Oracle Brings Real-Time Kernel Patching To Oracle Enterprise Linux 52
prisoninmate writes: Oracle's Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) Release 4 is an important engineering effort and introduces performance improvements and enhancements for some of the most essential components, including CPU schedulers and Automatic NUMA Balancing, along with powerful new features, such as real-time kernel patching, which is possible thanks to the Ksplice open-source extension of the Linux kernel 4 branch, which lets users to apply patches to the running kernel without the need to reboot the system, thus improving security and simplify the management of cloud infrastructures.
Welcome to 2008? (Score:3)
Welcome to 2008?
Re: (Score:2)
Returning the favour (Score:3, Insightful)
So Oracle takes linux tech and uses it for their own purposes. Okay fine. How about donating some source code to the ZFSonLinux project? What's that you say? Patents, you say?
Re:Returning the favour (Score:4, Informative)
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They could, but why bother? The CDDL is an OSI Approved license, just like GPL and BSD licenses are. It's already open source, just not GNU's open source.
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Ksplice really is not new (Score:5, Informative)
I would probably be an Oracle "fan boy". Ksplice is not new. They "bought" it a few years ago, one of the main reasons it took so long forTorvald's kernel to get hot kernel patching.
Ksplice will only update the OS, it cannot update drivers or firmware of any kind (Storage arrays, NICs, etc...) you still need to bounce for that. Learned the unfortunate way when we needed to update drivers for a buggy as be damned big blue flash array. (Very recent history...)
Also as I RTFA, SELinux does not yet work with an Oracle DB. When it does it will be amazing, but it has not happened yet...
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Also as I RTFA, SELinux does not yet work with an Oracle DB.
Are you sure about that?
Re:Ksplice really is not new (Score:4, Informative)
Also as I RTFA, SELinux does not yet work with an Oracle DB. When it does it will be amazing, but it has not happened yet...
Wrong. [redhat.com]
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Also as I RTFA, SELinux does not yet work with an Oracle DB. When it does it will be amazing, but it has not happened yet...
Wrong.
And this is what is wrong with redhate. They paywall their knowledge base. Their whole business is based on open information, but they hide theirs. They can really fuck off sideways.
Re:Ksplice really is not new (Score:4, Insightful)
Or, as usual, do the same thing with CentOS for free.
https://wiki.centos.org/HowTos... [centos.org]
I don't get the animosity towards RH. I haven't paid for their support in years and years, but when I did, it was so I could call somebody when something went wrong and get reliable help quickly.
I only ever had to call a couple times, but the support I got was better than I ever received from most companies.
Oracle? Oracle is on the opposite end of that list. I won't touch Oracle ever again if I can help it. I am aware of the things Oracle brings to the table but it's not worth the pain.
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I haven't paid for their support in years and years, but when I did, it was so I could call somebody when something went wrong and get reliable help quickly.
I agree. RH support is amazing. They follow-up on tickets almost instantly and they know their product well. Even on weird or very specialized questions they usually come back with the solution quickly.
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RH Satellite is a duct-taped pile of half-baked modifications vomited on top of old branches of abandoned forks of semi-structured open-source projects. I see no reason why supporting this "product" would prove difficult for RH.
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Sun brought k-splice to all of Linux
No, they didn't. Sun had nothing to do with ksplice. Oracle acquired Ksplice, Inc. 18 months after their acquisition of Sun was completes.
real-time ad time (Score:3)
are you kidding me (Score:3, Insightful)
read a joke about Slashdot shilling oracle Linux for the next slashvertisement. At least I thought it was a joke.
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Wait (Score:3)
If it's unbreakable why do they have to patch it?
"Yeah, this thing will never break! Hang on a sec while I fix it..."
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I does seem a bit ballsy for Oracle to name their product 'unbreakable', considering the fact that they broke Java so badly that it was pretty much banned from all web browsers...
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I does seem a bit ballsy for Oracle to name their product 'unbreakable',
That was a triumph of marketing over common sense. It's like naming the local slut, "Lil' Miss Faithful".
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The Java web plugin was insecure shit long before Oracle owned it.
k-splice? (Score:2)
Isn't that a Korean boy band?
Live patching cloud? (Score:3)
If you need to live patch your kernel you've got a misdesigned application. Failures happen and if you can't design your application for redundancy, don't expect uninterrupted service.
If you need to live-patch kernels in your cloud infrastructure, you need to go back to the drawing board because you don't have a cloud, you have a SPOF.
Real time (Score:3)
"Real time" like with bounded deadlines, right? Or maybe you mean "live", "online" or "nonstop"?
Kernel 4 is supposed to support hot plug? (Score:2)
KSplice is not news, and it works for other distros too, including Ubuntu (while it takes a while to add support for new hardware enablements). It was cool before kernel 4.
But kernel 4 series is not supposed to support hot plug out of the box?
KSplice have been available, but only for $$$ (Score:2)
Funny (Score:2)
I have admins that keep telling me they can't keep the OEL machines up to date more than 3 months because Oracle releases patches on a 3 month schedule. Even then, we have to have a patch set made just for us.
I'll believe it when I see it.