Hello, welcome to Oracle Linux how-to video series.
This video is to help you familiarize with the Unbreakable Linux Network, commonly known
as ULN.
All steps and procedures explained and performed in this video are based on Oracle Linux release
7 Oracle Linux is free to download, use and
distribute.
You only need to pay for enterprise level support.
ULN allows access to security patches, updates and bug fixes for your Oracle Linux system.
It also includes access to a feature called ksplice that allows zero-downtime updates.
This enables us to perform kernel update without rebooting the Oracle Linux server.
You can gain access to ULN using an Oracle single sign-on account and customer support
identifier that is issued to you when you purchase Oracle Support subscription.
All Oracle Cloud instances running on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure have full access to the
content on ULN without any need to register or use any tools to manage channel access.
This is made possible by the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure regional yum servers.
The ULN site can be accessed by logging in at linux.oracle.com
ULN hosts various content such as bug fixes, security updates and software updates to various
software provided with the Oracle Linux distribution as well as few additional packages that are
not part of the distribution.
The ULN also gives access to zero-downtime updates with Oracle Ksplice.
This is the landing page that you see once you login to the Unbreakable Linux Network.
Here there are multiple tabs that allow you to see channels that are available for subscription,
a list of systems that are registered, errata updates that are available for your system
and the CVE information.
Each CSI will have an administrator who will have access to an Administrator tab.
CSI administrators can list active and expired CSIs, transfer registered systems to a different
user or a different CSI and can add or remove other administrators for a CSI.
This image shows how a single administrator can manage multiple CSIs and also how a single
CSI can have multiple administrators.
A new user can be registered to ULN by going to linux.oracle.com/register
If a user is not registered in ULN and a new system is registered to ULN with that user,
a profile is automatically created for that user in ULN.
To register a system to ULN the rhn-setup tool is used.
By running the uln_register command and providing the username password and CSI when prompted
a system can be easily registered to ULN.
Let us a see quick on how to register a system to ULN.
We start by running the ULN register command.
This opens an interactive window where we can proceed with the registration.
At the login prompt enter your username for the Oracle single sign-on account.
At the password prompt enter the password for your Oracle single sign-on account.
And finally the CSI provided with your Oracle Support subscription.
Once the login details are provided system information is collected.
Details about the packages installed on the system are also collected.
Finally click next to send the system profile to the Unbreakable Linux Network.
Next you are prompted whether you would like to receive zero-downtime updates with Oracle
Ksplice.
When we click OK the ksplice repository is configured.
Once done the details of the subscription is listed.
Here we see that the channels for Oracle Linux 7 latest packages, Ksplice packages for Oracle
Linux 7 and Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel release 5 channel for Oracle Linux 7 are subscribed.
Finally click Finish to finish registering the system to ULN.
We can subscribe or unsubscribe from channels for a system from the Systems tab in the ULN
website.
Also the name and CSI for the registered system can be edited in the System details section
which can be seen by clicking on the registered system's name.
All available errata for a registered system can be downloaded as a comma separated values
that is a CSV file.
ULN is integrated with yum which allows to get updates to the system directly using yum.
"Yum repolist" will list the subscribed channels in ULN.
"Yum install" can be used install new packages and "yum update" to update a specific package
or the complete system itself.
This is how the Systems tab looks in ULN website.
It shows a listing of the systems registered with ULN.
Oracle Linux is focused on delivering options that ensure administrators have the features
and tools they need to deploy their workloads securely using best in class solutions and
established best practices.
Following pages consolidate a list of the various features, tools and documentation
relating to security and Oracle Linux, including but not limited to OVAL definitions, security
errata and security guides.
The ULN website also lists all the CVE details and the packages that are affected and the
updates that need to be performed to mitigate the vulnerabilities.
Here are some useful links and my oracle support knowledge documents that will help you get
more information on Oracle Linux and the Unbreakable Linux Network.
The knowledge documents can be accessed by logging in at support.oracle.com
That ends our short video on the Unbreakable Linux Network.
Thank you for watching.