For as long as there has been a Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) there has been a beta ahead of each minor release update. Betas allows customers to get a preview of changes to come, test major features, and provide feedback or report issues before the final release. While timing has varied over the years, it became very predictable since Red Hat Enterprise Linux moved to a 3-year/6-month release cadence target for major and minor releases, respectively. Since then, major release (E.g. RHEL 9.0) betas have been provided 6 months before each major release, while minor release (E.g. RHEL 9.3) betas have been provided approximately a month before each minor release update.
Do Betas Improve the Release?
The answer is a resounding: It depends. For new major releases, the 6-month release window has been a great success: It provides a predictable amount of time for customers, partners, and the software ecosystem, in general, to get ready for all the new features and capabilities that will soon be available. For minor releases, there is often too little time to be able to deliver bug fixes found during that beta. This means a change is called for.
What is Changing
Starting with RHEL 9.5, minor release versions will be simplified. This means releasing packages earlier, and continuously, while reserving documentation, full installation media and virtual machine images for the full release.
Beta Packages
As soon as an upcoming minor release has completed its initial phase of development and testing, the packages will be released to the beta channels. This means that the packages will be published up to 4 months in advance of the upcoming release. Additional updates will also be published weekly.
Installation Media
To help support this earlier and more rapid release process, no installation media will be proactively generated for RHEL minor release betas.
This includes:
- Pre-built ISOs
- Cloud Images
- QCOW Virtual Machine Images
Red Hat Image Builder will gain the ability to generate beta images in the various supported formats. In addition, Satellite customers can continue to be used to host this Beta content.
Product Documentation
In a similar fashion, the product documentation will be reserved for the full release in order. This is to make the published revision fully reflective of the new release.
What is Not Changing
Prerelease packages will continue to be published to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux beta channels (now several weeks before the traditional beta release) in the following repositories:
rhel-9-for-<arch>-baseos-beta-rpms
rhel-9-for-<arch>-appstream-beta-rpms
Development in CentOS Stream continues and remains the preferred place for community development, testing and contribution to future Red Hat Enterprise Linux minor releases.
There will be no changes to any planned minor release within RHEL 8 or earlier. This change only impacts RHEL 9.5 and later, and will continue into RHEL 10 minor releases starting with RHEL 10.1.
Partner access to RHEL prerelease content will continue to be delivered through their existing content delivery channels.
Testing
As with all beta content, there may be bugs encountered and it is not recommended for production use. More information on the RHEL beta approach can be found in “What does Beta mean in Red Hat Enterprise Linux and can I upgrade a RHEL Beta installation to a General Availability (GA) release?”
For Red Hat customers, please reach out to Red Hat Customer Support for any issues encountered and they would be happy to file a bug report on your behalf.
Sobre el autor
Navegar por canal
Automatización
Las últimas novedades en la automatización de la TI para los equipos, la tecnología y los entornos
Inteligencia artificial
Descubra las actualizaciones en las plataformas que permiten a los clientes ejecutar cargas de trabajo de inteligecia artificial en cualquier lugar
Nube híbrida abierta
Vea como construimos un futuro flexible con la nube híbrida
Seguridad
Vea las últimas novedades sobre cómo reducimos los riesgos en entornos y tecnologías
Edge computing
Conozca las actualizaciones en las plataformas que simplifican las operaciones en el edge
Infraestructura
Vea las últimas novedades sobre la plataforma Linux empresarial líder en el mundo
Aplicaciones
Conozca nuestras soluciones para abordar los desafíos más complejos de las aplicaciones
Programas originales
Vea historias divertidas de creadores y líderes en tecnología empresarial
Productos
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux
- Red Hat OpenShift
- Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform
- Servicios de nube
- Ver todos los productos
Herramientas
- Training y Certificación
- Mi cuenta
- Soporte al cliente
- Recursos para desarrolladores
- Busque un partner
- Red Hat Ecosystem Catalog
- Calculador de valor Red Hat
- Documentación
Realice pruebas, compras y ventas
Comunicarse
- Comuníquese con la oficina de ventas
- Comuníquese con el servicio al cliente
- Comuníquese con Red Hat Training
- Redes sociales
Acerca de Red Hat
Somos el proveedor líder a nivel mundial de soluciones empresariales de código abierto, incluyendo Linux, cloud, contenedores y Kubernetes. Ofrecemos soluciones reforzadas, las cuales permiten que las empresas trabajen en distintas plataformas y entornos con facilidad, desde el centro de datos principal hasta el extremo de la red.
Seleccionar idioma
Red Hat legal and privacy links
- Acerca de Red Hat
- Oportunidades de empleo
- Eventos
- Sedes
- Póngase en contacto con Red Hat
- Blog de Red Hat
- Diversidad, igualdad e inclusión
- Cool Stuff Store
- Red Hat Summit