Red Hat Expands Customer Involvement in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Development

Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT), the world’s leading provider of open source solutions, today invites Red Hat Enterprise Linux users to help discuss features for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, the next major planned release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux enterprise operating system. The Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Ideas discussion group on the Red Hat Customer Portal is now open to all Red Hat subscribers – users and partners – to share use cases and discuss features.

The Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Ideas discussion group is an extension to the interactive processes already underway with partners, customers and contributors in the open source community. It provides a venue for sharing thoughts and use cases and is invaluable to Red Hat engineering development groups. Access to the Red Hat Customer Portal, which includes a wealth of Red Hat Enterprise Linux information and knowledge, is provided as an important component of every Red Hat subscription.

“Since its inception, Red Hat has always operated in a truly transparent and collaborative way – the open source way – and this is especially apparent in the way we approach product development,” said Jim Totton, vice president and general manager, Platform Business Unit, Red Hat. “We welcome all of our customers and partners to participate in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Ideas group and collaborate with other users and Red Hat engineering to make the next version of our enterprise operating system better than ever.”

“Having a formal process that allows customers to influence new features and overall product direction can be beneficial for vendors and customers alike,” said Elaina Stergiades, research manager, Software Support Services, at IDC. “By including this capability in an online portal, software support providers can simplify the feedback process and increase engagement between internal staff and customers - providing expanded benefits and additional value for support subscriptions.”

To participate in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Ideas discussion group, Red Hat subscribers can join by logging into the Red Hat Customer Portal using their Red Hat Network (RHN) log in information, http://access.redhat.com and click on the discussion group link on the front page.

For more information about Red Hat Enterprise Linux, please visit http://www.redhat.com/rhel. For more information about Red Hat, http://www.redhat.com. For more news, more often, visit http://press.redhat.com.

About Red Hat, Inc.
Red Hat, the world's leading provider of open source solutions and an S&P 500 company, is headquartered in Raleigh, NC with over 65 offices spanning the globe. CIOs ranked Red Hat as one of the top vendors delivering value in Enterprise Software for seven consecutive years in the CIO Insight Magazine Vendor Value survey. Red Hat provides high-quality, affordable technology with its operating system platform, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, together with virtualization, applications, management and Services Oriented Architecture (SOA) solutions, including Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization and JBoss Enterprise Middleware. Red Hat also offers support, training and consulting services to its customers worldwide. Learn more: http://www.redhat.com.

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