10 years of Red Hat Enterprise Linux

(Scroll down to experience the timeline)

Red Hat has been around longer than ten years, and Linux much longer than that.

Red Hat Linux first appeared in 1994, with an October release called—appropriately—Halloween. After that, a new version of Linux was released approximately every 6 months. ISVs and users struggled to support such a fast release cycle.

We pick up the story in 1997. Red Hat Linux is available online, and sold in stores as a boxed set of CDs—the operating system of choice for hobbyists, scientists, and forward-thinkers. It will grow to become much, much more.

1997

January

February

March

April

In May, this happened:

June

July

August

September

October

December

By 2011, more than 2.5 million Red Hat Enterprise Linux subscriptions were deployed in a variety of enterprise uses worldwide. Linux is running businesses of all sizes, in both the private and public sector.

Today, Red Hat has more than 30 Linux and middleware courses, many with certification standards. RHCE remains the leading Linux certification in the industry.

28 stock exchanges across 24 countries run Red Hat Enterprise Linux to handle more than 50 percent of the world's trading volume.

In 10 years, Red Hat has captured both technology and business innovation, proven by the success of our company. And it's all built on the same subscription model. From Red Hat Enterprise Linux to JBoss middleware to virtualization to CloudForms, OpenShift, Gluster, and onward.

Our success is a result of community-powered innovation. We would like to thank you--all of you--for being part of our community of subscribers, users, partners, certified professionals, tinkerers, thinkers, and friends.

We look forward to the next decade, and the exciting new ideas it will bring.

Let's get started.

rhel logo fedora logo

MAY 29

Red Hat Linux 4.2

Red Hat Linux 4.2 contained over 220 packages, including sendmail, BIND, INN, and Apache, and supported UNIX and shadow password authentication, and MD5 password support. It also boasted the 2.0.30 kernel, and was released in Intel, Alpha, and SPARC versions. Red Hat Linux 4.2 could be downloaded from Red Hat's web site or purchased as a box set. Box sets contain two CDs, boot diskettes, and the Red Hat Linux 4.2 User's Guide. Suggested retail price was around $49.95.

Read more

NOVEMBER 18

First commercial support for Red Hat Linux 5 (Intel and Alpha)

On December 1, 1997, Red Hat began offering support contracts for the Intel platform (with Alpha and SPARC support to follow in 1998). Resources include an internet-based solution database of technical information, a centralized trouble ticket system, a technical mailing list, and assistance with difficult support questions provided by Red Hat's support and development departments. Future announcements would detail Red Hat's plans for end-user telephone support.

Read more

FEBRUARY 6

Fermi Lab core utilities and applications supported on Red Hat Linux

Fermi Lab—a research lab that was part of the high-energy physics community and, at the time, the home of the highest-energy particle accelerator in the world (the Tevatron)--announced that they provide core utilities and applications that run on Red Hat Linux (in addition to the usual flavors of UNIX that these scientific high-performance computing farms usually support). This was the beginning of Linux as a cost saver in scientific computing architectures.

Read more

MAY 15

Red Hat Secure Web Server

Red Hat Secure Web Server was announced—a product based on Apache web server with RSA key technology, and including source code, proxy and cache server, search engine, log analysis software, Netscape web browser, and a discount for Thawte Consulting site certificate.

Read more

MAY 13

NASA, Red Hat, and others announce Beowulf project

The Beowulf project—also known as Extreme Linux—was one of the early efforts by open source software to develop open source tools that could aid in high-performance clustering. This work included NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center researchers, Red Hat engineers, and many other research center scientists who needed cheaper, faster parallel processing power. An CD-ROM of Extreme Linux sold for $29.95, and was available online at the usual mirrors.

Read more

JUNE 01

Red Hat Linux 5.1

Red Hat Linux 5.1 included enhanced installation features, as well as system configuring, web caching, window management features and an additional CD of applications for Linux. DHCP networking, boot floppy creation, enhanced rescue mode, and an improved kickstart also highlight the 5.1 installer.

Read more

JULY 23

Oracle, CA, and Informix join Netscape, Corel, Cygnus, and Interbase in making Red Hat a supported platform.

Oracle Corporation, the leading supplier of software for information management, announced support for Red Hat Linux 5.1. Oracle also announced plans to port Oracle8 and Oracle8.1, which are scheduled to ship by year's end, to Linux on the Intel platform by early 1999. With the support of Oracle and Netscape, as well as the support of other leading vendors like Informix, Computer Associates, Interbase, Corel, and Cygnus, Red Hat Linux now had the applications that the industry demanded.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 29

First round of strategic financing from Intel and Netscape, with venture capital firms Benchmark and Greylock.

Intel, Netscape Communications Corporation and venture capital firms Greylock and Benchmark Partners took minority equity positions in the company. Red Hat also announced that it was establishing an Enterprise Computing Division, offering enterprise-grade products and services to support global, mission-critical applications.

Read more

NOVEMBER 02

Red Hat Linux 5.2 (plus Applications CD)

Red Hat Linux 5.2 included new and improved installation with workstation or server install paths (still customizable), DHCP, boot floppy creation, enhanced rescue mode, multiple SCSI support, and included Apache 1.3 and GIMP 1.0 (the long-awaited graphics program). This boxset was available from local retailers (or redhat.com) for $49.95 and included 3 CDs—installation, an application CD, and user manuals.

Read more

JANUARY 27

Red Hat and HP announce service and support alliance

HP and Red Hat formed an alliance to offer end-to-end service and support for HP customers running Red Hat Linux 5.2 on Intel-based NetServer systems. In addition, HP announced plans to port Linux to its IA 64 architectures.

Read more

FEBRUARY 18

IBM supports all IBM systems on Linux

Red Hat and IBM work together to offer high-performance IBM systems—including Netfinity servers, PC 300 Commercial Desktops, IntelliStations, and ThinkPads—running Red Hat Linux. The partnership also covered Red Hat hardware certification testing and dedicated customer training.

