How to Migrate From CentOS 8 to Rocky Linux 8/Alma Linux 8

Today we learn How to Migrate From CentOS 8 to Rocky Linux 8/Alma Linux 8, As you may already know, Red Hat decided to abandon the vanilla CentOS 8 project, which will reach end-of-life on December 31, 2021, and shift its focus to CentOS Stream. This tutorial is going to show you how to migrate from CentOS 8 to Rocky Linux 8/Alma Linux 8.

CentOS 8 Alternatives

There are several CentOS 8 alternatives, the most popular of which are

• Rocky Linux: A project led by one of the original creators of CentOS.
• Alma Linux: Created by CloudLinux, which is a Linux hosting software company.

Both of them are 100% open-source and are ready for production environment. Which one is better, you might think? Rocky Linux has better appeal in the open-source community, but development in Alma Linux is much faster than that of Rocky Linux.

Although the methods in this article are tested successfully, it’s always a good idea to make a backup before doing the migration.

If the migration to Rocky Linux fails, you can try migrating to Alma Linux, and vice versa.

How to Install and Configure Mono on Rocky Linux 8 and CentOS 8

Migrate From CentOS 8 to Rocky Linux 8

First, update existing software with the following command.

sudo dnf update -y

Then download the official migration script from Github.

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rocky-linux/rocky-tools/main/migrate2rocky/migrate2rocky.sh

Add execution permission to this script.

chmod +x migrate2rocky.sh

Next, run the migration script.

sudo ./migrate2rocky.sh -r

It will replace the CentOS repository with Rocky Linux repository and also replace the software packages. The script will take care of everything. You don’t need to intervene in this process.

At the end of this process, you will be told to reboot your system.

sudo shutdown -r now

After reboot, check your Rocky Linux version.

cat /etc/rocky-release

Migrate From CentOS 8 to Alma Linux 8

First, update existing software with the following command.

sudo dnf update -y

Then download the official migration script from Github.

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AlmaLinux/almalinux-deploy/master/almalinux-deploy.sh

Add execution permission to this script.

chmod +x almalinux-deploy.sh

Next, run the migration script.

sudo bash almalinux-deploy.sh

It will replace the CentOS repository with Alma Linux repository and also replace the software packages. The script will take care of everything. You don’t need to intervene in this process.

At the end of this process, you will be told to reboot your system.

sudo shutdown -r now

After reboot, check your Rocky Linux version.

cat /etc/almalinux-release

Wrapping Up

I hope this tutorial helped you migrate from CentOS 8 to Rocky Linux 8 or Alma Linux 8. As always, if you found this post useful,