Registering RHEL 7 or CentOS Linux 7 with RMT
This guide describes how to use SUSE Liberty Linux to update Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 or CentOS Linux 7.
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1 Introduction #
SUSE Liberty Linux 7 has reached the end of general support and is now in LTSS (Long Term Service Support).
If you have a SUSE Liberty Linux subscription but do not have an LTSS subscription, you can continue to use your systems. However, registering new RHEL 7 or CentOS Linux 7 systems with the general subscription is no longer supported.
To register new RHEL 7 or CentOS Linux 7 systems, and to continue receiving new updates for existing systems, you must purchase a SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7 subscription.
Additionally, the optional High Availability extension is no longer supported with SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7. You must remove this product from your system before you can register with an LTSS subscription.
If you previously registered your systems with a general subscription and want to move them to an LTSS subscription, see Section 4, “Mirroring SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS repositories with RMT” and Section 5, “Registering RHEL or CentOS Linux with RMT”.
SUSE Liberty Linux is a technology and support solution for mixed Linux environments. With a SUSE Liberty Linux subscription, you can register and receive updates for Red Hat Enterprise Linux, CentOS Linux, and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server.
CentOS Stream is not supported.
You can register RHEL 7 or CentOS Linux 7 with either SUSE Manager or the Repository Mirroring Tool (RMT).
This guide describes how to register with an RMT server. RMT is a proxy system for the SUSE Customer Center. The RMT server is registered with the SUSE Customer Center, and other systems in the network are registered with the RMT server and receive packages from it directly.
If you already have an RMT server and only need to register your RHEL 7 or CentOS Linux 7 system, skip straight to Section 5, “Registering RHEL or CentOS Linux with RMT”.
If you already have an RMT server but still need to mirror the SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7 repositories, go to Section 4, “Mirroring SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS repositories with RMT”.
If you still need to set up the RMT server, start with Section 2, “Installing a virtual machine to host RMT” and Section 3, “Configuring the RMT server”.
SUSE Liberty Linux now provides what used to be covered by the SUSE Linux Enterprise Server with Expanded Support subscription. Some components might still use the Expanded Support name during the transition period.
2 Installing a virtual machine to host RMT #
Use this procedure to install a SLES Minimal VM, a preconfigured virtual machine image that contains a slimmed-down version of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES). This machine will be the Repository Mirroring Tool (RMT) server. You can use your SUSE Liberty Linux subscription to register this machine.
If you would prefer to install a full SLES machine on bare metal, see Installation Quick Start.
You have a SUSE Liberty Linux subscription.
You have a SUSE Customer Center account.
The VM must have a static IP address and host name. This guide includes steps for configuring the VM's network setup, but you must have basic networking knowledge to fill in the details.
You have the infrastructure to run virtual machines. This guide explains how to set up the VM to host RMT, but does not describe how to use different virtualization products. See the relevant documentation for your product.
The RMT server needs enough available disk space to mirror the SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7 repositories. Downloaded packages are stored in
/var/lib/rmt/public/repo/
. The amount of storage required depends on the number of repositories you mirror. We recommend at least 1.5 times the total size of all enabled repositories.Important: SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7 repository sizeThe SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS repositories will grow over time because older package versions are not removed. To meet the 1.5x size recommendation, based on the current[1] size of the default SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7 repositories, you will need approximately 225 GB of disk space available for the RMT server.
If you also need the
Source
andDebug
repositories, you will need an additional 770 GB available.
Download the appropriate
Minimal-VM
image for your virtualization infrastructure from https://www.suse.com/download/sles/.Use the
Minimal-VM
image to start the virtual machine.The default disk size for SLES Minimal VM is 24 GB. If you can customize the configuration before the installation begins, increase the available storage so there is enough disk space for repository mirroring.
When the
JeOS Firstboot
screen appears, select .Choose your keyboard layout and select
.Review the
End User License Agreement
and select . To agree with the terms of the license, select .Choose your time zone and select
.Enter a
root
password and select , then confirm the password and select again.JeOS Firstboot shows the command to use to register this VM. You do not need to write this down; the command is explained in this procedure. Select
.When the VM is ready, log in as the
root
user with the password you entered during setup.Register the VM using your SUSE Customer Center email address and the registration code for SUSE Liberty Linux:
#
SUSEConnect -e EMAIL_ADDRESS -r REGISTRATION_CODE
This activates the
Basesystem
,Server Applications
, andPython 3
modules.If you did not already increase the VM's disk space before the installation began, increase it now. You might need to shut down the VM to do so. The VM must have enough space to mirror the SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7 repository.
