Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 is here
Stumble it!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 has been released and if you are a Red Hat subscriber, it should have been delivered to you by now via Red Hat Network. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 comes with many improvements which may include Security hardening, Consolidated bug fixes etc. Most highlighted feature are:
Virtualization enhancements: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 supports larger x86-64 systems. The number of supported physical CPUs is increased to 126, while maximum memory is increased to 1TB. Virtual server CPU and memory limits have been increased to 32 and 80GB respectively – far higher than competing virtualization products. Additionally the per-guest limits for disks and network interfaces have also been increased. The performance and range of paravirtualized device drivers has been increased, enabling ever more applications to be deployed on virtual servers with near bare-metal performance.
Next-generation hardware enablement: The soon-to-be-released Tylersberg/Nehalem platform is the next-generation of Intel x86-64 hardware. Support for the virtualization and performance features provided by this processor combined with numerous optimizations have already demonstrated exceptional performance over previous processor generations in internal Red Hat testing.
OpenJDK: Red Hat is taking a leadership position in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 by shipping the first productized implementation of OpenJDK. OpenJDK in 5.3 has passed the full Java SE 6 TCK and is compatible with all applications written for Java SE 6 and previous versions. With the integration of OpenJDK, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 is the the first enterprise-ready solution with a fully open source Java stack when combined with JBoss Enterprise Application Platform.
Systemtap: This is an application development tool targeted at dynamically allowing applications to be monitored and diagnosed. With Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 support for User Mode (i.e. application level) tracing and profiling is provided for the first time – adding to the Kernel Mode support that was provided in earlier releases. The operative word here being “dynamically,” as the key benefit of Systemtap is the ability, on-the-fly, to add instrumentation, probe points, and memory tracking to running applications. This is key to enable identification and resolution of issues in live environments. Extremely powerful — both for user and kernel space.
Power management: With “green IT” gaining increasing focus, we have been implementing a progression of power-saving enhancements in every update of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. 5.3 is no exception, with improved handling of low-level power management low-power sleep states.
Disk encryption: Critical for laptop use, but also becoming increasingly important in server deployments (due to concerns with hardware disposal at the end of its lifecycle), Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 includes full support for encryption of storage, either at the block level or file system level. Installer enhancements enable encryption to be configured at installation time, and includes support for the root and swap devices.
To view the full release notes for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3, click on the following links
You can also download the technical overview for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 here