Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Reviews

The primary purpose of any operating system is to run all sorts of applications and databases on servers. We use RHEL to run applications and host containers but not much else. We don't use it for databases, and none of our clients use Red Hat virtualization, so no KBM. We install them onto VMware and use them like Red Hat virtual machines.

I primarily work for banks that tend to have a proper on-premise cloud because the data can't leave the premises. We also work for insurance companies, government, and law enforcement organizations. Most of them use it on a virtualized platform like VMware. Some are hardware installations, and other clients are experimenting with cloud infrastructure. One of the banks we work for has started to build its own cloud to get experience and move specific applications to the cloud.

One client has RHEL deployed across two data centers, which is usually a mirrored setup. In other words, two hardware servers are doing the same thing. It can be active-active or active-passive. The VMs also stretch across two data centers, but it's a Metro cluster, so it's in the same city. I've been working with my current client for a couple of years. Our three-person team manages 250 hardware services and about 400 VMs.

We are still migrating a couple of solutions to Red Hat, so the user base is getting bigger. 

We decided to use Red Hat Linux instead of Solaris or something else because it's widely used and accessible. It's easier to find people who know RHEL. It has also made the automation through Satellite and Puppet easier, which are built into Enterprise Linux. 

RHEL is stable, mature, and relatively easy to handle. I'm pretty confident in it. We haven't had to raise a serious support ticket for any server in I don't know how many years. It has built-in high availability solutions for VMware on top of the hardware.  

Red Hat Linux is also useful for keeping applications from misbehaving. I like the fact that it has firewall controls.

Red Hat can be tricky at times, but all operating systems are. The moves to systemd and NetworkManager haven't made the product more user-friendly. The network management they had before was easier and somewhat more reliable than NetworkManager, which Red Hat forces us to use now.

That may just be my personal preference because I've been working on Red Hat for so long. It's something new that doesn't do exactly what it used to do, so it's probably more of an old person's complaint.

The firewall controls can also be somewhat challenging in terms of automation. An application may use a different setup, so you need to consider that if you want to automate installations. 

You can't easily port an application to another operating system unless it's CentOS or Fedora. It's not portable if you want to port it to something like Windows except for Java and containers. Unless it's another Red Hat, CentOS, or Fedora, the application itself isn't portable if it's installed on a thick virtual or physical machine even. It's not easily portable because you must recompile the application or make changes.

I have been using Red Hat for more than 15 years.

There are bugs, but you can usually find a workaround quickly. When somebody discovers a bug, it's fixed pretty quickly in the next release.

The services run well, and it can handle pretty much anything provided you have enough hardware resources. That's something you always have to watch out for.

RHEL is so stable in the environments I've been working on that I have never had to call Red Hat. Any issues we've had were either hardware or application problems. It's never an issue with the operating system. 

The community resources are helpful. You can find answers to most questions you have in terms of setup or troubleshooting. There are issues now and again, but you can go to the website or a discussion board to find the solution, and it works. When I say we've never had a problem, it's not exactly true. Sometimes it doesn't do what you expect, but you can usually find the solution, so we have never had to call support to ask.

A lot of my clients used to use Oracle Solaris, but many of them switched to Red Hat due to hardware costs. Oracle hardware is expensive, but it is good stuff. We had systems that ran for three years without any issues, but it gets expensive if something breaks or you need to replace hardware due to the lifecycle. 

You can install RHEL on any x86 hardware and deploy it on several Dell servers, which is much cheaper than a single Oracle server. For example, we needed to replace a system because the hardware got sold. We were quoted a price for Solaris running on an Oracle T5. It was four times the price of replacing it with HP hardware. So that's the main reason many clients have shifted to RHEL. 

It's a vicious cycle. As more companies switch, other clients say, "Oh, but there's not much user base left. How long will this run? Let's follow the mainstream trend." That said, I love Solaris. It's unbelievably stable and easy to use, but just the hardware underneath it is too expensive.

I've been involved in deployment, but it depends on the client. I've done everything from architectural design to installation and administration for specific clients. Setting up RHEL is pretty straightforward if you know what you need to know. Of course, you have to do your homework before. For example, if you are deploying it on a VM, you need to see the size you need and what else you have to install. 

When someone orders a server, we typically tell them the deployment will take half a day, but the installation takes around an hour. You may need to install other things, but the out-of-the-box operating system takes about an hour.

