4 things about EuroLinux that are worth to know
Tags: eurolinux, linux, opensource
Published: 2022-11-03 09:58:30

_Do you know the Four Foundations of Fedora (Freedom, Friends, Features, and First)? Fedora is a Linux distribution focused on the fresh packages versions as a testing candidates to Red Hat Enterprise Linux._

_Today I will try to describe four values of another Linux distro from Red Hat family - EuroLinux - in a similar way._

_To understand the relationship between them better, let's imagine a development path of the software. First you have unstable and testing system (Fedora) with short lifecycle, then it becomes more mature (CentOS Stream), next to approach your final product (RHEL). In accordance with Open Source principles there are also free derivatives of RHEL, EuroLinux is the eldest one of them. Ready? Let's get to the point_

**FIRM**

EuroLinux was made to be solid-stable and to provide long-lasting support, similar to other Enterprise-like distributions.

The main target for this distro is server environment for  demanding industries such as financial, banking, logistics, government institutions and much more.

Therefore, you can expect putting a lot of effort to stability and security to match the criteria of their end-users.

**FAIR**

Let's consider what happened with CentOS Project. It was first free enterprise Linux distribution founded by community. Next the RH bought the project giving beautiful promises. Finally they cut off the main usage of CentOS moving it to position for testing distro (upstream), similar to Fedora. I will not share everything what I know about this case, because I don't want to say anything bad. My point is, you can find many reasons to look for independent RHEL alternative.

EuroLinux is fair to the customers and fully independent from any third-party influence. The company is kept wholly thanks to its paid customers (three levels of support).

**FREE**

The EuroLinux crew are all Open Source enthusiasts. EuroLinux puts a lot of attention to the 'no vendor lock-in' principle.

Since version 8, EuroLinux is also free to use.
You can switch between free and paid version of the system at any time both ways.

**FRIENDLY**

The main value promoted by the company is professional support. Indeed you can find good people there with sincere and helpful attitude, ready to treat your problem very seriously, even if you ask for a triffle.

There are also a few positive suprises inside the system.  Once you take a deeper look at the packages available in EuroLinux repositories, you will find open buildroots that allow you to satisfy dependencies during building your own or third-party software. 

-----------------------------------------------
BONUS: the fifth property
-----------------------------------------------

**FOR SECURITY PARANOICS :)**

EuroLinux made its own building system, that builds packages from source files as the only input, and the system can be deployed inside the customer organization (special license is required).

That means it can provide the highest possible level of trust, since you can take EuroLinux sources and use that build system to make sure the packages came from, what you see on your own. Inherently, you can create your own custom distribution based on RHEL source code, what is really great!