[CentOS-announce] Release for CentOS-5 i386 and x86_64

Thu Apr 12 22:36:44 UTC 2007
Karanbir Singh <kbsingh at centos.org>

We are pleased to announce the immediate availability of CentOS-5 for 
the i386 and x86_64 Architectures.

CentOS-5 is based on the upstream release 5, and includes packages from 
all variants including Server and Client. All upstream repositories have 
been combined into one, to make it easier for end users to work with. 
And the option to further enable external repositories at install time 
is now available in the installer.

Further Arch support for PowerPC, IA64 and Sparc are planned and will be 
released soon. These arch's will follow the existing pattern of release 
to Beta first, and then to Final.

+++++++++++++++++++++++
Verification of downloads and media

We highly recommend that all forms of downloads be verified before use. 
Both md5sum and sha1sum for all isos and torrents released by the CentOS 
project are published at the same location as the isos and torrents 
themselves. md5sum and sha1sum verification tools are available for all 
major platforms. As an added option, but not a replacement to the 
md5sum/sha1sum process, its possible to check media during install time.

All rpms published by the CentOS project are signed with a gpg key, and 
by default we configure yum to verify this signature on package 
download. In order to check that this is operating as normal ensure that 
each repository section includes two lines that look exactly like this :

gpgcheck=1
gpgsignature=http://mirror.centos.org/centos/RPM-GPG-KEY-CentOS-5

Note: 1) url to the gpg key will never point at an external non 
.centos.org machine.
           2) a copy of the gpg key is also provided on the install 
media, and installed as /etc/pki/rpm-gpg/RPM-GPG-KEY-CentOS-5, however 
do the possibility of compromised media we recommend you still verify 
that key with the one hosted on http://mirror.centos.org/

+++++++++++++++++++++++
Download Instructions:

First a request from us : When possible, consider using torrents to run 
the downloads. Not only does it help the community and keeps mirrors 
from running up high bandiwdth bills, in most cases you will find its 
also the fastest means to download the distro.

Via BitTorrent :
Torrents are available for i386 at 
http://isoredirect.centos.org/centos/5/isos/i386/
and for x86_64 at http://isoredirect.centos.org/centos/5/isos/x86_64/

Via direct download:
    Due to bandwidth considerations the CentOS Project does not publish 
ISOS directly from our network machines. However direct downloads are 
available from external mirrors over http, ftp and rsync, and a geoip 
based is available at http://isoredirect.centos.org/centos/5/isos/ to 
give you the best possible match ( and only lists mirrors that are 
updated already, so you dont need to go looking for a mirror with all 
the isos you want ! )

    Some mirrors also publish DVD images that can be downloaded 
directly. Refer to the mirrors list page at 
http://www.centos.org/mirrors for more details Mirrors that offer DVD's 
are clearly marked on the page.

-----------------------------------------------
i386 ISOS and their sha1sum's are :

820346490eb58c10ea952e62e4d61596a267edea  CentOS-5.0-i386-bin-1of6.iso
8e91bf3cd0bb3ef86598a5014741d8992cf4cad5  CentOS-5.0-i386-bin-2of6.iso
71358b3260f83a37ddc084e730e34f8f9b3a9bfd  CentOS-5.0-i386-bin-3of6.iso
d350a93a7d32e75a65648b8a8c759039fe582f5e  CentOS-5.0-i386-bin-4of6.iso
5f2dab38eb4ec415e789f754a5b3f89bd28fce1d  CentOS-5.0-i386-bin-5of6.iso
30e5dee028670fd14a5d91c8a9a7b00a5c9c0f14  CentOS-5.0-i386-bin-6of6.iso
d4aa041570417eeecee9021e6f8bcc845e65145a  CentOS-5.0-i386-bin-DVD.iso

-----------------------------------------------
x86_64 ISOS and their sha1sum's are :

1c24d7e92d6d50771f8b7b0a6695172d76352944  CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bin-1of7.iso
3c3b9dc8fbd0faec804f97602cbcc7d110babd83  CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bin-2of7.iso
527bb1c903427eb59f8a1394b44650f614813088  CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bin-3of7.iso
6b84394592e1bc6e1c40ed1e3c57f77a593f84a3  CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bin-4of7.iso
3d602beaba3c09418bd29d8e814fb55f03531def  CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bin-5of7.iso
4ad9da763501845df4b29775bff4d35b82e44ace  CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bin-6of7.iso
aef44f965c4560317098f40f22227ada54c49751  CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bin-7of7.iso
b5fb7dd9ea8d9369b5d0d14e5f51f96b1dc138bb  CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bin-DVD.iso

+++++++++++++++++++++++
CentOS-5 Release Notes:

The distro release notes are available in the root directory of the 
install media, as well as online at 
http://wiki.centos.org/Manuals/ReleaseNotes/CentOS5.0/ . These include 
important changelog info as well as notes about the installer and 
outcomes from test situations which the centos-qa team worked through. 
Its considered essential reading.

Upstream release notes are available in the NOTES/ directory of the 
install media, as well as online at 
http://mirror.centos.org/centos/5/os/i386/NOTES/. These include release 
specific technologies, new features in the distro and other misc 
infomation that can help you better utilise the distro. Always something 
worth reading.

Note: some of the non-english language release notes might not come up 
clearly in the installer, but are fixed in the online version.