We're just one team who manages the infrastructure for one department. It's highly specific. There's a specialized market team that does stock exchanges and financial services. The demands for hardware and availability are particular to that segment. We have three people responsible for installation, maintenance, and administration.

RHEL is stable and relatively cheap, so you get much more out of it than other Linux flavors. I mostly work as a consulting system engineer and am usually not involved in any of this financial stuff.

I can suggest how many subscriptions they need and how much it will cost, but I can't say if it's worth it to the client. I don't know, but we have never had any complaints. People never say, "Oh, but this is expensive, and it doesn't fit into what we had planned."

RHEL has a decent pricing model. It's a subscription, which makes sense. The OS itself is free, but you pay for the support. I have never heard any complaints about the pricing.

You can also purchase a virtual data center license that allows you to set up a hundred virtual servers. You can also add a Satellite license subscription to your standard server. There are several different add-ons that will increase the price of the subscription, depending on the functionality you need.

It's hard for me to compare Red Hat with other open-source solutions because we only have clients who work with Red Hat Linux. Of course, there are entirely free ones you could use. Fedora is the most extensive free version of Red Hat. You could use Ubuntu or any other Linux flavor, which is mostly free. However, I have no idea what additional cost you'd pay if you want to support.

I rate Red Hat Enterprise Linux nine out of ten. I would recommend it, but I need to qualify that by pointing out that I don't have enough experience with other Linux flavors to say that it's better than the others. I've mostly used RHEL because it's so ubiquitous.

Our primary use case for Red Hat Enterprise Linux is to set up and manage servers for various application teams, especially those dealing with hospital ADT applications. These applications handle critical data related to patient admissions and management within healthcare facilities. 

While configuring Red Hat Enterprise Linux and its associated tools can be complex and sometimes frustrating, I have found that leveraging the support and resources provided by Red Hat is invaluable. Through collaboration with Red Hat's support team and a better understanding of the intricacies involved, we have significantly improved the speed and efficiency of managing our extensive infrastructure, making the process smoother and more manageable than before.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux has improved our system's security. 

While measuring uptime is important, what matters most to us is improving the value and efficiency of patch and reboot cycles. Red Hat Enterprise Linux's tools, including Satellite and Ansible, provide valuable visibility and transparency regarding vulnerabilities, packages, and infected systems, helping enhance security and patch management.

The most valuable feature of Red Hat Enterprise Linux is the Ansible Automation Platform, closely followed by Satellite. These two tools are integral to our environment. 

Satellite helps with provisioning, managing metadata, and licensing, while Ansible ensures uniform setup across our extensive environment, making the management of our infrastructure much smoother and more efficient.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux could be improved in several ways, especially regarding transparency and communication of new features. Enhancements could include better documentation and quick reference materials for various user groups, including developers, system administrators, etc. 

Additionally, there could be improved visibility for new and improved commands within Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Many users still rely on outdated commands when newer, more efficient alternatives are available. Providing frequent updates and maintenance for resources like the admin blog would help improve communication and transparency regarding Red Hat Enterprise Linux's capabilities and features.

I have been using Red Hat Enterprise Linux for 11 years.

I would rate the support for Red Hat Enterprise Linux an eight out of ten. There has been a noticeable improvement in their support, particularly after their acquisition by IBM.

Positive

The deployment of Red Hat Enterprise Linux was initially complex because we were not aware of all the available tools to streamline the process. We had to learn, but now we are more proficient. 

Tasks that once took a month can now be completed in a week. We worked directly with Red Hat Enterprise Linux, without an integrated reseller or consultant.

We have seen a return on investment with Red Hat Enterprise Linux. By transitioning applications to the Red Hat Linux platform, we have been able to reduce our data center footprint and associated costs, such as electricity. This cost savings in other areas has been a clear benefit of using Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Our upgrade and migration plans are focused on a balance between stability and staying current with the latest and most secure versions of Red Hat. 

While there is a desire to be on the cutting edge, we must consider what is currently in use by our clinicians and staff who rely on our hospital systems. We aim to strike a balance between these factors and leverage a sandbox environment to test the latest versions before deploying them in our production environment. 

We have been thoroughly impressed with Red Hat Insights and are currently in the process of exploring Leapp, which has shown great results in our evaluations. The web console has been invaluable for us, particularly when collaborating with application custodians who may not be familiar with the command line interface. 

