Oracle Linux Reviews

By far, the most valuable feature of Oracle Linux is the fact that the unbreakable UEK kernel is optimized to run Oracle databases. Basically out of the box, the kernel parameters are automatically set up for I/O, for memory, and for performance.

Benefits of Oracle Linux for a lot of customers include things like Ksplice, for example, the ability to perform online kernel patches with zero downtime. In fact, a lot of the other vendors like Red Hat and SUSE are starting to embrace that technology, but they’re years behind.

Overall, Oracle Linux is full of great features and functionality. Because it is an Oracle product, what would be nice is if there better integration between the Linux operating system and Oracle ASM and things like ASMLib and the integration with Oracle RAC.

From a stability perspective, Linux has been around for decades, and Oracle Linux is going to be around for a long, long time, and it’s going to be a dominant player.

It is a derivative of Red Hat, but for all practical purposes, it’s immensely scalable, especially as you're talking about doing multi-node clusters with Oracle Linux. There are numerous customers who are leveraging Oracle RAC on Oracle Linux, that’s a very common platform for a lot for customers today. 

A lot of customers who are on Red Hat, for example - it’s all pricing. Again, this is another key benefit of being on Oracle Linux. If you buy Oracle hardware, for example, be it x86 or ODA or even Exadata, all those platforms will run on Oracle Linux, but because you're paying annual support for the hardware, you will automatically get free support on Oracle Linux. That’s by far, probably, the biggest benefit of going on Oracle Linux. 

If you compare also from cost of support of Red Hat versus Oracle Linux, Oracle Linux is going to be a lot cheaper overall.

When selecting a vendor, the cool thing about Oracle Linux is that the customers are going to be running an Oracle database on it. At the same time, if they’re going to be running Oracle databases on top of Oracle Linux, you have one vendor to call for support, you have one vendor to choke at the end of the day if things go wrong.

It's a 10 out of 10. You are going to get great support from Oracle Linux. The portal that you would log into for support for Oracle Linux is going to be the same portal that you would log into to get your database support. It will be the same portal that you log into to get your Exadata and ODA if you're running those hardware appliances as well.

I learned Linux on Red Hat, so Oracle Linux was an easy transition. When I first started using Oracle Linux, it wasn't that much different from Red Hat Enterprise Linux, but now, the differences are dramatic. It is much easier to install, configure, and run Oracle Database and Grid Infrastructure on Oracle Linux than Red Hat.

Many of the customers I work with are used to working with Oracle Database on Unix or Windows and are new to Linux. It is much easier to get a customer who is not familiar with Linux running on Oracle Linux than on most other Linux platforms because there are fewer prerequisites. For example, ASMLib is included with the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK is the default kernel in Oracle Linux) and the preinstall RPMs take care of almost all of the prerequisite OS requirements.

I had some issues going from versions 5 to 6 to 7 because of the change from SysVinit to Upstart to Systemd.

Also, you wouldn't fully replace another Linux product with Oracle Linux. Although it is a full Linux distribution, Oracle Linux is formulated (especially the kernel) for Oracle software and hardware products.

I've been using it since 2010.

Deployment methods and software used for other Linux variants should have no problem provisioning Oracle Linux. In addition, Oracle Enterprise Manager has a number of features that make it much easier to deploy dozens or hundreds of Oracle Linux installations. I have found that the kernel enhancements make the OS perform better under heavy loads, especially when running Oracle Database and Enterprise Manager.

We've had no issues with stability.

We've had no issues with scalability.

Oracle Linux is free and open source, just like Red Hat, so a support contract is not required. If there are issues with the product requiring support, the answers are almost always the same as those for similar issues in Red Hat or CentOS. If you do have a support contract and access to My Oracle Support, there is a ton of information available on Linux in general and Oracle Linux specifically. I have found My Oracle Support issues involving Oracle Linux are generally resolved quicker and with less back-and-forth than issues involving the database.

I continue to use Oracle Linux, Red Hat, SUSE, Ubuntu, Debian and a number of other distributions. They all have different purposes and complimentary strengths and weaknesses. When it comes to running most Oracle products on Linux, I almost always choose Oracle Linux because of its familiarity and ease-of-use.

Setup is almost exactly the same as Red Hat, so those familiar with that distribution should have no trouble porting their knowledge to Oracle Linux. The most difficult transition I had was going from versions 5 to 6 to 7 because of the change from SysVinit to Upstart to Systemd.

