Chapter 1. Introduction to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux software certification The Red Hat Enterprise Linux Software Certification Policy Guide describes the policy overview to certify third-party vendor products running on Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 8 and 9. This guide is intended for partners who want to offer their products for use with RHEL in a jointly supported customer environment. A strong working knowledge of RHEL is required. 1.1. Certification and Partner validation Red Hat offers you the ability to certify or validate your products. Red Hat-certified products undergo thorough testing and are collaboratively supported with you. These products meet your standards and Red Hat's criteria, including functionality, interoperability, lifecycle management, security, and support requirements. Partner-validated products are tested and supported by you. Validation allows you to enable and publish your software offerings more quickly. However, by definition, validated workloads do not include the full thoroughness of Red Hat certification. We encourage you to continue efforts toward stabilization, upstream acceptance, Red Hat enablement, and Red Hat certification. Note The validation option is not available for all infrastructure software. Understanding the differences between certification and validation, along with the capabilities, limitations, and achievements of your products, is essential for you and your customers. 1.2. Support responsibilities Red Hat customers receive the best support experience when using components from our robust ecosystem of certified enterprise hardware, software, and cloud partners. Red Hat provides support for Red Hat-certified products and Red Hat software according to the Red Hat Service Level Agreement (SLA). If a certified or validated third-party component is involved in a customer issue, Red Hat collaborates with you to resolve it according to the Third party support policy . Red Hat does not stipulate customer support policies. However, we require your support in assisting customers with diagnosing and resolving issues related to the functionality, interoperability, lifecycle management, and security of your software in conjunction with ours. Being listed as certified or validated in the Red Hat Ecosystem Catalog indicates your commitment to supporting your products and providing reliable solutions for our joint customers, adhering to your policies with Red Hat products. 1.3. Certification prerequisites and process overview 1.3.1. Prerequisites To start your certification journey, you must: Join the Red Hat Partner Connect program. Accept the standard Partner Agreements along with the terms and conditions specific to containerized software. Enter basic information about your company and the products you need to certify. Common information includes a product overview and links to supporting collateral such as product documentation, datasheets, or other relevant resources. Test your product to verify that it behaves as intended on RHEL. Support RHEL as a platform for the product being certified and establish a support relationship with Red Hat. You can do this through the multi-vendor support network of TSANet , or through a custom support agreement. 1.3.2. Process overview The Red Hat certification and partner validation procedures are outlined below. See the Red Hat Software Certification Workflow Guide for details on how to complete each step listed below. 1.3.2.1. Certification procedure Complete the prerequisites On Red Hat Connect Create your product Create and associate components for each product component Complete the product listing checklist Complete the certification requirements for each component as appropriate Container Images On Red Hat Connect Complete the component certification checklist for each component Publish your components Publish your product 1.3.2.2. Validation procedure Complete the prerequisites On Red Hat Connect Create your product Complete your Product List details Create a Validation request Complete the product listing checklist Complete the validation checklist Fill in the questionnaire Wait for Red Hat to review and approve the questionnaire On Red Hat Connect Publish your product Additional resources General Program Guide for Partners . 1.4. Test suite lifecycle Use the latest version of the test suit to certify your products. After the release of a new test suite version, Red Hat accepts test results generated with the earlier version of the suite for a period of 90 days. During this period, the Red Hat certification team may require you to run the tests with the latest version of the suite if they consider that it is more suitable for your certification project. Additional resources Red Hat Certification test suite download link 1.5. Red Hat Enterprise Linux versions and architecture A Red Hat Enterprise Linux software certification is architecture-specific and does not carry over to any other architecture. You must certify your product on each version and architecture of RHEL that it supports. The following table shows the RHEL versions, processor architectures, and hypervisor software that can you can combine in a certification: RHEL version Architecture Hypervisor RHEL 8 RHEL 9 x86_64 Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) VMWare HyperV Red Hat Virtualization (RHV) ppc64le s390x aarch64 Red Hat grants RHEL software certifications on specific RHEL 8 or RHEL 9 minor versions. The certification is valid for subsequent minor releases of RHEL if you follow the compatibility guidelines documented in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux: Application Compatibility Guide. Red Hat recommends partners to retest their products with each new minor version of RHEL. Additional resources Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8: Application Compatibility Guide Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9: Application Compatibility Guide 1.6. Partner's product versions Red Hat grants RHEL software certifications to specific major releases of your product. You should run the certification tests on minor releases of the product to avoid functional regressions, but you do not need to certify the product again. You must certify subsequent major releases of the product either as a new version of the existing product or as a new product entry. It is your responsibility to decide which releases of their product are major and which releases are minor. Additional resources Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8: Application Compatibility Guide Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9: Application Compatibility Guide 1.7. Packaging format Products targeted for certification can use any packaging format provided it does not alter the RHEL platform in a way that impacts its support. Red Hat recommends that you use packaging formats compatible with the platform's native tools, such as containers and RPMs. Any components packaged as containers must follow the requirements established in Container image requirements . 1.8. Publishing When you complete the Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Certification or the partner validation workflow, Red Hat publishes an entry in the Red Hat Ecosystem Catalog . This includes a product entry and relevant information collected during the process. Products with certifications include the associated component data for containers. Products without any certifications do not include component information. Red Hat expects that a RHEL software certification remains listed in the catalog until the end of support life for the certified RHEL version. However, Red Hat reserves the right to remove a catalog entry. 1.9. Catalog entries Red Hat expects that a RHEL software certification remains listed in the catalog until the end of support life for the certified RHEL version. However, Red Hat reserves the right to remove a catalog entry. 1.10. Distribution of certified container images The Red Hat Container Certification program offers the following options for the distribution of certified container images: Red Hat Container Registry : Managed by Red Hat at no cost to partners. This option requires compliance with U.S. export control laws. For more information, see the Export compliance guide . Non-Red Hat Container Registry : For example, your own registry, or any public registry such as Quay.io and Docker.io .

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