Business May Need to Shift from CentOS as CentOS focuses on CentOS Stream Now

Before we dig deeper into the main issues here for CentOS users let us understand a little bit about What is CentOS? and how CentOS shiting focus to CentOS Stream is going to impact CentOS’s corporate clients base and other users of CentOS and it is definitely opening the door of opportunities for few other linux distros especially for corporate to have their stable infrastructure.

What is CentOS?

CentOS Linux distribution is one of the famous, stable, predictable, manageable, and reproducible platforms derived from the sources of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL).

One of the major qualities of CentOS Linux is no-cost and free to redistribute.CentOS Linux is a leading community platform for emerging open source technologies coming from other projects such as OpenStack. 

As per the latest CentOS declaration that CentOS will focus on CentOS Stream in their new releases on 8th Dec 2020.While CentOS Community tends to focus on CentOS Stream. Their new release may not be aligned to many businesses using CentOS. They need to transform with a kind of emergency approach. Especially CentOS 8 users. For CentOS 7 they will provide support till the end of life up to 2024.

So whatever best option available for CentOS users to select a distribution that is similar in nature and has close relation with Redhat.

Oracle Linux

Oracle has launched its own linux distribution long back. They see this as an opportunity to grab a few additional enterprise linux clients in their customer list. Oracle Linux has been derived from RHEL so users will have a seamless experience.

As per them Oracle Linux source code and binaries remains free and they will charge only for support. It will start at $1399.It is open secret with Oracle how friendly it is for Open Source Community.

Rocky Linux

Greg Kurtzer & Rocky McGough being the backbone behind CentOS and after Red Hat’s acquisition of CentOS in 2014 they have faced many disputes with Red Hat which prevails Rocky McGough to start a new flavor of CentOS as Rocky Linux.

This is the best option for Enterprise to go with. They already have collaboration with AWS and in conversation with Microsoft as well. They have not released yet but they are trending and have good prospects and trying to extend their horizon. This they have a plan to deliver free.

This is a good option for CentOS 8 users to wait for the release and start using it. Big corporate can approach them to crack the deal as it is in its early stage for longevity. Will be a win-win for both.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Red Hat has been the source of CentOS and even Oracle Linux too. Rocky Linux is a segregated new part of CentOS so you will still have the same flavor and no need to tell about RHEL. Especially for enterprise shifting to RHEL is not a bad option at all. You can start with $349 without support for physical servers. Mind it cost may go higher except for physical servers. 

You can refer to this for how-to steps for many RHEL related stuff to increase the level of awareness about Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Conclusion

That`s it related to which linux distro to choose as CentOS changed their focus on CenOS Stream which may not be suitable for your infrastructure. It’s time for decision-making not to get confused. Staying with the same environment and compatibility and ease of matter of concerns to look after. I would bet to either go with RHEL or choose Rocky Linux even it may be marketing tactics from Red Hat or IBM no matter you need reliable infrastructure with very limited reliable options with high-quality support.