A beta release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.7 landed this week, replete with a host of bug fixes and new features, including the availability of Python 3.6; remediation for the recently-disclosed ZombieLoad vulnerabilities,; and performance enhancements for the network stack.
The release is not ready for all the RHEL7-supported architectures, with beta updates as yet unavailable for IBM POWER9; IBM Z – Structure A (kernel version 4.14) and 64-bit ARM-based architectures). That aside, there were plenty of updates and some welcome patches….
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.7: Final Release in 7’s Cycle
As Red Hat’s Chris Baker noted: “RHEL 7.7 marks the final release in the Full Support Phase of the RHEL 7 lifecycle. This 10-year lifecycle is a key feature of the world’s leading enterprise Linux platform… future releases will emphasize production stability, rather than introducing net-new features.”
He added: “The release includes the ability to offload virtual switching operations to network interface card hardware. The value of these features also improve the operation of Red Hat OpenStack Platform and Red Hat OpenShift deployments, both built on top of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, that use virtual switching and network function virtualization (NFV).”
RHEL 7.7 Beta users get default access to Red Hat Insights as part of their subscription; a software-as-a-service (SaaS)-based predictive analytics solution.
What Else is New?
The graphical installation program now detects if SMT is enabled
Previously, the RHEL 7 graphical installation program did not detect if Simultaneous Multithreading (SMT) was enabled on a system. (A technique for improving CPU use). With this update, the installation program now detects if SMT is enabled on a system and pops an alert up to avoid any issues.
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The Image Builder rebased to version 19.7.33 and fully supported
The Image Builder, provided by the lorax-composer package in the RHEL 7 Extras Channel, has been upgraded to version 19.7.33. Notable changes in this version include:
- The Image Builder, previously available as Technology Preview, is now fully supported.
- Cloud images can be built for Amazon Web Services, VMware vSphere, and OpenStack.
- A Red Hat Content Delivery Network (CDN) repository mirror is no longer needed.
- You can now set a host name and create users.
PMTU discovery and route redirection is now supported with VXLAN and GENEVE tunnels
Previously, the kernel in RHE) did not handle Internet Control Message Protocol and ICMPv6 messages for Virtual Extensible LAN (VXLAN) and (the emerging standard) Generic Network Virtualization Encapsulation (GENEVE) tunnels.
As a consequence, Path MTU (PMTU)* discovery and route redirection was not supported with VXLAN and GENEVE tunnels. With this update, the kernel handles ICMP “Destination Unreachable” and “Redirect Message”, as well as ICMPv6 “Packet Too Big” and “Destination Unreachable” error messages by adjusting the PMTU and modifying forwarding information.
As a result, PMTU discovery and route redirection are now supported with VXLAN and GENEVE tunnels.
*A technique for determining the maximum transmission unit size on the network path between two IP hosts.
For all the updates, see the full release notes here.
