

Of course they certify the expensive version

[jht]

Its interesting to note that the certification effort was made for the more proprietary (and costlier) Red Hat Advanced Server and not the basic Red Hat distribution

Why is this even worth noting? Certification efforts aren't especially cheap. If you're going to expend time and resources getting a version of your product certified, why not put the effort into the version that is likeliest to generate enough revenue as a result of the certification to pay for the effort.

After all, while RedHat is in relatively good financial condition, it's not like they have around $40 billion in the bank (unlike some operating system companies). Certifying Advanced Server is a good use of limited resources.

That said, any government security certification is a Good Thing in the commercial marketplace, too - it helps when the engineers need to make a positive case to their PHB's, and gives one more "checklist item" that can get marked in their favor when comparing RH to other vendors.

Re:Of course they certify the expensive version

[Jim Hall]

Its interesting to note that the certification effort was made for the more proprietary (and costlier) Red Hat Advanced Server and not the basic Red Hat distribution

Yes, it costs more. But it's about the same as (or less than) support & licensing costs for "big UNIX" like Solaris.

I think it's incorrect to label RHAS as "proprietary". It's based on a Red Hat Linux boxed set, but I believe they bundle in software from partners.

Each release of RHAS has a longer lifecycle (something like 14-18 months) so you don't have to upgrade every 6 months when the new Red Hat Linux comes out. You do get a "stepped-up" version of their Red Hat Network support, which we currently use on their boxed sets to stay up to date with erratas.

Re:Of course they certify the expensive version

[Pharmboy]

Why is this even worth noting? Certification efforts aren't especially cheap. If you're going to expend time and resources getting a version of your product certified, why not put the effort into the version that is likeliest to generate enough revenue as a result of the certification to pay for the effort.

After all, while RedHat is in relatively good financial condition, it's not like they have around $40 billion in the bank (unlike some operating system companies). Certifying Advanced Server is a good use of limited resources.

Amen. Their "more expensive" verion is what makes them money, not the free version. Certification of Advanced server doesn't take away from the benefits of their downloadable version, or other distros in any way.

If Linux is going to take hold, SOMEONE has to make money with it. People just miss the point: OS software is free as in speech, NOT as in beer. OSS doesn't mean everyone just walks around and works for free. It means programmers contribute code for "free", but make money when they support this code (and the code others contributed "free") to end users. When they add value to it.

If the GPL did not allow anyone to make any money, in any way, we would not be here talking about Linux.

Re:Of course they certify the expensive version

[Pharmboy]

Yes, that sometime is true of "open-source" software but free software [gnu.org] is free as in speech, AND as in free beer.

And it is not likely to ever get certified because there is no way to recover your costs.

The point being made here is Linux being certified, making it more able to compete with Microsoft in the marketplace. The point isn't to argue over symantics.

This is great

[hackstraw]

And impressive considering the other certified OSes (Solaris, AIX, HPUX, and NT). I first used the Advanced Server a couple of months ago while evaluating some Itanium2s, and I was plesantly suprised. I really like RH's decision to make the Advanced Server their "Enterprise" class distro with about an 18 month release cycle. Makes my job easier (TM).

I never thought I would say this, but I've gotten accustomed to using RH. I was a die hard Debian fan, and in philosophy still am. But when it comes to 3rd party support, and announcements like this, I have to say that RH is the distro right now, and probably will be for some time to come (at least in the US).

For all of the advancements that RH has done for Linux, and in spite of itself, including RPM. I would like for them to get a better package system. Yes, I know theres the apt-rpm or whatever its called, but I'm talking something that already comes with the distro and works on all architectures supported by RH. Someday...

Re:This is great

[A Masquerade]

That said, why DON'T we just package the source tarballs instead of the binaries?

Source doesn't fix the packaging problem - it just moves it around a little. You still have basically the same problem removing, replacing or upgrading a package with a source based package as you do with a binary

The killer of this idea for me is that I produce service systems which are designed for a particular (set of) function(s). Part of the philosophy I use is that the systems have only the software I need on them - which makes them more secure (fewer packages to have security bugs, easier to audit). In the case of service boxes they do not have compilers or tool chains on them - don't need anyone fiddling with stuff, if you need to do fixes those are done on a development machine, moved to a test machine and then deployed. Adding a compiler, and the associated tool chain, and the (development - then run times are probably already there) libraries to make stuff build makes my package set much bigger and consequently increases the maintenance task.

Re:Sure DoD uses the regular version....

[syle]

I use it on a box to run apps that I developed that our M$ monkeys haven't matched(or can't) match.

...I just bring out a new app coded in Perl that the green suiters can't live without.

How do these things relate to Linux? No one's arguing that it isn't a good development environment, but perl runs in Win32 fairly easily.

You say superior services, not platforms, but it sounds like you're taking programs that could otherwise be cross-platform using them to push Linux for its own sake. Or, are you doing something with perl that would tie it to Linux?

(Ready to be modded into oblivion for implying that Linux should exist just for its own sake...)

SRPMs are available

[d3xt3r]

All the source is right there on Red Hat's FTP servers. Download it and build it for yourself.

Don't do it that way.

[dmaxwell]

A more sane way to manage source packages on production boxes is to have a machine similar to the production boxes but with the developer toolchain installed.

The production boxes will still use debs or rpms but the compilation boxes can easily use something like checkinstall to make packages. This won't work in a potpurri environment but it would be fine if there's lots of identical machines. You mentioned that you wanted only particular software on your machines. With source compilation, you can even specify that the software only have certain options compiled in.

Since the dev toolchains are confined to a few boxes, maintaining those shouldn't be onerous either.