CloudLinux 9.4 = AlmaLinux 9.4 (Errors out on restores)

[webbytech]

CloudLinux 9.4 is basically AlmaLinux 9.4 which is supported, however Support says its nots supported. Recently after kernel updates and Veeam updates, backups work but restores when attempting to start error out with "error: Unable to get path commander."

Support is unable to clarify what that error means. Anyone have tips?

[Gostev]

I can only confirm that CloudLinux 9.4 has not been tested and thus is not supported.

[webbytech]

But CloudLinux = AlmaLinux, same code base, same developers, just free vs commercial.

Can you atleast tell me what your software means by "error: unable to get path commander"

[rovshan.pashayev]

Hello Josh,

We cannot troubleshoot code malfunctions over forum posts, for technical issues you will need to open a Support Case.

But, as Gostev mentioned, you are having issues with a Linux distribution that is not supported by Veeam.

Please use an officially supposted distribution. If CloudLinux really is completely the same as Alma, then please just switch to Alma and go from there to see if you get the same issue or not.

[webbytech]

Just to update Veeam reps, I h ave CloudLinux 9.4 working just fine after tricking your OS Check into thinking it was AlmaLinux 9.4. If you would like logs or prove it and bring CloudLinux into a technically supported OS let me know

[arthesys87]

Hello Veeam Team,

I’m curious why Veeam doesn’t support CloudLinux. Since CloudLinux is based on the same source as AlmaLinux, it seems odd that Veeam supports AlmaLinux but not CloudLinux. This limitation excludes a lot of potential users, including myself—I had to cancel my Veeam implementation because of this.

Is there a specific reason for this? If it’s not about financial reasons, it would make sense for Veeam to consider adding CloudLinux support.

Just my 2 cents!

[Gostev]

It's just about lack of QA resources to "marry" yet another variation of Linux and include it in all QA processes going forward. If anything, we are going an opposite direction these days - removing support of distributions which are in low single digits of actual usage according to our support big data, so that we could better serve customers of leading Linux distributions. It's just does not make any financial sense to keep testing unpopular distributions, as you correctly mentioned.

[arthesys87]

Hi Gostev,

I believe removing support for AlmaLinux would be a mistake.

As mentioned, AlmaLinux 9 and CloudLinux 9 share the same source, and CloudLinux 9 even uses the same kernel as AlmaLinux 9, so no additional resources should be required. Therefore, not supporting CloudLinux 9 in this case seems unreasonable.

I understand the need to limit support to enhance user experience and support quality, but in this situation, I think it is an error.

I also notice that support is provided for outdated operating systems. Perhaps prioritizing the removal of support for these obsolete systems could free up resources for your QA team and encourage clients to modernize their infrastructure with up-to-date systems.

[Gostev]

I never said we're going to remove AlmaLinux 9 support.

As mentioned, AlmaLinux 9 and CloudLinux 9 share the same source, and CloudLinux 9 even uses the same kernel as AlmaLinux 9, so no additional resources should be required. Therefore, not supporting CloudLinux 9 in this case seems unreasonable.

If they are truly so identical as you say, then why do you not simply use AlmaLinux 9 (which is fully supported by Veeam) and insists on using CloudLinux 9?

I also notice that support is provided for outdated operating systems. Perhaps prioritizing the removal of support for these obsolete systems could free up resources for your QA team and encourage clients to modernize their infrastructure with up-to-date systems.

We can only drop obsolete OS support in a major release (which we're definitely planning to do). We don't change system requirements within a major release (we can add but we never drop) because we always want all customers to be on the latest update for security considerations and maintaining system requirements intact is the prerequisite to this.

[arthesys87]

Code: Select all

 If they are truly so identical as you say, then why do you not use AlmaLinux 9 (which is fully supported by Veeam) and insists on using CloudLinux 9?

Simple, CloudLinux 9 is a commercial operating system with paid support and advanced features tailored for the web hosting market. AlmaLinux is free and support is provided by the community.

[Gostev]

Got it.

[webbytech]

Hello
If the Veeam team (@Gostev) or etc would like to evaluate it running on CloudLinux 9 I have it successfully running, just currently blocking updates from CloudLinux due to the workaround to make Veeam work.

If you wont support CloudLinux 9.x my other request that you turn backup OS Checks off so that the backups will function after the agent is installed and confirmed to be working

[Gostev]

More like "confirmed to be doing something and showing success"

The backup OS checks are there specifically to prevent users from using Veeam to protect untested OS, because we cannot know if it works reliably and will produce recoverable backups in the long term (including as the OS evolves and receives new updates, special components, different configuration settings for added security etc. This is why officially supporting any OS is an on-going QA commitment. As ultimately it will be Veeam reputation at stake when someone is unable to recover in future from your backups. For example, some years from now your successor at your company may not even know you chose to disable supported OS checks in 2024 and were running an unsupported configuration.

I don't know if Veeam will or will not support CloudLinux - as always it depends on this distro obtaining a meaningful market share to justify the on-going QA investment and this part is hard to predict.

[webbytech]

@Gostev - As a Veeam partner Im saddened to hear this. Perhaps Veeam should do some research. CloudLinux is widely used I the Data Center/Shared Hosting environment and is supported by cPanel which is the #1 hosting panel out there today. You already support AlmaLinux so supporting CloudLinux shouldn't be that hard because it's the same, AlmaLinux was created by the developers of CloudLinux as a drop in replacement of CentOS. CloudLinux is just their subscription based security tools and hosting management OS.

I can show it works as I have it backing up our load and have restored from it. Id be glad to provide a box for you to investigate.

How do we go about formally requesting CloudLinux to go through QA and be supported?

[Gostev]

You already did by posting it here

[webbytech]

@Gostev - Any progress on this? I have successfully been running Veeam on CloudLinux 9.4 for almost 2 months now without issue (It backs up and restores properly). The downside is, I have to keep modifying system files and rebooting to receive updates, and then change the files back to make Veeam work.

Is there a way I can open a line to Veeam to prove the stability of CloudLinux and Veeam so we can stop this madness of having to work around Veeams inherent block of CloudLinux?

[Gostev]

Hi, at this time we were not able to justify additional required QA investments based on the current CloudLinux market share and revenue opportunity for Veeam. If you have a sizeable deployment of CloudLinux, please reach out to your Veeam sales rep and they will track this opportunity internally in the dedicated system which is used for feature prioritization, which considers both the number of requests AND total revenue opportunity. Needless to say, the latter needs to be higher than on-going QA costs before we can consider official support. Thank you

[webbytech]

i’ll repeat again, cloud linux is rhel just like alma. you already support alma so there would be no difference in cloud linux support.

my guess is you haven’t even looked at cloud linux, perhaps i just find a different backup solution and start recommending it to users instead of veeam which is crazy considering i have been a long term veeam partner.

it’s also crazy that veeam is disabling install based on 2 lines of text, when it works flawlessly

[PTide]

Hi,

cloud linux is rhel just like alma

Agree. But I don't think that saying "hey, but webbytech told us it's just like alma!" will help us out if something breaks : )

That is, in order to verify and confirm that the other distro behaves as we expect it to in critical scenarios, we need to dedicate some resources.
And only after that we can take responsibility for announcing the distro as supported.

Thanks!