Read more

FEBRUARY 04

Dell-Red Hat Alliance is formed

Red Hat awarded hardware certification to selected configurations of the Dell PowerEdge 1300 and 2300 servers. This allowed PowerEdge server customers in the United States access to Red Hat Linux 5.2 on Dell servers through the DellWare procurement service, through direct sale from Red Hat, through any Red Hat Linux authorized reseller, and, for the first time, as a factory-installed option through the DellPlus Custom Factory Integration program.

Read more

MARCH 30

Red Hat partners with SAP

Red Hat announces an equity investment by the SAP Venture Fund. SAP provides funding to companies with promising technologies that are expected to further the state of the art for enterprise computing.

Read more

MARCH 09

Second round of investment: Compaq, IBM, Novell, Oracle, and SAP

Red Hat accepts equity investments from Compaq, International Business Machines (IBM), Novell, and Oracle Corporation. These industry leaders all take minority equity positions in Red Hat.

Read more

APRIL 26

Red Hat Linux 6

Red Hat Linux 6 server operating system sported symmetrical multi-processor support (SMP) for up to four processors, both GUIs (GNOME and KDE), and (for the first time) 30 days of unlimited phone-based installation support (with the purchase of a boxset).

Read more

APRIL 26

Dell is the first to ship factory-installed Linux-based servers.

Dell began to factory-install the Red Hat Linux operating system on Dell PowerEdge servers and Dell Precision WorkStations. This move was in response to customer demand, and expanded the joint efforts of Dell and Red Hat to make Red Hat Linux a success in the corporate market. It also made Dell the first major systems vendor to offer online ordering of systems with Red Hat Linux already installed.

JUNE 08

Red Hat and Compaq support partnership

Red Hat and Compaq expanded their strategic partnership to provide call center support for Red Hat Linux enterprise users worldwide. Under the agreement, Compaq's Customer Services organization, which serves hundreds of thousands of organizations in more than 100 countries, escalated the most advanced support issues to Red Hat's services and support organization.

Read more

AUGUST 11

Red Hat goes public with a record-breaking technology IPO

Red Hat's initial public offering (IPO), designed to raise between $60 million and $72 million to finance expanding operations, instead raised about $84 million.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 20

Red Hat training expands into the UK

Red Hat introduced the official Red Hat Certified Engineer qualification (RHCE) for technical professionals in the UK.

Read more

NOVEMBER 16

Red Hat Ready ISV certification program initiated

Red Hat announced the Red Hat Ready Program, the most comprehensive hardware certification program for ensuring hardware compatibility with the Red Hat Linux OS. The Red Hat Ready certification program uses a rigorous testing methodology from a trusted authority in open source solutions that assures enterprise users that their hardware choices are compatible.

Read more

JANUARY 11

RHCE training offered globally

After expanding Red Hat Training into the UK in 1999, a move forward into Asia—offering RHCE certification and training courses from Red Hat partners including IBM Japan, Global Knowledge Network Japan, SRA, Fujisoft, and others—makes Red Hat Training a truly global organization. Red Hat Japan (founded in 1999) is a Japanese corporation and 100 percent subsidiary of Red Hat, Inc.

Read more

JANUARY 20

Amareda Hess uses Red Hat for supercomputing cluster

Amareda Hess Exploration Department runs a cluster of 128 Red Hat Linux workstations to replace a leased supercomputer, saving more than $2 million. This cluster is used to perform mathematical functions for 3D modeling to help to find geologic structures that might contain oil or gas in hard-to-reach offshore areas.

Read more

MARCH 23

Red Hat offers enterprise channel partners program

Red Hat introduced an Enterprise Channel Partner Program to the largest resellers and network and systems integrators. IComputer Horizons Corp.'s G Triad is the first official Enterprise Channel Partner.

Read more

MAY 30

Google's search engine and computing functions use a 4,000+ server Red Hat Linux cluster

Google used Red Hat Linux for all Internet computing functions since its inception in 1998. To generate the necessary power for its in-depth searching capabilities, Google needed a large cluster with the dependability and scalability of UNIX, but without the prohibitive cost. With the support of Red Hat, Google has seen significant success.

Read more

JUNE 20

Dell and Red Hat form One Source Alliance

Dell and Red Hat continue their partnership to accelerate commercial adoption of the Linux operating system and to support businesses building Internet infrastructures. Linux is now one of three strategic operating systems Dell factory installs and supports globally, along with Microsoft Corp.'s Windows and Novell Inc.'s NetWare.

Read more

JULY 10

Red Hat High Availability Server 1.0

Red Hat High Availability Server 1.0 was a specialized version of Red Hat Linux 6.2. It provided an out-of-the-box clustering solution that delivered dynamic load balancing, improved fault tolerance, and scalability of TCP/IP-based applications. Users could combine individual servers into a cluster, resulting in highly available access to critical network resources like data, applications, network services, and more.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 25

Red Hat Linux 7

Red Hat Linux 7 provided enhanced security, new ease-of-use features, optimized software for higher-end Intel chips, and better 3D support. It included dozens of new enterprise-ready applications, and a free trial of Red Hat's new update service, Red Hat Network. Red Hat Linux 7 was pre-set for the release of the 2.4 kernel and came in three versions (Standard, Deluxe, and Professional) which included updates and varying levels of support.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 25

Red Hat Network debuts

Red Hat Network became a part of Red Hat’s service offerings beginning in December of 2000. Red Hat Network offered an update management service that kept systems secure and functioning during rapid open source development cycles. It provided security evaluations, notification and analysis services, a web-based management interface, and tight integration with RPM (for installation and dependency management) and support services. Red Hat Network was made available to all Red Hat Linux 7 customers on a free trial basis from September 26-December 31, 2000.

Read more

DECEMBER 12 (moved from May)

IBM pledges $1 billion to Linux

IBM's Lou Gerstner said that IBM "is convinced that Linux can do for business applications what the Internet did for networking and communications."Gerstner and VP of technology Irving Wladawsky Berger announced at the eBusiness Conference and Expo in New York that IBM had spend about $1 billion on Linux development and promotion, and that they expected that amount to grow in 2001.