Implementation of all OS's has always been through our in-house team. Once we have a repeatable build, we usually turn it over to an automated deployment tool like Puppet, Ansible, or the native Anaconda kickstart.

This probably isn't something you would replace another product with completely. Although it is a full Linux distribution, it is formulated for Oracle software and hardware products. Try it first for the Oracle database and see if you like it. Make sure to test out support as well. Oracle isn't the only vendor that will support this product, but they do have direct influence when something needs to change or troubleshoot.

We are using the latest version. 

It is useful for running our applications. 

I feel the stability to be the best feature. 

The licensing price could be better. 

We have been using Oracle Linux for six years.

I feel the stability to be the solution's best feature. 

We have contacted technical support on a couple of occasions and found them to be fine, super in fact. 

I am not in a position to comment on the installation process. Another party handled this for us. 

The deployment and maintenance is all being monitored by another company.

The solution should have a better licensing price. 

We pay a monthly subscription fee. 

There are 600 users making use of the solution in our organization. 

I would certainly recommend the solution to others. 

I rate Oracle Linux as an eight out of ten. 

• We use Oracle Linux templates for Oracle VM Server to provision our clone environments quickly.
• We installed Oracle RDBMS almost without any effort in the OS layer,(thanks to preinstalled rpms, yums, and an easy Oracle Linux installation). It is always good to use Oracle Yum, for easing the installation of additional OS packages when needed.
• We are supporting lots of critical customer environments that are mostly Oracle EBS or Oracle RDBMS running on Oracle Linux and we did not get any unexpected reboots or OS problems.
• Oracle Linux is interoperable almost with every Oracle product, and this interoperability comes built-in by default.
• Oracle Linux is well known in the community and that means quick information access when needed, for example, when data is lacking on administration or a requirement to diagnose a component.

• The preinstall packages for Oracle RDBMS.
• Single vendor support, as my customers mostly have Oracle Applications, Oracle cluster stack and Oracle RDBMS running on top of it.
• It is fully compatible with RHEL. (Considering Red Hat is a widespread distribution, it is a valuable thing, as we can run a wide range of applications that are developed for RHEL). So, any application that runs on Red Hat Enterprise Linux will run the same on the corresponding Oracle Linux version.
• Ability to have Oracle Support. (It is a sophisticated support environment.)
• Having Oracle Community for additional support.
• Free binaries and errata.
• Tested and verified by Oracle.
• Ability to check the Oracle Validated Configurations, which offers documented tips for configuring Linux systems to run Oracle database.
• It is a Linux OS but it comes with management and HA tools that are integrated and included for free. Oracle prefers to use Oracle Linux in its Engineered Systems. This also makes Oracle Linux more valuable for me. So, at the end of the day, if you know Oracle Linux, then you automatically get familiar with the Oracle's various Engineered Systems.
• Oracle Linux comes with 2 kernels: 1) UEK, 2) Base kernel. We mostly use UEK because it is Red Hat compatible, modern, current, tested and reliable. But in case of a problem, we can always boot with the base kernel. Offering the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) as part of Oracle Linux alongside what we call the Red Hat-compatible kernel gives us the ability to provide current, modern, tested code to customers without reducing reliable and availability.
• Oracle Database Smart Flash Cache is a key feature for those who use Oracle Databases. It allows us to extend the Oracle Buffer cache using flash-based storage.
• “cgroups” are also a key feature which let us create resource groupings based on CPU, memory or disk parameters.
• Ability to use Oracle YUM server, which gives us a free and convenient way to install the latest Oracle Linux packages.
• New Oracle product patches are firstly available in Oracle Linux... Also, Oracle Linux is quite frequently updated (even the DST patches are directly released).
• Ksplice lets us update the Linux operating system (OS) kernel, while it is running, without a reboot or any interruption.

• Oracle should increase the interaction between Oracle Linux and Oracle RDBMS. (Oracle RDBMS can be packaged into Oracle Linux; a tight integration will bring advantages.)
• File recovery should be added to Oracle Linux. (When you delete a file, you should recover it easily.)
• The RDBMS know-how that Oracle has, should be used to also develop Oracle Linux. (Oracle RDBMS has lots of features; why not mimic some of them in the OS tier?)
• Oracle Linux documentation should be enhanced.
• Oracle Linux clustering should be enhanced and made widespread. (Oracle should certify it in its products.)
• We need a file system other than ASM or ACFS. We need a file system which can be used for replication; maybe integrated Oracle databases.
• We need an Oracle Database-aware GUI but with a consolidated administration console added to the distribution.
• A GUI-based performance analysis tool should be added to the distribution.

