Oracle: Unbreak my Linux Heart

Someone on the Dell PowerEdge mailing list has written a script that uses SOAP calls to query dell's warranty site . I'm sure it's helpful to someone else to know this.

Dell TechCenter has released a LiveDVD image with OMSA to update firmware and BIOS on Dell hardware using a CentOS Linux distro.

The kind people of the German university of Göttingen have mirrored the Dell OMSA hardware and firmware repo for us. This way, we have a European mirror available that is also much faster than Dell's native server.

Dell has released version 6.5 of their OpenManage repository with firmware and BIOS updates as well as Linux monitoring of hardware found in Dell servers.

Besides having the option to download installation media from Oracle (for which you must register), you can use the Oracle Public Yum Server to get packages. For instance, to help solve ad-hoc dependencies. This alleviates you from the need to keep a local mirror available for all Linux releases.

A recent article on Linux security showed that an old backdoor (cve-2007-4573) , patched in kernel 2.6.22.7, has resurfaced . Using the leak, any user that has a local user account on a 64 bit server, can easily get root rights, using the compatibility layer. While I don't fully understand the workings, I do understand that all OEL4/OEL5 64 bit servers are potentially harmed as they have kernels 2.6.9 and 2.6.18, resp. So I logged a SR on Metalink to see if I have a big security issue in the data center. Update: CVE-2007-4573 has been renamed CVE-2010-3301 and RHEL states : This issue did not affect the versions of Linux kernel as shipped with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3, 4, 5, and Red Hat Enterprise MRG, as they do not contain the upstream commit d4d67150 that introduced this flaw. Update2: the issue is also listed as CVE-2010-3081 , which is slightly different and Red Hat does track this one, as it affects RHEL5 . Update3: Ksplice has a test available to verify your syste...

Oracle is pleased to announce the general availability of Enterprise Linux Release 5 Update 4 for x86 (32 bit) and x86_64 (64 Bit) architectures. This update includes the following kernel/driver changes: Bug Fixes added by Oracle * Check to see if hypervisor supports memory reservation change [orabug 7556514] * Add entropy support to igb [orabug 7607479] * Convert ENETUNREACH to ENOTCONN [orabug 7689332] * Add xen pv/bonding netconsole support [orabug 6993043] * Shrink zone patch [orabug 6086839] * Fix aacraid not to reset during kexec [orabug 8516042] * Fix failure of file creation from hpux client [orabug 7579314] Fixes/Additions from the upstream distribution provider * A new tunable parameter /proc/sys/vm/max_writeback_pages has been added to the kernel, allowing system administrators to change the maximum number of modified pages kupdate writes to disk per iteration each time it runs. It defaults to 1024 or 4MB ...

Oracle has released the Linux base install repositories to the public. This means that, when you have obtained the ISOs for OEL4 or OEL5, you can install packages freely using yum. The so-called "base channels" are available for free and without support over Internet. This applies to Oracle VM (Xen) as well. All you need is their .repo files, yum check-update, and you're set. Updates and Patches require a support license. Check Oracle Public Yum Server for details and howto.

We're using Oracle Enterprise Linux in the data center, so the Red Hat life cycles are of some importance to us. However, Oracle's support policies are more important. So I took some time to dig up the nitty gritty, which I'll summarize here for my and your convenience. Sources: Red Hat and Oracle Red Hat Support RHEL4  OEL4 Oracle Support General Availability 14 Feb 2005 Feb 2005 General Availability End of Production 1 phase 31 Mar 2009 Feb 2010 Premier Support Ends End of Production 2 phase > 31 Dec 2009 . . End of Production 3 phase 29 Feb 2012 Feb 2013 Extended Support Ends

Got a question about the Life Cycle of certain RHEL releases. When does support end? is there Extended Support? When will support on hardware (i.e. bare metal vs VM) end? The Red Hat Enterprise Linux Errata Support Policy has all information in this area, including End-of-Life support. Now I'm wondering what Oracle's Linux Support statement (PDF) is and how it'll differ from this, if at all...

Oracle has released new patches for a ton of their software. Check the Oracle Critical Patch Update - October 2007 for details...

Got an email from the Oracle Enterprise Linux errata mailing list about a patch for a bug in OCFS2 in version 4 and 5. Yesterday, they patched a bug in snmp for version 4... If you're serious about Unbreakable Linux or Enterprise Linux, you should subscribe at least one sysadmin to this list!

Oracle updated their instructions on how to setup a local yum repository . They not only updated the up2date program to a new version, but also now include the option to download both 32bit and 64bit sources to your yum server. Very handy! Sadly, they didn't notify me on any channel and had to find myself... :'(

Oracle plans to release 37 security patches next week as part of its quarterly update cycle. The fixes cover as-yet-unspecified flaws in products including Oracle Database, Application Server, and E-Business Suite, among others. Some of the patches due to be released on Tuesday, 17 April cover flaws in multiple products. An unlucky 13 of the planned security updates include fixes for versions of Oracle's database. Three of these patches are particularly important since they cover flaws that might be exploited remotely without requiring login credentials. Two of the 11 flaws in Oracle's E-Business suite might also be remotely exploited by hackers, Oracle warns in a pre-release announcement . Source: The Register

Since updated code released by Red Hat takes some time to reach the public and then takes a few additional days before Oracle can obtain, process, verify and release the updates to their customers, you may be unprotected for a few extra days longer. However, based on experiences with CentOS, this is acceptable.