Meet OpenELA - the What, the Why, and the Plan for the future

It’s like the new neighbors who just moved in down the block; you see them in the yard and wave as you pass by, but it’s nice to sit down and finally get to know them. That’s what the founding organizations of OpenELA are doing with this 3-part blog and video series—a meet and greet, if you will. We wanted to offer a personal introduction to OpenELA, sharing why the organization was started, what it’s here to do, and what exciting advancements lie ahead.

We’ll begin with Gregory M. Kurtzer, Founder and CEO of CIQ. Gregory went on TFiR to talk about what CIQ, SUSE, and Oracle came together to create in the OpenELA. A summary of the discussion is offered below the video.

OpenELA is a collaborative trade association of open source Enterprise Linux distribution developers that came together in the true spirit of open source to ensure the source code of Enterprise Linux is globally available to everybody as a buildable base, without limitations.

Collaboration builds stability, and time and time again open source communities have asked for their projects to remain free from corporate control and therefore secure, transparent, and reliable. That is why OpenELA was started as a 501(c)(6) nonprofit organization: so everyone felt free and welcome to participate, including IHVs, ISVs, and individuals.

This collaboration creating a common source for the base of multiple Enterprise Linux operating systems has also resulted in the creation of standards and compatibility among those operating systems. Customers now understand they have a choice—another true tenet of open source.

Please check out the next blog in the series, featuring Wim Coekaerts of Oracle sharing more about why Oracle, CIQ, and SUSE came together to start OpenELA.

(You can watch the full interview with Greg here.)