We use Ansible for managing our Red Hat Enterprise Linux systems for provisioning and patching, which has improved visibility and reduced issues compared to third-party solutions. Overall, I would rate Red Hat Enterprise Linux as a nine out of ten.

Red Hat Enterprise Linunx's most valuable feature is patching. 

I am not happy with Red Hat's support. It is difficult to find knowledgeable people. It's hard to troubleshoot. 

I have been using Red Hat Enterprise Linunx since 2009. 

We used Solaris before Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Solaris' environment is closed, while Red Hat Enterprise Linunx is open-source. 

Red Hat Enterprise Linunx's knowledge base is good, and you can find answers there. 

I rate the product a nine out of ten. 

We use the product for application hosting, availability, and CI/CD pipelines.

The solution has good availability and is easy to use. It saves money and resources like support staff.

The product should provide a portal to manage licenses.

I have been using the solution for more than five years.

The solution’s stability is fine.

The product’s scalability is fine.

The support is good.

Neutral

We have seen an ROI on maintenance. As long as our servers run, our company makes money.

We evaluated SLES and Windows.

We purchased the solution via a cloud provider. We use AWS, Google, and Azure. The resiliency of the product is the same as other products. 

The solution helped us reduce costs. We use SLES and Windows alongside Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Application support and vendor support for Red Hat Enterprise Linux are better than other products. 

Overall, I rate the product an eight out of ten.

For the past couple of years, our contractor team has been engaged with the Department of Veterans Affairs, focusing on developing and deploying software and containers and we use Red Hat Enterprise Linux for that.

One of the most valuable aspects is the ease of installing packages on the server. When we need to run specific software, adding and installing packages on Red Hat Enterprise Linux is quite straightforward.

When we initially began working with containers, we encountered some challenges with compatibility. Red Hat provided an older and somewhat outdated version of Docker, which made the early stages of our container journey more challenging than I would have preferred.

I have been using Red Hat Enterprise Linux for three years.

The customer support they provide is highly commendable. I would rate it nine out of ten.

Positive

I've mainly used Windows on my computer or laptop. However, it was a different scenario when we were developing in the cloud and were given Red Hat Enterprise Linux servers to work with.

We regularly perform upgrades on our OpenShift clusters, typically on a monthly basis. When it comes to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux servers, we frequently update the images on our virtual machines to ensure that we stay current with the latest versions. We're actively working on implementing automation using Ansible to streamline and facilitate these tasks.

Overall, I would rate it nine out of ten.

We use RHEL for database servers, a few of them run Oracle servers, and we are also using it for some of the network and infrastructure services.

The best operating system I've ever used is Red Hat, in terms of its ability and consistency of the operating system. Other than that, the vast majority of applications that I had, I could deploy those on Red Hat without much effort as it supported a vast majority of applications. I never faced any major issues with the OS, the support is also very good.

The most valuable features are:

• The stability and reliability of the OS itself
• Being open-source and leading the open-source market trends/ technologies
  
• The wide variety of applications we can deploy on Red Hat
• Their support 

I am a big fan of the OS and the user experience. They're very good. The OS is very stable and very good in performance as well.

RHEL enables us to deploy current applications and emerging workloads across all virtualized hybrid cloud and multi-cloud environments. It is one of the most stable OS that are available. 

We use RHEL to run multiple versions of the same applications and databases on a specific operating system. We have several deployments of database and a few of them are running on a bit older versions of Red Hat and some of them are running on newer versions. We are running different versions on different platforms. The management aspect is also very good, especially when we need updates on the different packages from the RH support network, management is easy.

We also use the tracing and monitoring tools to monitor OS as well as applications running on RHEL platform. The OpenShift is also a big plus through which you can manage and deploy enterprise-ready containerized workloads.

Being an advocate of open source technologies I always wished that Red Hat subscription/ support should be offered free of cost. Having said that, I understand the economics involved in running large enterprise like Red Hat; support cost is one area that can be improved. They should offer it at reduced prices.

I have been using RHEL since the start of my technical career, which was around the mid of 2003. So it's been almost 18+ years. I started using RH when it was version 7.

Stability has always been a plus for RHEL. 

Scalability is excellent. With the introduction of hybrid and multi-cloud support, one can scale up as well as scale out his workloads pretty easily. We usually scale up our traditional workloads when we need more resources i.e., during peak seasons. 