Read more

APRIL 17

Red Hat Linux 7.1 (2.4 kernel)

Red Hat Linux 7.1 included the new 2.4 kernel with improved SMP support for superior performance on Intel multi-processor platforms. Red Hat Linux 7.1 also delivered new configuration tools for set up and administration of DNS, Web, and print servers. This release also featured Red Hat Network connectivity, including software anager.

Read more

JUNE 26

Red Hat offers consulting services

Red Hat announced a new suite of consulting services to help companies plan and rapidly migrate key elements of their computing infrastructure to Linux and other open source solutions. Services included Linux migration and integration, open source web infrastructure services, open source strategic opportunities services, and more.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 25

Oracle validates Red Hat Linux 7.1 for Oracle 9i Database and Application Server

Red Hat Linux 7.1 completed validation on Oracle 9i, and work continued to validate other versions of Oracle and Red Hat Linux software products. As a result of those efforts, Red Hat would support Red Hat Linux for use with Oracle software, and Oracle would support Oracle software on Red Hat Linux.

Read more

OCTOBER

Amazon, in its SEC filings, credits their Linux migration with millions of dollars in savings per quarter

"The decline in absolute dollars spent during the three months and nine months ended September 30, 2001 in comparison to the corresponding periods in the prior year primarily reflect our migration to a Linux-based technology platform that utilizes a less-costly technology infrastructure, as well as general price reductions for data and telecommunication services due to market overcapacity." [ October 30, 2001 10-Q SEC filing ]

Read more

DECEMBER 13

Red Hat CEO testifies before Senate Judiciary Committee

Red Hat CEO Matthew Szulik told the Senate Judiciary Committee that Microsoft was a "monopolist [that] has seriously warped the technology industry" Szulik went on to say that Microsoft's monopoly power has widened the digital divide, extending the gap in information technology between the haves and have-nots in our society.

Read more

DECEMBER 17

Red Hat and IBM collaborate to deliver Linux solutions for IBM servers (including S/390 and zSeries mainframes)

Red Hat Linux was optimized for IBM's S/390 Parallel Enterprise (G5 and G6) and Multiprise 3000 servers. It also runs on IBM's zSeries 900 servers. Utilizing the same open source code base as Red Hat Linux 7.2, enterprise companies could now deploy Red Hat Linux on the S/390 and take advantage of increased performance and efficient resource sharing.

Read more

APRIL 08

Credit Suisse First Boston reports 20x performance boost with Red Hat Linux-powered trading architecture

A mission-critical component of the Credit Suisse First Boston (CSFB) worldwide financial trading architecture was successfully migrated from UNIX to Red Hat Linux. CSFB is a leading global investment bank serving institutional, corporate, government and individual clients. CSFB's Agora enterprise notification system, powered by Red Hat Linux, processes roughly 35 million global and 25 million U.S. transactions each day.

Read more

APRIL 30

Jim Henson’s Creature Shop uses Red Hat Linux

Henson Digital Performance Studio (HDPS) used Red Hat Linux to power digital design projects, and Red Hat Network to save time on systems management. Red Hat Linux is the operating system base for both HDPS and the animatronic Henson Performance Control System (HPCS), ground-breaking technologies in the world of motion pictures, video games, digital puppetry, and more.

Read more

MAY 28

Dreamworks reveals first films rendered on Linux

Linux started at Dreamworks as servers for rendering—clustered computational power that was far less expensive than mainframes and proprietary OSes. Over time, Linux would become the standard for everything from rendering to desktop animation. Shrek and Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron were the first films rendered on Linux servers. Others (like Kung Fu Panda) would follow.

Read more

MAY 6

Red Hat Linux 7.3

Red Hat Linux 7.3 includes Evolution email client and contact manager, project management software, Mozilla web browser, GNOME Meeting video conferencing software, Apache 1.3 web server, PostgreSQL relational database management system, KDE 3.0, and GNOME 1.4. It also included support services and management and update services through Red Hat Network. Red Hat Linux 7.3 was available in two versions, Personal or Professional.

Read more

MAY 29

Red Hat Linux Advanced Server 2.1

Red Hat Linux Advanced Server was the ideal Linux solution for partners and customers due to longer release cycles, added enterprise-class features, and unprecedented reliability and stability. Red Hat Advanced Server was created as a response to customer and partner needs for a longer release cycle, and would eventually become Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Read more

JUNE 05

Red Hat, Dell, and Oracle announce Linux partnership

The Red Hat, Dell, and Oracle partnership addressed growing customer demand for performance and reliability, with increased flexibility and cost-effectiveness for the enterprise market. Oracle, Dell and Red Hat collaborated to develop, test, and bring to market Linux solutions based on Dell PowerEdge Servers and Dell|EMC and PowerVault storage systems, Release 2 of Oracle9i Database with Real Application Clusters and the Red Hat Linux Advanced Server operating system.

Read more

JUNE 05

Oracle migrates development platform from SPARC/Solaris to x86/RHEL

Release 2 of Oracle 9i Database, Application Server, and Developer Suite offered Linux support, and IDC expected Linux to become a key platform for enterprise databases. Oracle was the first vendor to provide support for Linux in a commercially available relational database, application server, and set of developer tools.

Read more

AUGUST 13

Red Hat Advanced Server support for AMD Hammer technology (x86-64)

Red Hat announced mainstream support of AMD's x86-64 technology in enterprise product lines, providing optimized native 64-bit and 32-bit application support. This provides several benefits, including open standards-based tools powering critical enterprise applications, extreme performance for servers, workstations, and desktops, and simple support from companies and individuals with existing training and technology.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 30

Red Hat Linux 8

Red Hat Linux 8.0 delivered enhanced productivity tools and an updated graphical interface that combined to create an easy-to-use operating environment for personal and professional users. Key features included Bluecurve desktop, OpenOffice.org office suite, personal firewall and configuration tools, Red Hat Network integration, Apache 2.0 web server, and more.

