Chapter 10. Edge

Ability to add SQL backend for storing and querying FDO Owner Vouchers as Technology Preview

With this Technology Preview, you can select an SQL datastore in the FDO servers options, along with credentials and other parameters, to store the Owner Vouchers for the following FDO servers:

Ability to build FIPS enabled RHEL for Edge images

During the image provisioning, you can build FIPS enabled images for the following RHEL for Edge image types:

Support to build RHEL for Edge AMI images

You have support to build .ami images for RHEL for Edge, customize the blueprint with Ignition to inject the credentials into the image during boot, and upload the .ami image to AWS and boot an EC2 instance in AWS.

Support to build RHEL for Edge VMDK images

You can also build RHEL for RHEL for Edge VMDK images, customize the blueprint with Ignition to inject the credentials into the image during the initial boot, and load the image on vSphere and boot the image in a VM vSphere.

Support for RHEL for Edge minimal raw image that boots on 64-bit ARM architectures

The RHEL for Edge minimal raw image type now supports the 64-bit ARM architecture, and AMD and Intel 64-bit architectures.

New FIDO Device Onboarding Servers container images available

The following FIDO Device Onboarding Servers container images available in Red Hat Container Catalog:

RHEL for Edge Simplified images have support to the Ignition provisioning utility

You can customize your blueprints configuration with the Ignition provisioning utility to create your RHEL for Edge images. The Ignition injects the user configuration into the images at an early stage of the boot process. During the first boot into the system, the Ignition utility reads its configuration either from a remote URL or a file embedded in the Simplified Installer image and applies that configuration into the image.

The FDO customization in blueprints is now optional

You are no longer required to add the FDO customization section in blueprints to build a Simplified Installer image.

Support for automatic provisioning and onboarding RHEL for Edge images using FDO

You have support for automatic provisioning and onboarding RHEL for Edge images using the FDO (FIDO device onboarding) process. With this, you can build a RHEL for Edge Simplified Installer image, provision it to a RHEL for Edge image. Then, you can use the FDO process to automatically provision and onboard your Edge devices, exchange data with other devices and systems connected on the networks.

Support to rpm-ostree upgrades from RHEL 8 to RHEL 9

You can upgrade RHEL 8 systems to RHEL 9 using rpm-ostree rebase.

Support to auto-rollbacks

The health checks run during the boot process and can determine if the nodes are functioning properly. If the health checks fail, a counter tracks the number of attempts and the node uses rpm-ostree to rollback the update. Podman automatically rollbacks the container if a new application version exits when the update fails.

Support to build a RHEL for Edge Simplified Installer image

You can use RHEL image builder to build a RHEL for Edge Simplified Installer image. It enables an unattended installation to a device, and provisioning the image to a RHEL for Edge image.

Support to build a RHEL for Edge Raw image

You can also build RHEL for RHEL for Edge Raw image. These are compressed raw images, which consist of a file that contains a partition layout with an existing deployed OSTree commit in it. The RHEL for Edge Raw Images can be used to flash on a hard disk drive or boot on a virtual machine.

The RHEL 9 for Edge minimal installation is much smaller

The RHEL 9 for Edge minimal installation is much smaller, when compared with RHEL 8:

Supported RHEL for Edge image types

With RHEL for Edge, you can compose customized RHEL (rpm-ostree) images using RHEL image builder, and then remotely install and manage the images on Edge servers.

Supported RHEL for Edge image names

Previously, the image types were prefixed by rhel-. This prefix was removed, but the previous image names, such as rhel-edge-container and rhel-edge-installer still work as aliases to the new names. These names are considered deprecated and may be removed completely in future versions. The following RHEL for Edge image names are supported in RHEL 9: