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20.8. Verifying and Updating the redhat-release File

Verify that the redhat-release RPM is installed on your Red Hat system:
rpm -q redhat-release
This RPM is important for Red Hat Enterprise Linux since Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2.1, 3, 4 and 5 are Linux releases supported by Oracle. Without this RPM, Oracle 10g OUI will not be able to recognize it as a supported OS. However, the installer of 10g 10.1.0.3 does not recognize Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 as a supported release yet. This means that you will have to edit the /etc/redhat-release file. It is not recommend to execute "runInstaller -ignoreSysPrereqs" since this will disable other checks you may need.
On Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 (for 10g R1) you have to change the /etc/redhat-release file to make Oracle 10g believe it is running on a supported release.
Regarding Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4, the installer for 10g 10.1.0.3 does not recognize Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 as a supported release but 10g R2 OUI does.
To change the /etc/redhat-release file, you can simply copy and paste the following commands:
su - root
# cp /etc/redhat-release /etc/redhat-release.orig
# cat > /etc/redhat-release << EOF
Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS release 3 (Taroon)
EOF
After you are done with the Oracle 10g installation, undo the changes you made to /etc/redhat-release:
su - root
# cp /etc/redhat-release.orig /etc/redhat-release