Read more

SEPTEMBER

Open Source Development Lab (OSDL) forms

OSDL will later become The Linux Foundation.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 16

IBM/Red Hat Global Alliance

IBM and Red Hat announced a multiyear alliance including services and expanded support for software and servers.

Read more

DECEMBER

Fedora Linux Project founded at the University of Hawaii by Warren Togami

After the creation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, users led by Warren Togami, preferring the rapid-release cycle of Red Hat Linux, created a project based on Red Hat Linux that would continue the bleeding-edge development and innovation of RPM-based applications for Red Hat Linux. They named the project Fedora.

Read more

FEBRUARY 11

Defense Department COE certification for Red Hat Linux Advanced Server

The Defense Department certification is broadly recognized within the U.S. Federal Government as one of the most rigorous computing certifications to obtain. This prestigious certification establishes Red Hat Linux Advanced Server as an approved DoD mission-critical operating system and sends a clear message to all Federal agencies to confidently move forward with broader Red Hat infrastructure deployments.

Read more

MARCH 12

Red Hat Enterprise Linux (AS, ES, and WS)

The Red Hat Enterprise Linux suite was born. AS (originally called Red Hat Linux Advanced Server) provided a complete operating system for a entry-level and departmental server applications, and was ideally suited for application, network, file, print, mail, and web serving. Red Hat Enterprise Linux WS was Red Hat's first enterprise-class engineering desktop workstation. Red Hat Enterprise Linux WS was ideal for software development, electronic design and compute-intensive work.

Read more

MARCH 31

Last major version of Red Hat Linux (9, Shrike)

Red Hat Linux 9 introduces Native POSIX Thread Library and includes OpenOffice.org office suite, Mozilla web browser, Ximian Evolution email client, CUPS for printing, and upgraded core components including Linux kernel 2.4.20, GCC 3.2.1, GNU libc 2.3, and Apache 2.0 web server software. Red Hat Linux 9 would be the last major version of Red Hat Linux, as the focus for rapid innovation and cutting-edge development shifted to the Fedora Project.

Read more

MAY 08

Red Hat and Fujitsu partner

Fujitsu and its principal subsidiaries and affiliates, including Fujitsu Siemens Computers, became Premier partners for the fulfillment and service of the complete Red Hat Enterprise Linux line of solutions on Fujitsu's Intel-based PRIMERGY servers worldwide. The parties announced plans to collaborate in software development, marketing, sales, delivery, and support efforts to optimize Red Hat Enterprise Linux for mission-critical use on Fujitsu hardware.

Read more

JULY 07

Red Hat and Rackspace announce hosted solutions partnership with Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Red Hat Network

Rackspace (rackspace.com) and Red Hat Linux (redhat.com) announced that they formed a partnership to deliver hosted solutions to customers running Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Rackspace uses Red Hat Network to offer managed services designed to scale enterprise platforms and keep systems current.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 09

VeriSign migrates 2,000+ servers to Red Hat Enterprise Linux, reduces operating costs

VeriSign's migration to Red Hat began with the Naming and Directory Services business unit and the deployment of Oracle on Linux for several corporate applications. Migration continued over the next 18 months throughout the entire company. VeriSign maintains a definitive database of over 27 million web addresses in .com and .net—including some of the world's most recognizable top-level domains—and responds to over 9 billion DNS look-ups daily.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 22

Red Hat Linux merges with the Fedora Linux Project

The Red Hat Linux Project merged with the Fedora Linux Project to combine efforts, renaming the combined effort the Fedora Project. The output of the Fedora Project would be the Fedora OS, which was also called (early on) Fedora Core.

Read more

OCTOBER 24

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 supported a greatly increased range of IT deployments and spanned seven hardware architectures. The technology emphasized scalability, performance, and extended system coverage, and was available as part of an annual subscription that included Red Hat Network management tools and services.

Read more

OCTOBER 24

Red Hat and HP expand global alliance

"HP is bringing the powerful and flexible Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 platform to enterprise customers on leading HP industry-standard solutions," said Martin Fink, vice president of Linux, HP Enterprise Storage and Servers. "HP is delivering on its commitment to put customers first, offering them solutions with the best price and performance available on the market today."

Read more

NOVEMBER 06

Fedora Core 1 available, Fedora Core 2 (with 2.6 kernel) work begins

Fedora Core 1 provided a complete Linux platform built exclusively from open source software. Available at no cost, the release served the needs of community developers, testers, and other technology enthusiasts who wish to participate in and accelerate the technology development process. Following its release, work began on the next wave of Fedora technology—integrating the 2.6 kernel into what would become Fedora Core 2.

Read more

DECEMBER 09

World record TPC-C benchmark result tops 1 million transactions per minute with clustered Linux services

This TPC-C benchmark result was achieved with the latest version of Oracle Database, Oracle Database 10g, HP Integrity rx5670 servers with Intel Itanium 2 processors and Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS 3.0. The benchmark not only set a new industry record, but also reflected the power of industry-standard servers running the Linux operating system in a scale-out clustered server configuration.

Read more

JANUARY

Eight of the top ten global investment banks use Red Hat

JANUARY

CME doubles daily trades and cuts hardware costs by 50% with Red Hat Enterprise Linux

JANUARY 29

Open Source Assurance

RedHat announced that all existing and future Red Hat Enterprise Linux customers are now covered under the Open Source Assurance program. Red Hat created the Open Source Assurance program to provide customers a guarantee that their investment in open source solutions from Red Hat will generate long-term economic value. A key feature of the Open Source Assurance Program is an Intellectual Property Warranty.

Read more

MARCH 29

Fedora Core 2

Fedora Core is a proving ground for many new open source technologies. Fedora Core 2 was an excellent example of this, sporting technologies developed in collaboration with the National Security Agency. SELinux is an implementation of Mandatory Access Control, which provides security technologies built in to the Linux kernel, preventing many standard kinds of compromise-based attacks.

Read more

APRIL 05 and APRIL 20

10,000 RHCEs, 750+ applications certified on RHEL

Read more

Read more

JULY 28

Orbitz travel website backed by Red Hat Enterprise Linux supports 23 million unique users

The Orbitz migration story was told by Orbitz CTO Chris Hjelm and Red Hat CEO Matthew Szulik in LinuxWorld opening keynote.

