AlmaLinux is a distribution of the Linux operating system, also based on open source, which is derived from CentOS; being its most natural replacement within the “free distribution” plan following the decision of Red Hat (its developer) to stop offering support for CentOS 7 and CentOS 8 starting in 2024.
AlmaLinux is now the freely distributed version of Linux, an alternative for fans of the Red Hat and CentOS way of working, and we share this link if you want to learn more about the dates scheduled to retire its versions.
What is AlmaLinux
Technically, AlmaLinux is an independent operating system, and is a fork of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) as CentOS once was. It is completely free, with no licensing costs, and uses the traditional long-term support and updates model that the different versions of original CentOS had. Although AlmaLinux was not created as an emergency after the matter began to be talked about, due to the sudden changes that were coming for CentOS, its developers pushed for the completion and release of this new distribution into the field.
A community behind Almalinux
The continuation of CentOS called AlmaLinux, is carried out by a large community of developers, with main players such as CloudLinux, which after several successes in the development of tools and operating systems, are also in charge of developing it, financing it and supporting it, with the commitment to maintain update support.
At first, there was a lot of uncertainty about what was going to happen to all CentOS users, but AlmaLinux quickly gained the support of hundreds of thousands of Linux users and Linux-based system administrators, and is now one of the most used versions for operate servers.
What are the features of AlmaLinux
With AlmaLinux nothing changed in the way of managing a server, so it had nothing to envy of CentOS, and here we name some of the favorite features of our community of Linux fans:
- It is completely free and open source like CentOS was.
- It’s ultra RHEL compatible, so all the packages you use regularly will still work and be supported.
- It is developed, supported and financed by a huge community of users from all over the world.
- Supports control panels such as cPanel, Plesk and Control Web Panel.
- You will have guaranteed support and updates over time.
What is the difference between AlmaLinux and CloudLinux
If you are in the world of web hosting, you are probably wondering what CloudLinux has to do with AlmaLinux. The first thing you should know about this is that both AlmaLinux and CloudLinux coexist as operating systems independent of each other despite having the developer in common. Although both share the same starting point and the same team of developers, CloudLinux OS will continue to be the main product of CloudLinux since its fork of Red Hat Enterprise, which, although also paid, had massive adoption by hosting providers website for its stability and benefits for server management.
AlmaLinux will be a free product, but that does not mean it is bad or neglected; and hundreds of Linux fans are improving it day by day; and thousands of members of the Internet community will be contributing new features and updates so that this will grow more and more to continue offering support.
How does this impact my website hosting plan?
It is likely that by the time you have read this note, your web hosting service provider has already resolved the issue, or has decided on some type of action (or maybe not, we don’t know). This is just a change to the base operating system of your servers, and your services should not be affected, as well as the speed, capacity of your plan or your payment quota.
If, on the other hand, you are the one who manages your own server, or you are the systems administrator of a company, then you have probably made one of these decisions:
- Make a backup and reinstall your server with AlmaLinux.
- Acquire a new server with Almalinux and move your content.
- Upgrade CentOS to AlmaLinux using ELevate without reinstalling your server (+).
- The good news is that if you have chosen to host your website with WNPower, this is not a problem for you, since we think of our platform as something dynamic and long-term, in order to cushion any impact similar to this movement and how mobilizing it was for the other web hosting providers.
- At WNPower we think about you and your time, and we want you to have your mind focused on your business. That is why we provide the most complete, secure hosting service, with hundreds of exclusive tools, support that is always there to help you, and we host our servers on Amazon AWS. Do you need something else for your website?