+++++++++++++++++++++++
Upgrade Options and process recommendations :

The best and most recommended way to get your existing CentOS-3/CentOS-4 
machine running CentOS-5 is to update the machine via the installer. 
This involves booting the machine with the install media, and running a 
normal installation path. You will be given an option to upgrade the 
machine if an older CentOS install is found on the installable 
harddrive. You will still need to check for rpm orphans once the machine 
has booted into CentOS-5. Packages from non-CentOS repositories might 
need special attention.

There is a wiki page starting now at http://wiki.centos.org/Migration/5 
to document the process's and experiences of people - so as to create a 
single combined knowledge base about updating to CentOS-5 from 
CentOS-3/4 as well as from other Distributions. So do join in and 
contribute.

-----------------------------------------------
Online Upgrade from CentOS-5/Beta :

We recommend a fresh install, however it should be possible to in-place 
update a machine from CentOS-5/Beta to CentOS-5.0/Final using the 
folloing steps:

step-1) init 3
step-2) yum clean all;
step-3) yum --disablerepo=* --enablerepo=base --enablerepo=updates 
update yum* rpm*
step-4) yum clean all;
step-5) yum --disablerepo=* --enablerepo=base --enablerepo=updates upgrade

For the final step, you should do an 'upgrade' rather than an 'update'. 
The yum man page has details on the differences between upgrade and 
update options. Also, its important to init 3 before doing the yum 
update in order to work around the dbus restart issues that have been 
widely reported. And doing the main update using the newer yum can 
result in upto 4 times faster update speeds, so its recommended that you 
first update yum and rpm.

-----------------------------------------------
Online Upgrade from CentOS-4/Final

The best way to move from CentOS-4 to CentOS-5 is via an installer 
upgrade. However if you must do it online, here are some tips to help:
- Remove as many packages as you can, strip it right back to the 
original OS if possible
- Backup everything
- Disable all repositories, except the centos-5 OS and Updates repos
- init 3
- shutdown as many services as possible
- download and install the centos-release-5.x rpm, which will update 
your yum configs
- run a yum upgade ( not update )

-----------------------------------------------
Online Upgrade from CentOS-3/Final

Online upgrades from CentOS-3 are not recommended. The CentOS Wiki has 
some details and examples from tests done by members of the centos-qa 
team and if you really *must* upgrade a machine running CentOS-3 to 
CentOS-5, I recommend you start with those notes. Feel free to 
contribute your experiences there.

+++++++++++++++++++++++
About release version ( Major and Minor release tracking ability )

There has been a fair bit of talk about upstream adopting a new policy 
on Updates and the ReleaseCycles. I'd like to clarify what that means 
for CentOS users and how we will approach this issue. The first thing is 
of-course, that no one really knows exactly what is going to happen on 
this front upstream. ( perhaps a better way to say the same thing would 
be that - noone upstream will tell us what they intend to do! )  As far 
as we can work out, there are going to be some options created for users 
as to what upgade path they intend to follow, how that is going to work 
and what the distro specific implementaion of this policy is going to be 
: open to discussion, since there is no clarity from upstream.

So we need to keep the options open. At this time time, on CentOS-5 we 
have created infrastructure and package management options that will 
allow users to either stick with the recommended default option of 
staying with the latest released security and bugfix rpms or to be able 
to branch out into minor release tree's (eg. allowing a user to keep 
his/her machine at CentOS-5.0.x, and not upgrading to CentOS-5.1 when it 
becomes available ).

+++++++++++++++++++++++
How to get help with CentOS

The best place to start when looking for help with CentOS is at the wiki 
( http://wiki.centos.org/GettingHelp ) which lists various options and 
communities who might be able to help. If you think there is a bug in 
the system, do report it at http://bugs.centos.org/ - but keep in mind 
that the bugs system is *not* a support mechanism.

Friendly URL's :
   http://wiki.centos.org/
   http://www.centos.org/
   http://bugs.centos.org/
   http://www.centos.org/donate
   http://lists.centos.org/

+++++++++++++++++++++++
And a big thanks to everyone who contributed to the distro, including 
the translation teams, the qa team, the CentOS Developers and all the 
Users out there.

The translation team :
Ralph Angenendt, Andreas Rogge, Fabian Arrotin, Pierre Reinbold, Matteo 
Centonza, Roger Peña Escobio, Ernesto Perez, Hardy Beltran,  Leonardo 
Pinheiro, Rodrigo Barbosa,  David Hrbác(, Akemi Yagi, Anatoly Davidov, 
Daniel De Kok, Dennis van Onselen, Manuel Wolfshant, Kazuhiko Oho, 
Hajime Taira, Jordi Espasa Clofent, Charles A. Landemaine, Lennert 
Buytenhek, Dominick Grift, Mark Ruys, Roeland Struijk

The QA Team:
Stephen John Smoogen, Phil Schaffner, Michael Best, John Jullian, 
Patrick Moelands, Chris Halstead, Daniiel De Kok, Jason Meers, Charlie 
Brady, Connie Sieh, Seth Vidal, Matthew Miller, Fabian Arrotin

And all the CentOS Developers who worked with us on this release:
John Newbegin, Jim Perrin, Lance Davis, Ralph Angenendt, Donavan Nelson, 
Tru Huynh

A special wave to Gideon de Kok, who worked his machines and himself 
well into many nights getting the artwork done, redone, redone, 
retouched up, change, redone, changed some more, redone and put up with 
us as we continued to make changes till almost the last minute possible!

Plus the millions of users out there, you all know who you are!

Enjoy!

Johnny Hughes Jr and Karanbir Singh
The CentOS Project, http://www.centos.org/