Read more

NOVEMBER 19

Rackspace is now deploying Red Hat Enterprise Linux on 6,000+ servers and continues to work extensively with Red Hat Network engineering teams

Rackspace also became the first Red Hat Advanced Hosting Partner in Europe—yet another milestone on the ever-growing Red Hat and Rackspace relationship journey.

Read more

FEBRUARY 15

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 with SELinux

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 was based on the 2.6 Linux kernel and provided performance improvements for the desktop, security and compliance tools including SELinux, and exceptional performance and scalability for both 32- and 64-bit workloads. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 was available by subscription in 14 languages and included management and services.

Read more

FEBRUARY 02

US Department of Energy Labs deploys RHEL for high-performance clustering environment

U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National Lab CIOs agreed to a broad deployment of Red Hat Enterprise Linux for systems in the DOE National Laboratories and Technology Centers. Guaranteed support for seven years, the commitment to open source assurance, and proven price performance benchmarks were key factors in the decision-making process for standardization on Red Hat.

Read more

MARCH 22

Ticketmaster's email system runs on Red Hat

Ticketmaster, the world's leading ticketing company, chose StrongMail on Red Hat Enterprise Linux to power the company's e-mail-based marketing tool for clients across the globe. StrongMail serves as the email generation and delivery engine for Ticketmaster's email marketing product, with Red Hat Enterprise Linux serving as the platform solution.

Read more

APRIL 05

Statoil migrates from UNIX, reduces administration costs by 50%

Statoil, Norway's largest oil company with representation in 29 countries, migrated its IT environment from UNIX to Red Hat Enterprise Linux, realizing cost savings of 50%. The cost savings stem from more efficient systems administration and improved performance of current applications. After the migration, 70% of Statoil's E&P applications run on Red Hat Enterprise Linux and the number of UNIX variations deployed within Statoil decreased from seven to four.

Read more

APRIL 07

BPU Banca migrates from Sun Solaris, reduces workstations costs by 50%

BPU Banca, the operational parent bank of the group Banche Popolari Unite, Italy's seventh largest banking group and first co-operative credit banking group, chose to implement Red Hat Enterprise Linux across its desktops and servers.

Read more

JUNE 01

First Red Hat Summit in New Orleans, LA

Red Hat hosts the first Red Hat Summit in New Orleans—a premier open source event celebrating technology, collaboration, Linux, and the open source way.

Read more

AUGUST 10

Fedora Core 4

The Fedora Project announced the availability of Fedora Core 4, including Global File System (GFS), which was the most scalable enterprise cluster file system on Linux, supporting up to 256 nodes. GFS was another example of the innovative technologies that, because of open source development, appeared first in Fedora for trial and testing before being added to a major Enterprise Linux release.

Read more

DECEMBER 20

Skanska migrates from UNIX-based Sun Solaris platform to Red Hat on Intel-based hardware, reduces IT costs by 30%

Skanska migrated business-critical intelligence systems from UNIX to a Red Hat Enterprise Linux solution powered by Intel-based hardware. Red Hat's collaboration with Skanska resulted in cost savings within Skanska's IT infrastructure department and improved the performance of the company's servers and applications.

Read more

MARCH 14

Red Hat announces integrated virtualization strategy

Red Hat annonuced detailed plans for creating a Red Hat virtualization environment and working with partners such as AMD, Intel, Network Appliance and XenSource to simplify virtualization deployment for customers. Red Hat will support customers and partners with tools, services, and technology previews that let customers deploy computing resources at the lowest possible cost while maximizing utilization of each resource over the long term.

Read more

MARCH 21

Fedora Core 5

Fedora Core 5 included security gains using SELinux, hard disk encryption support with LUKS, and Xen virtualization based on Xen 3.0 development branch.

Read more

APRIL 04

Red Hat-Intel Solutions Acceleration Program

Red Hat and Intel announced the creation of a global program to help customers plan for, accelerate, and optimize their deployments of Linux solutions. The program was the first of its kind for Linux solutions development, initially focused on developing and disseminating tools for virtualization of enterprise computing.

Read more

APRIL 26

Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) saves $15 million with UNIX to Red Hat Enterprise Linux migration

The U.S. Department of Transportation's FAA saved the federal government more than $15 million in datacenter operating and upgrading costs by migrating to Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The FAA executed a major systems migration to Red Hat Enterprise Linux in one-third of the original scheduled time and with 30 percent more operational efficiency than the previous system. In addition, by switching to Red Hat Enterprise Linux, the FAA realized 50 percent savings and spent less than $10 million on a project initially estimated at $25 million.

Read more

MAY 22

Atos Euronext migrates trading platform from UNIX, improves performance 10x, reduces cost

Atos Euronext Market Solutions (AEMS), the leading global provider of IT solutions for exchanges, clearing houses, banks and intermediaries, will migrate the IT infrastructure of its LIFFE CONNECT trading platform to Red Hat Enterprise Linux. AEMS will roll out approximately 3,000 gateways running Red Hat Enterprise Linux, managed by the Red Hat Network Satellite Server, for member trading firms operating on its global LIFFE CONNECT platform.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 12

Red Hat Enterprise Linux and RHN used at major universities

Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Red Hat Network are powering mission-critical systems at Wake Forest University, the University of Washington, and Vanderbilt. These top-tier universities have made the switch to Red Hat to deliver affordable, high-performing solutions with trusted support, manageability and security.

Read more

OCTOBER 03

Red Hat financial services benchmark of 1.8 million real-time market data updates per second on RMDS 6.0

In performance tests conducted by Technology Business Development Corporation (tbdCorp), Reuters Market Data Systems (RMDS) 6.0 surpassed previous benchmarks and demonstrated its ability to leverage the power and performance of Red Hat Enterprise Linux running on the Dual-Core Intel Xeon processor-based HP ProLiant DL380 server.

