March 10th, 2007
These are the Release Notes for the CentOS-5 (Beta) release. They compliment the upstream Release Notes and highlight only some of the issues in this release. It is recommended that you also look at the upstream release notes, which can be found in the NOTES/ directory of your install media. Also included in these notes are the list of changes made to the CentOS-5 (Beta) and how it differs from upstream.
CentOS-5 (beta) is based on the upstream EL5 Beta2 product line.
This is a beta frozen release. Which implies there are known security issues with packages in this release, and there will be no updates provided in order to resolve those issues. This release is *NOT* meant to be used in production and there are no upgrade paths guaranteed from this release to the final product, although efforts will be made to try and facilitate that. As a user, you should consider this beta release as unsuitable for deployment but usable in a test environment to look at new technologies and changes in the distribution since CentOS-4. We envision the Final release to be significantly different to this beta, however none of the functionality present here should go away.
This release is available from http://beta.centos.org/ and associated mirrors. The release tree will stay functional allowing users to use and test the package mangers till 48 hrs before the Final release is rolled out. We do recommend you establish local repositories for your own testing, within your network, should you have more than a few machines or installs to evaluate.
All forms for feedback are appreciated:
Bug and issue reports should goto http://bugs.centos.org/ . Try to be as descriptive about the situation and conditions that allow us to reproduce the issues. Some people have argued that all issue reports should go upstream, however we feel that most issues should be reported at bugs.centos.org so that we maybe able to ensure its not a CentOS induced issue and if not, its likely we would be able to go upstream with a fix path/ patch / suggestion. So, unless you are very sure its an issue only upstream should know about, file it at bugs.centos.org.
Conversation and Support can be either via the MailingLists or IRC. Web Forums are not suitable for discussions related to this Beta release since they are not actively monitored by the developers and the QA/QC team members. We would prefer if all communication was via the Mailing lists. There is no specific list for testing or beta related content, so use the centos users list and/or the centos-devel list.
On IRC, use the #centos-qa and/or #centos-devel to bring up issues and conversation about the centos-5/beta
Starting with Version5, the upstream vendor has introduced a new tree layout, in line with their commercial offerings and a form of key based install to allow / setup various install options. The CentOS release will not follow this layout since we have no commercial offerings nor business model to align with distro install options. The CentOS installer makes _all_ packages from all variants of the upstream vendors products available via the single installer, and all key handling mechanisms have been disabled.
We don't expect there to be any major fallout due to this change, initial testing has shown that most kickstart files still work across upstream-5/beta and centos-5/beta, with the extra options in upstream-5's files being ignored, since they are not used, in the centos-5 installer. We are also not aware of any third party product or project that might have problems with this. If any are found or if issues created, report them on the bugs.centos.org website and we will work on resolving those.
Its important for the CentOS project to ensure all tools and apps that work upstream continue to do so on the CentOS Release as well and any issues brought up that might have an effect on this will be handled with the highest priority.
List of packages that have changed from upstream vendor:
am-utils: Build issues (#1767)
anaconda: Branding and installer policy changes
brltty: Build issues (#1768)
centos-release: CentOS Core distro release policy and branding
centos-release-notes: Release notes for this Release
Deployment_Guide-en-US (and others): Branding
desktop-backgrounds: Branding
eclipse: Branding
firefox: Branding
firstboot: Branding
gdm: Branding
gnome-desktop: Branding
gnome-pilot: Branding
gnome-session: Branding
httpd: Branding
initscripts: Branding
kernel: module signing key
m4: Build issue (#1652)
perl-XML-SAX: Build issue (#1684)
pm-utils: Build issue (#1687)
redhat-artwork: Branding
redhat-logos: Branding
rhgb: Branding
squirrelmail: Branding
strace: Build issue (#1657)
thunderbird: Branding
xorg-x11-proto-devel: Build issue (#1656)
yum: repo handling fix (#1769)
For packages that say 'Branding' it implies we had to remove upstream trademarks and/or artwork and logos. We are required to do that by request from the 'upstream' lawyers. If there are things that we might have missed or not noticed, do let us know via http://bugs.centos.org/ and we will try to remove them asap, or change them.
Items that are in our bugs database have the bug number in parentheses, for example (#1687). That would mean if you want to look at the issue, go to bugs.centos.org and search for bug number 1687.
This product is not suitable to use in Production. We feel that its not likely to be tested nearly enough unless its used in at least similar to production environments. Common sense and sysadmin acumen should be used to work out where you can and should use this. If you break things, all the bits are belong to you, and only you.
We don't know whats in the Final release ( if you do, please let us know - it will help save time when release time comes around and I promise to buy you a few beers ) - so the best guess situation applies here. It *should* be possible to upgrade to final from this beta, but in some cases it might break so your deployment and usage of this beta should take that into consideration.
The only upgrade path tested and known to mostly work for upgrading from CentOS-4 to CentOS-5/Beta is via the installer. Running yum against the CentOS-5/Beta repo's might work or it might not. We do encourage you to try it and post feedback on the wiki.centos.org/ so that others might learn from your mistakes. ( http://wiki.centos.org/Migration/5 )
The Final version should be released sometime in Mid March 2007 ( based on media reports only, no one is really sure when its going to be released ). CentOS-5/Final will follow soon after. Our Goal is to release our final product within 2 weeks of the upstream final release. Infrastructure work and mirror management required for the final release has started already.
A fair bit of testing has already been done and is ongoing - http://wiki.centos.org/QA/ . Everyone is encouraged to add notes and mention details there, it should be possible to turn this part of the wiki into a knowledge base and hardware support resource for the CentOS-5 release cycle if enough people can contribute there.
The CentOS project is completely voluntary organization, we rely on community members for all development, testing and release. However, we do have bills to pay, so if you are using CentOS in a commercial environment do consider donating to the project ( http://www.centos.org/donate ).
Some handy urls about the CentOS project
http://www.centos.org/ : Main website
http://lists.centos.org/ : Mailing lists ( non-English lists too! )
http://wiki.centos.org/ : The CentOS Wiki
http://bugs.centos.org/ : Bug and issue handling system
http://mirror.centos.org/ : CentOS.org mirror network
http://beta.centos.org/ : CentOS Beta network
Vmware install issue : Some testers reported doing installs under vmware-server and vmware-gsx the installer is unable to see the harddrives. Workaround seems to be ensuring that its the LSI interface that vmware emulates rather than the BusLogic.
Upgrading from CentOS-4 : kernel-smp is replaced by the kernel-PAE, while this should not really be a problem, its worth tracking and if there are people who have problems, do let us know via the bug / issue reporting setup.
How to contribute to the CentOS Project.
Last, but not the least, we would like to thanks everyone involved with the project, the users and the contributors, including the people who came together in the -qa group at the last minute and really helped with the testing. Also, a big wave to the people 'upstream', for doing a good job on this release, and for doing the right thing and making CentOS-5 possible.
Enjoy!
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The CentOS-5 Development Team