OpenELA, a non‑profit trade association formed by open‑source enterprises—principally CIQ, Oracle, and SUSE—to ensure that the source code of Enterprise Linux remains freely available, announced ELValidated, a verification and compatibility suite designed to streamline development and deployment across distributions.
This open-source toolkit promises to reduce testing costs, minimize compatibility risks, and—most importantly—give end-users more flexibility in choosing their Enterprise Linux solutions without sacrificing stability.
For years, ensuring compatibility across different Enterprise Linux distributions has been a persistent challenge.
While vendors and developers have worked to maintain alignment, the lack of a standardized validation tool meant extra overhead—requiring extensive testing, recompilations, or even modifications for software to run smoothly across different environments.
ELValidated changes that offer a clear, industry-backed method to verify Application Binary Interface compliance against OpenELA’s published standards.
In simpler terms, it checks whether critical libraries and packages in a given distribution behave the same way as those in the reference Enterprise Linux standard. If they do, developers and vendors can breathe easy—their software will run seamlessly across all compatible distributions.
The implications are broad, touching nearly every corner of the Enterprise Linux ecosystem:
- ISVs & IHVs can now validate their applications against a single standard, eliminating the need for costly, distribution-specific testing.
- Enterprise Linux distributors gain a trusted way to prove compatibility, reassuring customers that their systems align with industry norms.
- End-users enjoy more choices without worrying about vendor lock-in or unexpected compatibility hiccups.
For more information, see the announcement. The tool is freely available on OpenELA’s GitHub repository.