You must also configure a static IP address and host name for the VM. If you are familiar with any networking tools in SLES, configure the network with your preferred tool. If not, use the YaST graphical interface:
Install YaST and the YaST
network
module:#
zypper install yast2 yast2-network
Start the YaST
network
module:#
yast2 lan
In the
tab, select to change the settings of theeth0
device. The dialog opens.In the
tab, activate .Fill in the
, , and fields.Select
.Switch to the
tab and fill in the field.Change
tono
.Fill in at least one
field.Switch to the
tab and select . A new dialog opens.Fill in the
field. Make sure to remove the-
character.From the
drop-down list, selecteth0
.Select
to close the dialog.Select
to complete the configuration and close YaST.Check the network settings:
#
ip addr
Check that the network interface can access external networks:
#
ping www.suse.com
Cancel the ping with Ctrl–C.
You can now install RMT on the virtual machine.
3 Configuring the RMT server #
Use this procedure to configure the Repository Mirroring Tool (RMT) on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 15.
A SLES 15 virtual machine is installed as described in Section 2, “Installing a virtual machine to host RMT”.
The SLES machine has a static IP address and host name.
You have a SUSE Customer Center account and organization credentials.
On the SLES machine, install RMT:
#
zypper install rmt-server
Install the following packages, which are not installed by default on a SLES Minimal VM:
#
zypper install yast2-rmt mariadb nginx
Start the YaST
rmt
module:#
yast2 rmt
Enter your
, then select .To find your organization credentials, log in to the SUSE Customer Center, select your organization from , and click . Your organization's are in the top right corner.
Enter
for a new MariaDB database user, then select . The new user is created.When prompted, enter and confirm a new password for the MariaDB root user, then select
.Enter a
for the SSL certificates. The common name is usually the host name of the server.If the server has other domain names or IP addresses, enter these as
. Select to add new names. When all common names are entered, select .If prompted, enter and confirm a password for the CA private key, then select
.Activate the check box
, then select .YaST displays the
. If there are no issues, select .Review the
, then select to close YaST.
YaST enables and starts all RMT systemd
services and timers.
4 Mirroring SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS repositories with RMT #
Use this procedure to mirror the SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS repositories for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 and CentOS Linux 7.
The RMT server is installed and up to date.
The RMT server has enough storage available for repository mirroring. The amount of storage required depends on the number of repositories you mirror. We recommend at least 1.5 times the total size of all enabled repositories. Be aware that the SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS repositories will grow over time.
Your organization credentials appear correctly in
/etc/rmt.conf
.You have a SUSE Liberty Linux subscription activated in the SUSE Customer Center.
The repository structure has changed in SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7. Previously, there was
one default repository and one optional Source
repository. Now there are
two default repositories, BASE
and LTSS
, along with
optional Source
and Debug
repositories for both.
The BASE
repositories are frozen and contain the existing packages from
the original SUSE Liberty Linux repositories. The LTSS
repositories contain
new packages for SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7.
There are no new High Availability repositories. High Availability is not supported with SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7.
If you previously mirrored the SUSE Liberty Linux repositories with the general subscription, clean up these repositories first before you start mirroring the new LTSS repositories:
Disable the original product. This also disables all repositories associated with the product:
#
rmt-cli product disable 1251
If your previous subscription included the High Availability extension, disable this product too:
#
rmt-cli product disable 1252
High Availability is not supported with SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7.
Free up space on the server by cleaning up the files associated with the disabled repositories:
#
rmt-cli repos clean
On the RMT server, update the available product and repository metadata:
#
rmt-cli sync
Synchronization is also performed automatically by
rmt-server-sync.timer
. You can check the status and the next scheduled synchronization time with the following command:#
systemctl status rmt-server-sync.timer
Enable SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7 using the product ID
2702
:#
rmt-cli product enable 2702
This enables all the default repositories associated with the product.
