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Status Not under consideration
Workspace Instana
Categories Self Hosted
Created by Guest
Created on Oct 6, 2021

Support for podman on RHEL8 for Self-hosted backend server

At this point, we are not planning to add support for hosting the Instana backend with podman.

The RHEL 8 docker package has been replaced by the container-tools module in RHEL 8 and some customers do not want to install docker-ce for RHEL 8 for technical or compliance reasons.

Technical, RHEL users have to choose RHEL 7 or other supported OS (e.g., CentOS, Ubuntu, Debian) that are not familiar with technically.
In a proof of concept situation, this sets the bar too high.

Compliance, RHEL 8 might be the only approved OS they have.

Idea priority Low
  • Admin
    Hubert Hesse
    Reply
    |
    Jul 6, 2022

    Hi,

    I directly answered Nicolas question via email, but in case anyone else wants to follow up on Openshift. please see https://automation-management.ideas.ibm.com/ideas/INSTANA-I-81 for more details

  • Guest
    Reply
    |
    Jun 23, 2022

    Hello,

    As discussed by email briefly, we have customers in Canada who do not have other alternatives (security constraints, skillset, etc) but to use Podman. This makes it impossible to have POCs with a self-hosted backend Instana server.

    Also, I read in the comments "Alternatively consider our Kubernetes offering, which soon is going to support Openshift."
    What is "soon"? Do we have a date?

    Because opportunities with our customers for POCs leading to a sale are NOW. If we cannot have successful POCs due to our lack of support of Podman, which is the new standard on RHEL, we will lose those opportunities. And our competition will not.

    Thanks,

    NJ

  • Guest
    Reply
    |
    Jun 3, 2022

    Hi,

    Is it possible to reconsider this position regarding podman? We have already to clients rejecting Instana due to the docker only support. I think that possibility of using podman for self hosted Instana would be great and bring possibility for clients not willing to use docker.


  • Admin
    Hubert Hesse
    Reply
    |
    Apr 14, 2022
    Why don t we look into adding a support statement for docker EE which should be a question of certifying it as it is the supported version of Docker.

    You can run Instana on docker-ee there are no problems with that we know of and many self-hosted customers do so. Only issue for RHEL8 is there is only docker-ce (from the CentOS package repositories) for x86_64. See s390x https://download.docker.com/linux/rhel/8/

  • Admin
    Hubert Hesse
    Reply
    |
    Apr 14, 2022
    So, what would be our position on the support for RHEL 8 (x86-64)?

    Bart, in addition to what we wrote via Slack DM. Our position on RHEL 8 remains unchanged. You can use docker-ce with RHEL8 or any of the other supported OS versions. Alternatively consider our Kubernetes offering, which soon is going to support Openshift.

  • Guest
    Reply
    |
    Apr 1, 2022

    #EMEA #NORTH

  • Guest
    Reply
    |
    Apr 1, 2022

    Why don t we look into adding a support statement for docker EE which should be a question of certifying it as it is the supported version of Docker. To me quite logical that Redhat and other OS vendors would not add official support statements for a community edition.

  • Guest
    Reply
    |
    Mar 31, 2022

    After further research, docker-ce and docker-ee have the same support position for RHEL 8 on x86_64, i.e. unsupported. It's only supported on s390x.

    So, what would be our position on the support for RHEL 8 (x86-64)?

  • Guest
    Reply
    |
    Mar 31, 2022

    Will the Instana server be supported on RHEL 8.4 with Docker EE? The docs only mention that Docker CE is a requirement.

    Unlike Docker CE, Docker EE IS supported on RHEL 8.4:

    https://docker-docs.netlify.app/install/linux/docker-ee/rhel/

  • Admin
    Hubert Hesse
    Reply
    |
    Mar 24, 2022

    After consideration in the team, I have to inform you that supporting podman for Instana Self-hosted will not be implemented in the foreseeable future.

    The reason is that our Self-hosted installer tightly integrates with the docker golang API that cannot be easily replaced as drop-ins like the docker cli.

    We see the value in continued support on these platforms. Therefore, will intensify our work on Openshift support and simplified Kubernetes onboarding. This will help you in proof of concept situations on these platforms.

  • Guest
    Reply
    |
    Mar 3, 2022

    #EMEA #Italy we need this feature also in Italy.

  • Admin
    Hubert Hesse
    Reply
    |
    Feb 8, 2022

    thank you for your suggestion. We added this feature request to our product backlog and will consider it in future planning.

    For now, please consider one of the following supported operating systems as per https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/obi/current?topic=installer-container-based-installation#supported-os

    • Ubuntu 18.04

    • Ubuntu 20.04

    • Debian 10.x

    • Debian 11.x

    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.9

    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.x with Docker CE

    • CentOS 7.9

    • Amazon Linux 2.x

    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 SP5

    • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15

    You can still choose to install docker-ce for RHEL8.

    Please add any additional context you have here.