14 DAY TRIAL // Red Hat announced the availability of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 RC for all customers and partners just a few days ago, and now the company has even provided an image that anyone can download and test.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 is based on the latest stable Fedora release and promises to bring a much needed update to the classic Red Hat operating system. If you’ve ever tried any Red Hat OS in the past you know that it's not the most modern. In fact, it's one of the few desktops that still retain that GNOME 2 look well after everyone has moved on.
“As a pre-release build of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 RC offers a near-final look at the only operating system crafted for the open hybrid cloud, building upon the feedback collected during the beta program for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.”
“Also, Red Hat plans to introduce Red Hat Enterprise Linux Atomic Host as a new addition to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux family. Red Hat Enterprise Linux Atomic Host couples the flexible, lightweight and modular capabilities of Linux Containers with the reliability and security of Red Hat Enterprise Linux in a reduced image size that will enable easy movement of Red Hat Enterprise Linux-certified applications across bare metal systems, virtual machines and private and public clouds,” reads the official announcement.
Getting a Red Hat Enterprise Linux version without paying for it is rather unusual, but the company is most likely looking to attract more customers. Red Hat is the poster child of the Linux ecosystem that shows how a distribution can make billions of dollars for a company.
This is not a Live system, which means that you will have to download and install it. It will take some time (the image occupies a little over 3GB), but in the end you will get a GNOME 3.8 desktop environment that has been adapted to reflect a GNOME 2.x look. In any case, it looks a lot better than the previous RHEL 6.x versions and it's definitely a step up for the company.
The complete release notes can be found in the official announcement. You can also review and purchase the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 RC distribution from Softpedia. Please keep in mind that this is not a free operating system.
Remember that this is a development version and it should NOT be installed on production machines. It is intended for testing purposes only.