Four people in my team are responsible for deployment and support of Linux based workloads. 

We have around 300 virtual machines (VMs) and roughly 20% of them are running on Linux environment.

Whenever I open a case, I believe the support team will be able to solve my problem. They are very good at it. The documentation RHEL provides is also very good. Almost all the time, I get a solution to my problem. :)

We are using other flavors of Linux OSes, that include Oracle Enterprise Linux (OEL) and CentOS, both of which are binary compatible with RHEL. We are also using a couple of other Linux flavors like Ubuntu and OpenSUSE.

RHEL provides features that help speed our deployment. Installing on a physical server takes more time than installing it onto a virtual machine (VM).

Because of absence of local support in our part of the region, we did find some difficulties in the initial deployments with hardware vendors/ partners when we started in 2003. The local partners didn't have much knowledge of Linux environments at that time, and the support for hardware was also a bit tricky. The deployment took a couple of days until we got support from the hardware manufacturer.

Nowadays, it's very good. I managed to get good support from the hardware vendors after that incident.

We have our own deployment plans for the operating systems that include some baseline configurations and security checklists.

We usually deploy in-house as we have a trained team. Occasionally, little help is sought from the vendor teams, some of them have skilled professionals.

RHEL offers an efficient, cost-effective and reliable OS environment for enterprise-level environments. Similarly cost of running operations and the scalability factors make RHEL a good choice for providing a better ROI. The feature set it offers, support for a variety of applications, ease of deployment, and an excellent level of support all result in a good ROI. 

I believe for an enterprise-level operating system and the feature set RHEL offers, it's like any other enterprise platform cost. The introduction of OpenShift is also a big plus in terms of deployment and management of container based workloads. Red Hat as mentioned earlier can improve a bit on support/ subscription costs.

We had been using a couple of Red Hat variants for some scientific experiments that included Scientific Linux CERN (SLC) and Scientific Linux (SL), which were a confidence booster for choosing and deploying RHEL for production workloads.

Since I started with version RH 7, I believe the GUI is quite close to any other GUI operating system. There have always been a variety of tools and features that attract a non-Linux user.  As already mentioned, RHEL has been a pioneer in open-source technologies; it continued to evolve with changing market needs, that has been a big success for them.

I would definitely advise choosing RHEL if you need stability, scalability, and reliability of the OS platform. I would be a big advocate for the use of Red Hat to any new person who wants to deploy his production workloads, on-prem or on cloud on a Linux environment.

I would rate it a nine out of ten. It's near perfect. 

Most of our servers are low latency, and it's easier to have low latency applications run on Linux. Red Hat Enterprise Linux's installation is easy. We don't have to reboot Red Hat Enterprise Linux like Windows, where there are a bunch of system updates that you have to do. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is just easier to manage.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux's most valuable feature is its stability.

We would like to have a better understanding of what to expect when we move to a different version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

A latency always gets introduced when we move to newer Red Hat versions. I wish we wouldn't see that as often as we do nowadays. It would be nice to know the changes upfront rather than when we have to open a case, go through a couple of months, and then find a good resolution. We want a better understanding of what we will see when we update the kernel from seven to eight.

I have been using Red Hat Enterprise Linux for 15 years.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux is a pretty stable solution. Its stability is a lot better than most other operating systems.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux's scalability is better than other competitors.

For the most part, Red Hat Enterprise Linux's support has been really good. Most of the time, we've had to escalate it to get a good response.

Neutral

Red Hat Enterprise Linux’s initial setup is pretty straightforward.

Whenever we see a compliance issue and need a patch, it's been relatively easy to get Red Hat Enterprise Linux to update it.

We have a mix of Windows and Linux. Around 80 percent of our systems are Red Hat, but we also have Windows. So it depends on the application.

Most applications are compatible with Red Hat Enterprise Linux. It's easier to tune on a Red Hat system than on another OS. We could pin applications to a core with Red Hat Enterprise Linux. In terms of tuning, Red Hat Enterprise Linux performs better in the long run.

Overall, I rate Red Hat Enterprise Linux an eight out of ten.

One of our use cases is for our in-house applications that the development team builds. We also use it for typical tasks like running Jenkins, GitLab, and other development tools to make them accessible for the developers who write code and do software development.

