A server-oriented GNU/Linux distribution

Jun 16, 2016 03:15 GMT  ·  By

Softpedia has been informed today, June 16, 2016, by Alessio Fattorini, that the final release of the NethServer 6.8 server-oriented, open-source, and free GNU/Linux operating system is now available for download.

Based on the recently released CentOS 6.8 distribution, which, in turn, uses the freely distributed sources of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.8 operating system, NethServer 6.8 arrives as the latest and most advanced long-term support release of the project, shipping with numerous goodies for NetServer fans.

NethServer 6.8 had a quick development cycle, with only one Beta build released at the end of May for public beta testers. It comes eight months after the debut of NethServer 6.7, which, of course, was based on CentOS 6.7 / Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.7, and it appears to be a worthy upgrade, as usual.

Release highlights include the collectd 5 system statistics collection daemon, the move of the SELinux policy from permissive to disabled, the addition of a new interface module for managing policy routing rules in the built-in firewall, as well as a much simpler Multi WAN configuration panel.

Other exciting new features include better spam filtering, thanks to the implementation of support for DNS-based Blackhole List (DNSBL), IPsec site-to-site support, a new Bonding mode on the Network page, and the ability to free up more disk space by dumping YUM transactions.

NethServer 7 development continues

Other than the above, it looks like NethServer 6.8 lets system administrators use either CIDR (Classless Inter-Domain Routing) or IP ranges as the source and destination for the proxy bypass settings. There are also support for multiple interfaces on ntopng and a new "Public IP" field for OpenVPN.

"As always, there have been several changes with a focus on performance. This includes an optimized ntopng since it heavily used redis to save temporary data about host network traffic. In a scenario where there are many hosts involved, ntopng will highly increase redis memory usage," said Alessio Fattorini.

NethServer 6.8 is available for download right now via our website. We recommend upgrading from NethServer 6.7 as soon as possible. In the meantime, the development of NethServer 7, the next major release of the OS, continues with great new features, and a Beta version should arrive soon.

Firewall: web interface for policy routing
Firewall: web interface for policy routing

NethServer 6.8 (7 Images)

NethServer 6.8 released
Firewall: web interface for policy routingSimplified Multi WAN configuration
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