In this release, Oracle included the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel Release 6 (UEK6) inside the installer image itself along with Reh Hat Compatible Kernel (RHCK).
Oracle Linux 8.2 which is the second update in this series, also based on stable mainline Linux Kernel 5.4 which included driver updates, bug fixes, and security fixes. It is available for 64-bit Arm (aarch64) and 64-bit AMD/Intel (x86-64) platforms.
There is a heavy list of new additions in this release, here are some of the notable ones which I found from the release announcement.
Whatโs New in Oracle Linux 8.2
- Linux Kernel 5.4
- GNOME Desktop Environment 3.32+
- Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel Release 6 (UEK6)
- Red Hat Compatible Kernel (RHCK)
- Secure Boot available by default
- Clang toolset updated to version 9.0.0
- Rust toolset updated to version 1.39
- Go toolset updated to 1.13.4
- GCC Toolset 9
- GCC version updated to 9.2.1
- GDB version updated to 8.3
- MySQL 8.0
- Python 3.8
- Nested Virtual Machines (VM) capability added; this enhancement enables an Oracle Linux 7 or Oracle Linux 8 VM that is running on an Oracle Linux 8 physical host to perform as a hypervisor, and host its own VMs.
- virt-manager application deprecated; Oracle recommends using the Cockpit web console to manage virtualization in a GUI.
For more details, check out the release notes. You can download the latest Oracle Linux 8.2 ISO for free. Go to the below link for mirror locations of download.
Oracle Linux arguably is one of the best company-developed Linux distribution, although it is tightly coupled with Oracle products. It is indeed stable for suitable for servers with features such as โzero downtime patchingโ which enable admins to update the kernel without a reboot.