One of Red Hat Enterprise Linux’s valuable features is its enterprise-level security. We are guaranteed that it's secure, and that's important for us because we need to comply with security regulations. Security always remains a top priority.

We just run Red Hat Enterprise Linux’s built-in security features day in and day out. We know it's secure, and then we just move on to other tasks. It's like a routine where we don't have to think too much because we know it's already integrated into the whole enterprise. It's the next step, and it gives us more time to focus on other tasks.

We are trying to figure out how to enable encryption or just encryption. The last thing we want is to use locks, which are a hassle for encryption. We don't have the personnel to unlock the system every time it gets rebooted. I know there's a way, like on Windows, where they have TPM. I'm not sure how Red Hat Enterprise Linux’s TPM works. That's one of the issues we face—how to utilize TPM effectively.

I think in the future, if the company requires us to encrypt everything, it would be a time-consuming process. I'm not sure how long that would take or if it will happen. I just want to understand how Red Hat Enterprise Linux and TPM work or if there's an existing solution that works similarly where I don't necessarily have to be present every time my system reboots and enter a password. At least for Windows, we know that it works, but I'm not familiar with the equivalent functionality in Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

In future releases, I would prefer a Red Hat Enterprise Linux image that fits on a DVD. The Red Hat Enterprise Linux image keeps getting larger and larger. One of the biggest requirements for my company is that it has to fit on a DVD. Now, with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 approaching close to ten gigabytes, it won't fit on a DVD anymore. The last thing we want to resort to is using Blu-ray. I prefer not to use Blu-ray. So we need to keep the image size on a DVD smaller. That's one of the main issues. And we can't use USB sticks either, even though they're a new option. Everything needs to be burned on a DVD. So having a Red Hat Enterprise Linux image that fits on a DVD would be beneficial for any future versions or releases.

I have been using this solution for eight years now. Right now, we're migrating. I'm trying to upgrade from Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7. And that process is painstaking. It's taking a lot of time. I know we want to get that done before October because I think that's when the security support for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 expires. We need to move everything to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.

We have a lot of legacy systems, and it's very time-consuming trying to figure out what will work and which version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux will support all our applications. So it's just a lengthy process to go through.

In terms of stability, there have been some issues, particularly on the workstation side. The workstation tends to freeze up occasionally, requiring a system restart. The server side, on the other hand, works well as intended. Although Red Hat Enterprise Linux is primarily designed for servers, our developers use it as a workstation, and that can sometimes cause issues after a couple of days of continuous use.

They may need to restart their systems when something freezes or stops working. So it's one of those things we encounter.

I don't really use it extensively. I have some knowledge and experience with it, but I don't heavily rely on Red Hat support. Whenever I encounter a problem, I usually turn to Google for solutions.

The knowledge base provided by Red Hat exists, but I find it difficult to navigate. The information seems scattered and hard to find. I tend to prefer searching on Google since I can get immediate answers there compared to the knowledge base, which can be challenging to navigate. It seems like the knowledge base could use some improvement.

One of the main advantages is the level of support. Red Hat Enterprise Linux provides nearly ten years of support, including two years of extended support, whereas other operating systems typically have one or two major versions released within five years. It can be challenging to allocate the budget for frequent updates over such a short period. So I think that's the main appeal of Red Hat Enterprise Linux—its ten-year support with an additional two years.

Since I've been working with Red Hat Enterprise Linux for a long time, it feels easy for me. However, for someone completely new to it, especially coming from a Windows background, it might seem more complicated. But for me, it's second nature and not that difficult. So the initial setup depends on the level of familiarity with the system.

For a brand-new system, it might take around ten minutes.

I have worked with CentOS, Fedora, and Ubuntu. So I have experience with different flavors of Linux, from the Ubuntu side to Fedora. From a developer's point of view, the main difference, if I compare it to Ubuntu, is that they always get the latest packages, which helps them a lot. 

On the other hand, with Red Hat Enterprise Linux, I understand that it's set up to prioritize security. But sometimes, from a development perspective, it's challenging for them to obtain the latest packages. As an assessment, I have to go out there, fetch the package or compile the new package for the new version, and then bring it into Red Hat Enterprise Linux so that developers can use it. I think that's the issue. It's a balancing act between trying to get the latest package versions and ensuring stability and security. It's a problem that I think everyone struggles with.

Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten because there is always room for improvement when it comes to technology.