Oracle Linux, a powerful and open-source operating system, plays a pivotal role in facilitating enterprise-grade Linux distributions. Designed to meet the demanding requirements of modern data centers, Oracle Linux offers a robust foundation for businesses seeking reliability, security, and performance across their entire IT infrastructure.
Leveraging the strengths of the existing open-source community while incorporating enterprise-specific enhancements, the Oracle Linux platform provides a scalable and adaptable solution that supports the Oracle database and seamlessly integrates with other Oracle technologies.
In this article, we explore the key features and advantages of Oracle Linux, taking a closer look at how it serves as a strategic choice for organizations aiming to optimize server environments, enhance security, and drive operational efficiency. We’ll also discuss our Oracle consulting services and where our team of experienced consultants can fit into your organization.
What is Oracle Linux?
Oracle Linux is a Linux distribution packaged and freely distributed by Oracle through the GNU General Public License, compiled from Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) source code and used for both general purpose and specific Oracle workloads.
The Oracle Linux operating environment delivers intelligent enterprise management capabilities designed to help organizations deploy, maintain, and optimize applications in on-premise, cloud, and hybrid business landscapes.
With a secure and reliable solution for managing critical workloads, Oracle Linux offers high availability, automation, visualization, and cloud-native tools to support modern infrastructure, improve performance, and facilitate connections across large-scale data workloads.
Features of the Oracle Linux Operating System
Here’s a closer look at the main features of Oracle Linux:
OS Kernel Options
- Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK): Delivers Linux desktop system innovations and performance optimizations for both on-premise and cloud deployment and compatibility with applications certified to run on the Red Hat Enterprise Linux system.
- Red Hat Compatible Kernel (RHCK): Enables users to run RHEL-compatible software on Oracle Linux without modification or extended system downtime.
Security and Compliance
- Ksplice: Offers zero-downtime patch updates and exploit detection tools to conduct auditing and alerting for system vulnerabilities and resolve hypervisor, kernel, and user-space libraries without requiring system interruption.
- Common Criteria: Supports the Common Criteria (CC) Certification and FIPS 140-2 Validation for cryptographic modules and advanced security formats.
System Availability
- Oracle Clusterware: High-availability enterprise software solution included with Basic, Premier, and Extended Oracle Linux Support subscriptions.
- Corosync/Pacemaker: Standard, open-source solution for Linux, supporting critical load balancing services.
Visualization Tools
- KVM: Included with Oracle Linux, the Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) supports various hardware extensions and Linux Kernel-enabled processors.
- Oracle Linux Virtualization Manager: Enables the configuration, maintenance, and management of Oracle Linux KVM.
Management Tools
- Oracle Linux Manager: Offers tools for managing and optimizing the Oracle Linux lifecycle, including installation, configuration, and maintenance tasks.
- DTrace: Provides a dynamic tracing network for greater insight into the performance of operating systems and customer programs in real-time.
- Oracle Linux Automation Manager: Leverages AWX and Ansible projects to improve the creation, management, and transfer of information automation tasks across teams.
- OS Management Service: Automates common operating system tasks, including product management, security and compliance, and reporting for Linux and Windows instances.
Key Benefits of Oracle Linux Production Environments
Oracle Linux support enables customers to improve data security and integrity, simplify data management operations, enhance critical DevOps, and reduce downtime across the entire landscape.
Here are a few of the main advantages of Oracle Linux for business users:
Improved performance and reliability
Oracle Linux is built for complex workloads, offering intuitive support options for the latest x86 and Arm landscapes across on-premise, edge, and multi-cloud environments.
By supporting various technical architectures and providing built-in Linux support for different business landscapes, Oracle Linux enables greater control over the Oracle public cloud and improves performance for data-and-compute intensive workloads.
Automated IT management
The Oracle Linux platform provides open-source, ansible-based automation tools at no extra cost, enabling users to automate manual DevOps processes, streamline critical management tasks, and increase the scalability, productivity, and reliability of their Oracle systems.
Reduced virtualization costs
The Oracle Linux KVM and Virtualization tool offers open-source KVM hypervisor and management tools with low overhead costs to modernize their Oracle-engineered systems, improve system performance, and reduce overall virtualization costs across teams.
Enhanced security and compliance
By leveraging Oracle Linux to fix security vulnerability issues without requiring downtime for a hypervisor, kernel, or other core user-space libraries, organizations can ensure critical compliance requirements are met and improve overall IT security.
Enhanced security and compliance capabilities also enable users to detect data discrepancies or security risks and leverage distribution techniques with FIPS and Common Criteria certifications to improve support for Oracle Linux operations.
Integrated cloud-native apps
With connections to Kubernetes and a tailored combination of open-source software, Oracle Linux supports the configuration, deployment, and upgrade of core enterprise infrastructure and applications. Oracle Enterprise Linux also offers the functionality needed to help organizations run cloud-native applications in both on-premise and cloud environments, all at no extra cost.
How Can We Help?
Our Oracle consulting services transcend traditional Oracle Linux Extended Support offerings, providing personalized support for your most critical needs and enabling better internal support for new and existing Oracle enterprise systems.
With extensive experience in virtually every aspect of the Oracle landscape and a proven track record in assisting organizations with enterprise implementation and integration projects, our Oracle consultants at Surety Systems are guaranteed to meet your needs.
Partnering with the Best
For more information about our Oracle consulting services or to get started on a project with our expert Oracle consultants, contact us today.