If you also need the
Source
orDebug
repositories, find and enable them with the following commands:#
rmt-cli repo list --all | grep RES-7-BASE
#
rmt-cli repo list --all | grep RES-7-LTSS
#
rmt-cli repo enable REPO_ID
Start package mirroring for the enabled repositories:
#
rmt-cli mirror
Packages are downloaded to the RMT server once per day by
rmt-server-mirror.timer
. You can check the status and the next scheduled download time with the following command:#
systemctl status rmt-server-mirror.timer
5 Registering RHEL or CentOS Linux with RMT #
Use this procedure to register Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 or CentOS Linux 7 with the RMT server.
CentOS Stream is not supported.
The RMT server is running rmt-server version 2.18 or later.
The SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7 repositories are available on the RMT server.
The system you want to register can access the RMT server.
The system you want to register is up to date. SUSE Liberty Linux only supports the latest minor release of RHEL 7 or CentOS Linux 7.
You have a SUSE Liberty Linux subscription activated in the SUSE Customer Center.
You have removed the system from any Red Hat subscription services it was registered to.
The repository structure and registration setup has changed in SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7. If you previously registered your system with a general SUSE Liberty Linux subscription, de-register your system from the original subscription before you re-register with the LTSS subscription:
De-register your system:
#
SUSEConnect --de-register
This command also removes the High Availability extension if it was installed on your system. High Availability is not supported with SUSE Liberty Linux LTSS 7.
Clean up the registration status:
#
SUSEConnect --cleanup
Download the
rmt-client-setup-res
script:#
curl http://RMT_SERVER/tools/rmt-client-setup-res --output rmt-client-setup-res
Run the
rmt-client-setup-res
script with the URL of the RMT server as a parameter:#
sh rmt-client-setup-res https://RMT_SERVER
The script installs
SUSEConnect
and its dependencies, then downloads and runs thermt-client-setup
script, which performs the following tasks:Downloads all keys from
http://RMT_SERVER/repo/keys
.Imports the keys with
gpg --import
andrpm --import
.Downloads the CA certificate from
https://RMT_SERVER/rmt.crt
.Imports the CA certificate to the trust store.
Uses
SUSEConnect
to register the system with the RMT server. Registering the system usingSUSEConnect
adds and enables all default repositories.
You should see
Successfully registered system
.Verify the installed product:
#
SUSEConnect --status-text
You should see the following output:
Installed Products: ------------------------------------------ SUSE Liberty Linux release file (RES-LTSS/7/x86_64) Registered ------------------------------------------
Verify the available repositories:
#
yum repolist
You should see
RES-7-BASE-Updates
andRES-7-LTSS-Updates
.Run the update command to make sure there are no errors:
#
yum update
You can now keep your system up to date from repositories provided by SUSE Liberty Linux.
6 Troubleshooting #
nginx.service
is inactive after installing the rmt-server packageContinue the procedure to configure RMT in YaST. This often resolves the issue. If that fails, Apache might be installed on your server, and must be disabled. Apache conflicts with NGINX because both web servers listen on port 80.
- SUSE Liberty Linux doesn't appear in
rmt-cli products list
afterrmt-cli sync
Check your network. If the network is down,
rmt-cli sync
fails without showing an error.- Mirroring completes with errors
If some packages could not be downloaded because of timeouts, rerun the
rmt-cli mirror
command until all packages are downloaded.- Setup script cannot access the SUSE Liberty Linux repositories
The
repodata
directory on the RMT server will not be available until all of the packages for that repository are downloaded. If some packages could not be downloaded to the RMT server because of timeouts during the first mirroring, rerun thermt-cli mirror
command until all packages are downloaded.- Setup script cannot install suseconnect-ng because of package dependencies
SUSE Liberty Linux only supports the latest minor release of RHEL or CentOS Linux. If your system is running the latest version and suseconnect-ng still has package dependency issues, try the following workaround:
Edit the
rmt-client-setup-res
script to add--skip-broken
to the following line:$YUM install sles_es-release-server suseconnect-ng librepo --skip-broken
Run the script and accept any proposed package changes. suseconnect-ng will be skipped.
Run the script a second time. The package changes from the first attempt can sometimes resolve the package dependency issues, allowing the second attempt to successfully install suseconnect-ng.