Chapter 3. Tools and applications available for Red Hat Subscription Management
Red Hat Subscription services have moved from the Customer Portal to Red Hat Hybrid Cloud Console, however, your technical environment might require you to perform some tasks in the Customer Portal. For example, a user with a Red Hat Satellite Server on a disconnected network will continue to use the Customer Portal to create and manage subscription manifests.
All Red Hat Enterprise Linux subscriptions automatically include the following tools for managing the subscription configuration:
- Red Hat Subscription Manager client tools to manage local systems on the command line
- Red Hat Subscription Management on the Red Hat Hybrid Cloud Console to manage systems and subscriptions for your account
- Red Hat Satellite as an on-premise solution for systems that may not regularly check in
The diversity of tools allows administrators to create a workflow that fits both the business and infrastructure demands of their organization.
3.1. Red Hat Subscription Manager
Red Hat Subscription Manager tracks and displays what subscriptions are available to the local system and what subscriptions have been consumed by the local system. It works as a conduit back to the subscription service to synchronize changes, such as available product quantities or subscription expiration dates.
The Subscription Manager includes the following components:
- A UI-based client to manage the local machine
- A CLI client, which can be used with other applications or in automation scripts
These tools allow authorized users to perform tasks directly related to managing subscriptions, such as registering a system to Red Hat and updating the certificates required for authentication. Some minor operations, such as updating system facts, are available to help show and track available subscriptions.
You must have root privileges to run the Subscription Manager CLI tool because of the nature of the changes to the system. However, Subscription Manager connects to the subscription service as a user account for the subscription service.
The Subscription Manager is part of the firstboot process for configuring content and updates, but you can register the system at any time through the Subscription Manager UI or CLI. New subscriptions, new products, and updates can be viewed and applied to a system through the Subscription Manager tools.
Additional resources
- For information about how to register your RHEL system, see Getting Started with RHEL System Registration.
- For information about how to view and manage your subscriptions and their details, see Viewing and managing your subscription inventory on the Hybrid Cloud Console
3.1.1. Launching Red Hat Subscription Manager
You can run Red Hat Subscription Manager from the Red Hat Enterprise Linux UI. The following instructions show you how to run Subscription Manager from the RHEL UI based on the release version of your system:
- In RHEL 9, click Activities > Show Applications.
- In RHEL 8, click Activities > Show All Programs.
- In RHEL 7, click System Tools > Administration.