Read more

OCTOBER 25

Oracle announces Linux support

Oracle debuts Red Hat Linux support—$99 for an update network similar to RHN, and technical support ranging from $400 to $1,000 per server, depending on the architecture.

Read more

OCTOBER 30

Priceline and Citistreet run high availability servers on Red Hat Enterprise Linux (and JBoss)

CitiStreet and Priceline.com are achieving high performance and savings from the combination of Red Hat and JBoss solutions. These enterprise companies have switched to Red Hat solutions from proprietary software in order to deliver mission-critical applications and services without the concerns of performance, cost or stability-related issues.

Read more

NOVEMBER 02

Microsoft and Novell Linux partnership

Microsoft and Novell announced a business and technical collaboration agreement to build, market, and support new solutions that allowed Microsoft and Novell product to work better together, and to provide patent coverage for the respective products.

Read more

DECEMBER 12

Red Hat is listed on the NYSE

Red Hat, traded on the NASDAQ stock market under 'RHAT,' moved to the NYSE in December 2006, trading under 'RHT.' "The move to the New York Stock Exchange is a significant event for Red Hat. We believe that listing on the New York Stock Exchange will increase Red Hat's visibility among investors, reduce trading volatility, and offer more efficient pricing," said Charlie Peters, CFO at Red Hat.

Read more

MARCH

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 continued to advance functionality, from the desktop to the datacenter, with the 2.6.18 kernel, integrated virtualization support, SELinux enchancements, and more.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 04

French Ministry for Education migrates 2,500 servers to Red Hat Enterprise Linux

The French Ministry for Education has migrated 2,500 servers across its 30 local education authorities to Red Hat Enterprise Linux. This decision was made in line with the Ministry's strategy to invest in open source solutions in order to free itself from the constraints associated with proprietary software and vendor lock-in.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 10

Red Hat Enterprise Linux earns Russian government security certification OUD4+/NDV4

SAP, the world's leading provider of business software, and VDEL, Red Hat's master distributor in Central and Eastern Europe, announce that they have reached an agreement to offer joint solutions for the government sector in Russia that comply with the security standards of the Russian government. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is currently the only Server and Workstation platform that has achieved government security certification OUD4+/NDV4, similar to the Common Criteria certification, in Russia.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 18

Swedish State Pharmacy migrates from SPARC-based Solaris servers to Intel servers running Red Hat, reduces TCO

Apoteket, Sweden's largest state-owned pharmacy chain, chose to replace all of its servers at approximately 900 pharmacies with Red Hat Enterprise Linux running on Intel hardware. Apoteket's server infrastructure was slowly reaching end of life and experiencing performance issues as a consequence of age. After careful evaluation, Apoteket made the decision to replace both the hardware platform and the server operating system with Red Hat Enterprise Linux running on Intel-based servers.

Read more

OCTOBER 15

SESCO Industries runs high-performance database structure on Red Hat

SESCO, an electricity and natural gas trading company, deployed Red Hat solutions including Red Hat Enterprise Linux and JBoss Enterprise Application Platform to facilitate the creation of a high-performance infrastructure to support its rapid database growth. The company has since experienced cost-savings, flexiblity and heightened performance and reliability.

Read more

NOVEMBER 07

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.1

This release included virtualization and hardware support improvements, new kernel features, improved auditing, and a handful of technology previews hinting at what would come in version 6.

Read more

NOVEMBER 26

Red Hat Enterprise Linux is the only OS offered in the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud

Red Hat announced the public beta availability of Red Hat Enterprise Linux on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2), a web service that provides resizeable compute capacity in the cloud and changes the economics of computing by allowing customers to pay only for the infrastructure software services and capacity that they actually use.

Read more

FEBRUARY 11 and MARCH 10

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Florida Hospital move to Red Hat Enterprise Linux for high availability, disaster recovery, significant cost savings

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), a Harvard Medical School teaching hospital in Boston, Mass., has migrated to Red Hat solutions, including Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Red Hat Global File System, Red Hat Cluster Suite and Red Hat Network. Florida Hospital, the largest hospital in the state of Florida, providing care to over one million patients per year, relies on Red Hat Enterprise Linux, JBoss Enterprise Application Platform, Red Hat Global File System, Red Hat Cluster Suite and Red Hat Network

Read more

Read more

MAY 13

Fedora 9

Fedora 9 featured the first non-destructive live USB with persistence, and marked the first major KDE 4-based distribution. Other highlights include improvements and enhancements for OpenJDK, GNOME 2.22, NetworkManager, PackageKit, the Anaconda installer and Firefox 3 Beta 5 browser.

Read more

MAY 14

NYSE Euronext migrates mission-critical environments to Red Hat Enterprise Linux

NYSE Euronext, operator of the world's leading and most liquid exchange group, migrated mission-critical HP-UX, IBM AID, and SUN Solaris trading environments to Red Hat Enterprise Linux. NYSE Euronext handles more than one-third of the world's cash equities trading.

Read more

AUGUST 20

Sabre Holdings, Travelocity use Red Hat to maintain uptime for tens of thousands of transactions per second

Sabre Holdings, a world leader in travel marketing and distribution and parent company to Travelocity, Sabre Travel Network and Sabre Airline Solutions, relies on Red Hat solutions for increased performance, system reliability and scalability for its mission-critical open systems. Compared to proprietary Unix/RISC solutions during benchmarking, Sabre's testing has proven that Red Hat Enterprise Linux on Intel performs three times faster and at a fraction of the cost.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 23

Red Hat achieves TPC-C benchmark for price-performance

Using Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.2, Red Hat achieved a powerful, record-setting TPC-C benchmark that demonstrates the rapid improvements that open source software can bring to overall performance and costs. In its fifth TPC-C result over 1M tpmC, Red Hat improved price performance to a level 20 percent lower than the best competing non-Red-Hat result.

