CentOS 8 Upgrade Project

Netsweeper Server OS Update

Netsweeper is committed to providing our customers with the best platform for web content filtering. This includes ensuring that the underlying technology Netsweeper is built on is stable, resilient, and secure. Netsweeper is built on the CentOS operating system, an enterprise grade operating system derived from Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and designed for high performance servers and critical infrastructure.

  • The current active version of Netsweeper is 6.3, within the Netsweeper 6 series
  • CentOS 6 is the underlying operating system Netsweeper 6.3 is build on
  • CentOS 6 will be End of Life (EOL) in November 2020

The Netsweeper delivery team is actively working to provide a new Netsweeper version operating on the latest CentOS version with full support. This work is ongoing, with a first release (EA) expected this summer. Based on our typical development release cycles, we expect a GA release within the 2020 calendar year. As this development progresses, we will provide further updates.

  • Target first EA of CentOS 8 base: Q2 2020
  • Target first GA of CentOS 8 base: Q4 2020
  • Updates will be posted on an ongoing basis as this project progresses

Some expected benefits of moving to the new CentOS operating system:

  • Benefit from the latest enterprise grade Linux operating system with active support for security updates
  • Improved network packet capture architecture that benefits Netsweeper’s capture modules framework
  • Default filesystem is XFS, an improved filesystem that excels at handling large files (log files, etc.)
  • Support for 500TB files, 1025TB filesystems, 24TB RAM
  • Support for the latest high performance processors

In preparation for your migration from Netsweeper 6, there are a number of considerations our customers should be
familiar with:

  • A base operating system update means there is no upgrade path, you will need to re-install your Netsweeper platform
  • Backwards compatibility will mean servers can be updated in a specific sequential order
  • Netsweeper will provide further information on migrating policy databases

Keep an eye on your email and our blog for more information regarding this project.