When running
Oracle Linux you do not have to purchase a support contract from Oracle. You are perfectly fine running Oracle Linux without purchasing the support. However, in general, when running Oracle Linux in a business environment you would like to have the option to call in support when needed. This means that most companies do purchase the support and use it whenever needed. A general misunderstanding is that everything shipped by Oracle is also supported by Oracle.
In fact some (a limited) parts are not supported by Oracle while at the same time you will be able to find them in the Oracle Linux distribution and you have the option to install them and use them. The general misconception comes from the fact that most people understand that when you download and install additional software that is not provided by Oracle you will not get support. At the same time they expect everything shipped by Oracle to be under the support contract.
In case you are in doubt if a specific part is under support you might want to check the “Unsupported Packages from ISO” at the Oracle Linux website. This list (current date –
Do check the latest version) has the following packages:
- ccs
- cluster-cim
- cluster-glue-libs-devel
- clusterlib-devel
- cluster-snmp
- cman
- cmirror
- cmirror-standalone
- corosynclib-devel
- ctdb
- ctdb-devel
- dlm
- fence-agents-all
- fence-virtd-checkpoint
- foghorn
- gfs2-utils
- haproxy
- ipvsadm
- keepalived
- libesmtp-devel
- luci
- lvm2-cluster
- lvm2-cluster-standalone
- N/A
- omping
- openaislib-devel
- pacemaker
- pacemaker-doc
- pacemaker-libs-devel
- pcs
- piranha
- python-repoze-what-quickstart
- resource-agents
- rgmanager
- ricci
- xfsdump
- xfsprogs
- xfsprogs-devel