Read more

NOVEMBER 25

Fedora 10

Fedora 10, the tenth Fedora release in five years, featured virtualization improvements for remote installation and management of storage provisioning. These features made system administration of virtual machine hosts and guests easier to automate, especially as they were integrated into Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Additionally, Fedora 10 includes NetworkManager connection sharing, which allows laptop users with an Ethernet or mobile broadband connection to provide Internet routing to others through the laptop wireless interface, for instant collaboration anywhere, anytime.

Read more

FEBRUARY 03

Bank of New Zealand reduces front-end power consumption by ~40% with 20% ROI using Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5

Bank of New Zealand (BNZ), a subsidiary of the National Australia Bank Group, deployed Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 on IBM System z mainframes to solve environment, space, and cost issues related to its datacenter. BNZ virtualized and consolidated their Sun environment as part of a green initiative-reducing datacenter heat output, footprint, carbon output, etc.

Read more

FEBRUARY 16

Red Hat and Microsoft partner on two-way virtualization for Hyper-V/RHEL guests and RHEV/Windows

This is a customer-oriented decision that provided choice and flexibility, and maintained interoperability. Red Hat and Microsoft signed reciprocal agreements to enable increased interoperability for the companies' virtualization platforms. Each company will join the other's virtualization validation/certification program and will provide coordinated technical support for their mutual server virtualization customers.

Read more

MARCH 18

10 years of RHCEs (38,000 RHCEs certified)

The Red Hat Certified Engineer (RHCE) certification was launched in 1999, and is one of the largest performance-based Linux certification programs. Its success stems from a performance-based assessment of the competencies necessary to administer Red Hat Enterprise Linux systems. With nearly 38,000 RHCEs worldwide, professionals holding this certification have continually helped their companies with successful deployments and migrations.

Read more

JUNE 09

Fedora 11

The community's eleventh release included the broadest feature set yet, emphasized developments in software management and sound, improved key virtualization components and introduced Fedora Community, a portal project beta.

Read more

JUNE 03

Verizon Business offers Red Hat Enterprise Linux as OS for cloud-based CaaS solution

Building on the strong, long-term technology collaboration between Red Hat and Verizon Business, Red Hat Enterprise Linux is offered as one of the first two operating system platforms available for Verizon Business' new computing-as-a-service (CaaS) solution.

Read more

JUNE 30

Amazon Web Services, first Red Hat Premier Certified Cloud Provider.

Premier Cloud Provider Partners collaborate with Red Hat on technical support, security updates, hardware certification, sales and marketing, and business models. Cloud computing pioneer Amazon Web Services extended its technology relationship with Red Hat to become the first Red Hat Premier Cloud Provider Partner.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 02

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.4 with KVM

The fourth update to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 platform provided the foundation of the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization portfolio of solutions and delivered expanded virtualization capabilities with the inclusion of kernel-based virtual machine (KVM) technology and Intel Virtualization Technology for Directed I/O (Intel VT-d) and PCI-SIG SR-IOV. This allowed multiple virtual machines in an Intel Xeon Processor 5500 Series-based platform to directly share I/O devices.

Read more

NOVEMBER 03

Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization

Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Servers enabled pervasive adoption of virtualization, with a comprehensive end-to-end solution combining a standalone hypervisor and powerful virtualization management. In February 2009, Red Hat announced plans to deliver the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization portfolio, building on its leading Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system platform, offering the proven security, performance, scalability, and cost advantages of open source virtualization technology. Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Servers entered a worldwide beta in June 2009.

Read more

NOVEMBER 17

Fedora 12

Fedora 12 included a robust feature set for desktop users, administrators, developers, and open source enthusiasts. New enhancements available in Fedora 12 included next-generation Ogg Theora video, virtualization improvements, and advancements to NetworkManager.

Read more

MARCH 30

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.5

The fifth update to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 added features designed to operate across physical, virtual, and cloud deployments, and offered enhanced virtualization and interoperability capabilities combined with support for important new hardware platforms, including Intel Nehalem EX, AMD Opteron 6000 Series (formerly codenamed "Magny Cours"), and IBM Power 7.

Read more

MARCH 22

Tokyo Stock Exchange records order response time of two milliseconds, information distribution time of three milliseconds

Records achieved with infrastructure TSE created using Red Hat Enterprise Linux-based, next-generation trading system named "arrowhead." With its Red Hat Enterprise Linux base, "arrowhead" provided TSE with more advanced reliability, greater scalability, lower latency, and improved flexibility and robustness. The new system delivered a capacity of orders accepted per second ten times larger than that of TSE's previous trading platform.

Read more

MAY 25

Fedora 13

Fedora 13 included a variety of features and improvements to enhance desktop productivity, assist in software development, and improve virtualization, installation, and graphics drivers for hardware support.

Read more

JUNE 22

Red Hat Customer Portal

Red Hat announced enhancements to its customer experience and subscription value with the general availability of a new global customer portal. Available to all worldwide Red Hat customers as an added benefit of their Red Hat subscription, the portal provides customers with access to Red Hat knowledge and software across product lines and to encourages engagement with Red Hat. The new customer portal allows Red Hat customers to participate in and benefit from communities of users and experts.

Read more

JUNE 23

NTT Data and IBM clouds offer Red Hat Enterprise Linux with KVM as the foundation

The Red Hat Certified Cloud Provider Program was the industry's first program to certify that vendors have validated cloud capabilities and support processes that provide rapid problem resolution. Red Hat expanded the program to include new partners IBM, NTT Communications, and Savvis.

Read more

JUNE 23

Subscriptions include Red Hat Cloud Access

Red Hat expanded development services that provide customers with the tools and expertise needed to deploy and manage cloud environments, as well as enhancements to the Red Hat Premier Certified Cloud Provider Program. Certified Cloud Providers can run any supported virtualization solution, ranging from Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization to VMware and Microsoft platforms. In addition, Premier Certified Cloud Providers are able to deliver Red Hat Cloud Access, an innovative and flexible licensing model that allows customers to easily use existing Red Hat Enterprise Linux subscriptions in the datacenter or the cloud.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 15

Qualcomm wireless finds Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization key to production virtualization strategy, Red Hat customer since 2003

Qualcomm first implemented Red Hat Enterprise Linux in 2003 and became an early adopter of the virtualization technology integrated into the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 platform in March 2007. The company also became active in the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization beta program in 2009, allowing it to test the performance, scalability, and density features offered by the solution.

