CentOS repo removals

phillxnet · June 17, 2025, 11:59am

We are in need of the resources that these repositories are taking up, ergo we must now remove them to lighten our administrative load and server resource requirements. This also helps facilitate our ongoing OS version support for non-legacy OS variants. See the following issue for more context:

github.com/rockstor/rockstor-website

Update Downloads page re CentOS repo removals

opened 10:58AM - 17 Jun 25 UTC

phillxnet

In the early days of our CentOS variant Stable subscription offerings we had the… following Tier: - EOL subscription (valid till 6/30/2024) This is now long-gone, as is CentOS itself in its prior downstream stance - is was repurposed as a very different upstream long after our move to a "Built on openSUSE" offering - beginning with Leap 15.0 beta. It is proposed that we now remove these repositories and indicate that they are also no-longer available on the Downloads page. Justification: - We are now a non-profit that must show responsible use of resources. - Our server resources cost, and are limited; long legacy unsupported OS variants should be removed. - We have in place [Migrating Legacy v3 (CentOS) to “Built on openSUSE”](https://rockstor.com/docs/howtos/centos_to_opensuse.html) - All prior CentOS pools, and config backups within their capability at that time, are importable/restorable to any newer "Built on openSUSE" variant. There is no wish to strand folks here.

Our Downloads page, since our “Built on openSUSE” pivot a few years ago, has displayed the following:

Legacy / Unsupported installer from 2017. Available here only for specialist purposes.

Also available on SourceForge as Rockstor-3.9.1.iso

DO NOT USE FOR NEW INSTALLS.

Last Testing Channel release (3.9.1-16) - November 2017
Last Stable channel released (3.9.2-57) - April 2020

And our last obligation regarding prior (pre non-profit) stable subscriptions has the last, and longest running tier as:

EOL subscription (valid till 6/30/2024)

Which is approaching 1 year past EOL. Hopefully a fair grace period on-from upstream’s own support - and likely repo availability.

There is also a resource issue - servers side cost / client side cause - that earlier Rockstor “Build on CentOS” installs cause that we can only ‘fix’ by removing these repositories.

Warning

N.B. repo unavailable issues on our prior CentOS base causes all repo updates to fail. Void in this case given upstream’s likely removal/re-purposing of their own repositories. And the EOL status of CentOS as-was re mid 2024.

If you are still running a CentOS variant. Please see our now longstanding doc entry on migrating to our current “Built on openSUSE” offering.

Migrating Legacy v3 (CentOS) to “Built on openSUSE”

From that document how-to entry we have the following quote:

All v3 (and likely earlier) Pools and Configuration Backup and Restore files (once downloaded), are expected to import and restore respectively as they would in a v3 install. It is important to import all pools before uploading and applying a config save file.

As of 3.9.2-56, in common with many NAS systems, the Apple Filing Protocol (AFP) was dropped.

As from 5.0.9 “Built on openSUSE” versions no longer auto-import the system pool. This is intended to discourage the use of the system Pool for data storage. But when imported (advanced users only) this pool is labeled “ROOT”. Prior to v4 the system Pool was labeled “rockstor_rockstor”. Starting with v4 the inadvertent appearance of the “root” share/subvolume has also been removed.

Please view the above linked how-to for more details and important caveates/differences.

phillxnet · June 18, 2025, 11:17am

As per the previously linked website GitHub issue, we have the following update:

Both “Built on CentOS” repositories have now been removed. However the last rpm published in each repo remains at the respective repos prior location: enabling by-hand rpm package retrieval. But no CentOS repo metadata is any-long maintained at these locations.

Moving to remove the CentOS installer entry entirely from our downloads page.

phillxnet · June 18, 2025, 2:27pm

We are also now removing the even older CentOS orientated ‘rockrepo’, again no functional change for existing/ongoing “Built on CentOS” installs, bar yet-another repo no longer existing.