I have used it for 5 years. I have used Oracle Linux for hosting several critical Oracle Databases and Oracle Application Servers. 90% of my customers are using Oracle Linux for hosting their Oracle E-Business Suite environments. Also, in the past 5 years, I have migrated lots of Oracle Databases and EBS environments from other OS vendors to Oracle Linux. I have also done several Exadata and ODA administration, which have Oracle Linux in their OS tier.

We did not encounter any stability issues.

We use Oracle Real Application Clusters for RDBMS-level scalability. We also use engineered systems, which are by default scaled out. All these environments are based on Oracle Linux and we didn't have any issues on the OS layer.

Technical support is 8/10.

We were using Red Hat Linux before. We started to use Oracle Linux, because it is free and supported by Oracle (owner of almost all the products that we are using or administrating). It has stabilized as time goes by and compatible with RHEL.

Initial setup was straightforward.

There is no license required for Oracle Linux; however, we recommend having an Unbreakable Linux Network (ULN) license for getting at least basic level support.

We are using Oracle products including Oracle RDBMS, Oracle FMW applications and Oracle EBS, so this is why the strongest option is always Oracle Linux.
Unless there is a hardware-OS relationship (i.e., IBM AIX and IBM Power Systems), we always use and we always recommend that people use Oracle Linux as the operating system.

• Check out the validated configurations.
• Read the guide to get the considerations (such as basic security considerations).
• Check the certification matrix for ensuring your applications and hardware are compatible with Oracle Linux.
• Get at least basic ULN support.

Areas for improvement would be the manager and the use of case space coordinates.

I've been using this solution for nine years.

Oracle Linux is very stable.

This product is scalable.

Technical support needs to improve their response time.

Implementation was easy.

This is a low-cost solution.

This is a good solution for implementation. I would rate this solution as ten out of ten.

The valuable features are the performance, the backup and the restore mechanism. We have had to restore once, and everything was able to restore.

It’s up and running the way the business wants it to be, and it doesn’t go down like other systems do.

Performance and storage could be improved. Dashboard reporting could also be more dynamic, and it would be nice if future versions were easier for users to navigate and drill down into.

We have been using the product for six years.

It is a very stable platform. It never goes down.

We have a couple environments, which have scaled according to business requirements and user growth. So far, it is going well.

We use partners for Oracle, so when we ask for support, we are forwarded to the partner that works with the solution in question. They are really good. If there is an issue where I can just drill down or look into the online forums, I do that as well.

Performance is amazing, and it’s better than Windows. I would give it a ten out of ten.

The biggest advantages of going with Oracle Linux are that it's very stable and it's an open source solution. Also, because we run a lot of other Oracle products, it's great that we can get support for it as part of our Oracle infrastructure.

It's really improved the reliability of our applications both in terms of the fact that Oracle Linux is so stable and because it works well with our other Oracle products. That's very valuable as we maintain an infrastructure that includes basic, high quality technologies from a one vendor.

It would be nice if they could release newer versions quicker. Sometimes we have to wait a while for some new versions to come out with features that we need. You want to be taking advantage of some newer features as soon as possible in order to function better.

We've had no issues at all deploying it.

I think it's fine, there's no issue there. It's been very, very stable.

We have no issues scaling it for our needs.

We use Red Hat as well. They're pretty comparable. I think they're pretty much the same from what I could tell, the differentiator being, of course, that we also run other Oracle products.

It's implemented just fine. The installer is pretty easy and straightforward. The ease of setting it up was a combination of the product and knowledge on our part.

We did the implementation ourselves.

Study ahead of time so you know what you're working with. It's not difficult, but you should know enough to make it easier on yourself.

We use this solution for deploying and managing operating systems and web servers. It is good for web, network, and file management.

The ease of deployment is very valuable because the deployment process is straightforward to manage.

The documentation capabilities could be better. Although it is sufficient, other solutions provide better documentation. 

We have been using this solution for two years and have used a variety of versions.

The solution is stable and we have no issues with it.

The solution is scalable, and it is easy to patch.

We have no experience with customer service and support. 

The initial setup was straightforward. However, it may be more challenging to set up for people with no experience.

I rate this solution a seven out of ten because there can be improvements to the documentation capabilities and the communities around them.