Read more

OCTOBER 12

Jeppesen chooses Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization as software build systems standard

Jeppesen, already a long-time user of Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Red Hat Network Satellite, migrated business-critical systems to Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization. Jeppesen achieved close to bare metal performance during its testing of Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, demonstrating that the Red Hat platform can help the company to achieve its goal of reducing both hardware costs and time to market.

Read more

NOVEMBER 02

Fedora 14

Fedora 14 enhancements and new features included Spice framework software (for desktop virtualization), powerful remote and out-of-band management capabilities with IPMI, new debugging features for developers, and an updated tech preview of the GNOME desktop environment.

Read more

APRIL 26

Red Hat receives 6 Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-2 security certifications on HP systems

The completion of six Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-2 certifications from the U.S. government's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) marks the culmination of one of the largest certification efforts that Red Hat has completed with the U.S. Government.

Read more

MAY 19

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.1

Enhancements provide improvements in system reliability, scalability and performance, coupled with support for upcoming system hardware. Technology updates included additional configuration options for advanced storage configurations, new technologies that enable smoother enterprise deployments and tighter integration with heterogeneous systems, and a technology preview of Red Hat Enterprise Identity (IPA) services, based on the open source FreeIPA project.

Read more

MAY 24

Fedora 15

Fedora 15 included major new features with special focus on desktops, developers, virtualization, security, and system administration. Advances included the GNOME 3 desktop environment, the Btrfs filesystem, the Indic typing booster, better crash reporting, the LibreOffice productivity suite, and a redesigned SELinux troubleshooter.

Read more

JUNE 24

Santos saves $2.5 million with Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Santos, a leading supplier of oil and gas for Australia and Asia, gained greater stability and faster performance, helping the company reduce its global carbon footprint. Santos sought out a direct replacement for its main proprietary thin client system in order to avoid the license outlay and the cost of replacing its workstations. After extensive investigation, Santos turned to Red Hat Enterprise Linux and an open source thin client solution, and has been reaping the rewards since the migration.

Read more

AUGUST 31

Customer Portal starts Ideas discussion group

Red Hat invited Red Hat Enterprise Linux users to discuss features for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7. The Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Ideas discussion group on the Red Hat Customer Portal is open to all Red Hat subscribers—users and partners—to share use cases and discuss features.

Read more

SEPTEMBER 13

Red Hat supports SAP business apps; supports SAP solutions on Red Hat Enterprise Linux on Amazon EC2

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 has been certified by SAP AG to run SAP business applications. As a recommended Linux enterprise operating system for running SAP applications, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 provides the reliability and performance required by enterprises to efficiently run their demanding SAP workloads. Red Hat also announced support for SAP solutions running on Red Hat Enterprise Linux on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2).

Read more

Read more

OCTOBER

IDC server operating environment numbers show growth of Linux, open source

Industry research firm IDC published research results substantiating how the operating system industry developed and stating that IDC sees Linux and Microsoft Windows as the two primary established platforms, both now and in the future. From IDC System Software Research, October 2011.

Read more

OCTOBER 25

Red Hat achieves record SPECvirt_sc2010 virtualization performance benchmark (7,424@456VMs and 76 tiles)

Red Hat achieved a new record-setting SPECvirt_sc2010 virtualization performance benchmark in collaboration with long-time partner HP based on the powerful Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) hypervisor and HP ProLiant systems.

Read more

NOVEMBER 08

Fedora 16

Fedora 16 included major advancements in cloud computing, virtualization, and the GNOME 3.2 desktop. Improvements included work on OpenStack tools, HekaFS, SPICE USB, KDE 4.7, Perl 5.14, GCC Python plug-ins, GRUB2, and more.

Read more

NOVEMBER 14

SGI UV 1000 with 1,280 cores and 8TB of memory certified to run on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6

SGI, the trusted leader in technical computing, announced that Red Hat has certified SGI servers with the largest x86 server configuration to-date for Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system. This certification highlights the benefits of the newest generation of Intel(R) processors and SGI's high performance computing technology for customers with data-intensive workloads requiring outstanding performance in a high-density form factor with excellent power efficiency.

Read more

DECEMBER 06

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.2

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.2 delivers significant improvements in resource management and high availability, as well as new features aimed at storage and file system performance and identity management.

Read more

JANUARY 31

Production life cycle of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and 6 extended from 7 to 10 years

Red Hat extended the production life cycle of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and 6 from seven to 10 years in response to enterprise customer demand. Enterprise customers now have additional deployment alternatives for their Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system implementations as they plan the future of their strategic IT deployments.

Read more

FEBRUARY 15

Cloud Access provides subscription portability to Amazon EC2

Red Hat announced that it is expanding its offerings on Amazon Web Services with the addition of Red Hat Enterprise MRG Grid via Red Hat Cloud Access. Red Hat Cloud Access is a capability that enables Red Hat customers to move their subscriptions between traditional on-premise servers and off-premise clouds hosted by Red Hat Premier Certified Cloud Providers, such as Amazon Web Services.

Read more

MARCH 28

Red Hat hits $1 billion in revenue

Total revenue for the quarter was $297.0 million, an increase of 21% from the year ago quarter. Subscription revenue for the quarter was $255.2 million, up 22% year-over-year. For the full fiscal year 2012, total revenue was $1.13 billion, an increase of 25% over the prior year, and subscription revenue was $965.6 million, up 25% year-over-year.

Read more

MAY 09

Red Hat and IBM achieve Common Criteria Certification for KVM on RHEL and IBM servers

Red Hat and IBM announced that Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 with the KVM hypervisor on IBM Systems has been awarded Common Criteria Certification at Evaluation Assurance Level 4+ (EAL4+). The Common Criteria is an internationally recognized set of standards used by the federal government and other organizations to assess the security and assurance of technology products. This security certification is the first of its kind for an open source virtualization solution.

Read more