During the Red Hat Summit this week, the firm introduced a novel container image deployment solution for Red Hat Enterprise Linux. This new alternative aims to improve operations, bolster consistency in hybrid cloud settings, and quicken the uptake of avant-garde technologies such as AI and machine learning.
Containers usually pare down operating systems to the bare minimum since they operate within a host OS, states Bradley Shimmin, the lead analyst for AI platforms, analytics, and data management at Omdia. Alternatively, Linux operates within virtual machines, which also operate on an underlying OS. However, this arrangement increases management complexity.
“Red Hat utilizes the Open Container image standard to generate bootable images, appearing and functioning as if it were the real OS running on bare metal,” Shimmin comments.
Enterprises now possess the ability to utilize all the tools they have established for managing containers. “Containerization is the prevalent paradigm, which everyone acknowledges and appreciates, for deploying software of any type and any kind,” clarifies Shimmin.
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The concept of installing Linux in a container is not a recent idea. Community projects delivering bootable containers, like Bluefin and Fedora, have been around for some time. Even Red Hat’s Linux version was previously offered as an image, like the Red Hat Universal Base Image. Additionally, Red Hat also owns a container-based operating system for Red Hat OpenShift named Red Hat Enterprise Linux CoreOS.
However, Ben Breard, the senior principal product manager at the Red Hat Enterprise Linux business unit, claims that “image mode for RHEL is one of, if not the, first enterprise Linux platforms to offer it.”
Breard explains, “The entire operating system will be delivered as a bootable container. Unlike Universal Base Image which still needed to be run on a host operating system – it was merely a container on a host.”
The advantage to doing this is that it can help enterprises streamline operations and management, maintain a consistent and reliable infrastructure whether on bare metal, on virtual machines, or in public clouds.
Companies rarely use an out-of-the-box operating system, Breard says. Instead, they build a standard operating environment by layering in hundreds, or thousands, of additional packages to meet their specific needs. “Problems arise when patches, updates and upgrades have to be pushed out,” he says. “Making changes to the underlying image can be incredibly tedious, time consuming and complex.”
Old-school monolithic applications had the same problem, he says. “But along came containers, which enabled discrete pieces of the app to be packaged and updated individually. So, applying this type of methodology to gold images would be a huge timesaver and innovation driver for enterprise IT. This is the initial problem that image mode solves.”
Being able to make these changes quickly is even more crucial for artificial intelligence, he says. “Patches and upgrades need to be pushed – and work – immediately,” he says. “If you can’t go fast, you can’t reap the benefits of AI workloads.”
The introduction of image mode opens up exciting possibilities that could significantly expedite processes, says one expert. One major advantage is that the operations teams can now utilize the same container tools and workflows as developers.
This allows for quicker implementation of adjustments in standard operating environments. In addition, it enables tech companies to use uniform tooling across both development and operations teams. It has now become more straightforward to release updates to clients with extensive IT infrastructure. Simply pushing a patch or driver update from a single console using a container ensures all installs and updates are performed automatically.
Furthermore, users can now view and modify image mode deployments directly from Red Hat Insights. Gunnar Hellekson, vice president and general manager of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux business unit, mentions this will help firms adopt a smarter strategy towards risk management.
He elaborates that this is part of RHEL subscription’s proactive advice feature. It can predict possible CVE exposures for users when they assemble a certain kind of image. This initiative aims to enhance intelligent coaching and assistance provided to customers during the construction of RHEL, instead of post-deployment.
Additional security benefits come from the fact that security teams will now be able to apply container security tools such as scanning, validation, cryptography and attestation to the base elements of the operating system.
