Update CentOS documentation to reflect reality
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The CentOS Project is a community-driven free software effort focused on delivering a robust open source ecosystem around a Linux platform. Packages contained in CentOS Linux are built from source code from the RedHat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) distribution. More information on the CentOS project can be found upstream at the [CentOS website](https://www.centos.org/).
On the 8th of December 2020, the CentOS Project [announced](https://blog.centos.org/2020/12/future-is-centos-stream/) it was shifting its focus from CentOS Linux to CentOS Stream, starting with the latest version, CentOS Linux 8. Support for CentOS Linux 8 will end at the end of 2021, and support for CentOS Stream 8 will continue until 2024. Prior to this announcement, CentOS Linux 8 was slated to be supported until 2029.
Currently, CentOS is a rebuild of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). In order to build RHEL, Red Hat engineers take a Fedora release, perform all their QA tests and assemble all the changes they want to make in their internal repositories. They rebuild all their packages and produce a new release of RHEL. Once this process is done, they push their sources to the CentOS public git repository. At this point, the CentOS project takes these source RPMs, rebuilds them and produces a new release of CentOS.
With CentOS Stream, Red Hat is doing their development work out in the open. They will continue to take Fedora releases and perform their QA on them, but now they will assemble all their changes publicly as CentOS Stream. Every 6 months or so, Red Hat will take CentOS Stream and rebuild it as a new RHEL point release. Once that is done, the sources of this new RHEL point release are rebuilt to produce a new CentOS release. This last step will now stop at the end of 2021.
CERN and Fermilab have been evaluating a number of options in view of the sudden change of end of life of CentOS Linux 8 in December 2020 and the move to Stream. A [migration path](/centos8/docs/migration) for servers already running CentOS Linux 8 is being provided to CentOS Stream 8 for those needing this release and latest features. Continued support for existing workloads on Scientific Linux 7 and CentOS 7 will be maintained as previously planned. We are evaluating a number of scenarios for future Linux distributions such as community editions or academic licence options over the next 12 months as the shorter Stream lifecycle is not compatible with a number of use cases for the scientific program of the worldwide particle physics community.
@@ -57,17 +16,17 @@ CentOS Stream 8 updates are staged
@@ -77,3 +36,25 @@ CentOS Stream 8 updates are staged
Currently, CentOS is a rebuild of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). In order to build RHEL, Red Hat engineers take a Fedora release, perform all their QA tests and assemble all the changes they want to make in their internal repositories. They rebuild all their packages and produce a new release of RHEL. Once this process is done, they push their sources to the CentOS public git repository. At this point, the CentOS project takes these source RPMs, rebuilds them and produces a new release of CentOS.
With CentOS Stream, Red Hat is doing their development work out in the open. They will continue to take Fedora releases and perform their QA on them, but now they will assemble all their changes publicly as CentOS Stream. Every 6 months or so, Red Hat will take CentOS Stream and rebuild it as a new RHEL point release. Once that is done, the sources of this new RHEL point release are rebuilt to produce a new CentOS release. This last step will now stop at the end of 2021.