Clear Linux OS

The American semi­con­duct­or man­u­fac­turer Intel holds around 80% of the global market share in computer mi­cro­pro­cessors and also produces various types of computer mi­cro­chips. The Clear Linux operating system, Intel’s flagship project, is optimised for this hardware. Intel first in­tro­duced this new Linux dis­tri­bu­tion at the OpenStack Summit in 2015. As part of the Linux family, Clear Linux OS is also an open source operating system. What sets it apart is that it has been specially designed for use with the cloud. However, the operating system now also offers an im­press­ive desktop en­vir­on­ment. This article provides a more detailed in­tro­duc­tion to Clear Linux and its features.

With the Clear Linux Project, the chip man­u­fac­turer Intel has launched an operating system that is light­weight, per­form­ant and secure. The Clear Linux cloud operating system has been optimised for use with Intel’s own pro­cessors and boasts par­tic­u­larly high per­form­ance when used with its hardware. This holds true for the entire stack: the platform, kernel, math libraries, frame­works, and runtime.

Clear Linux is a stateless system. User and system data are strictly separated. This makes it easier to install, configure, and update the data. One par­tic­u­larly important feature of the operating system is its flex­ib­il­ity. If needed, you can switch the in­stall­a­tion to a standard file system so that it works like a tra­di­tion­al operating system.

Another special feature of Clear Linux is that it has its own container format called ‘Clear Container’ which is based on Rocket and Docker. This format was developed around Intel Vir­tu­al­isa­tion Tech­no­logy and comes with its own security concept with isolation levels. Due to its increased isolation, it offers a level of security similar to that of a virtual machine. Clear Linux OS also offers the typical per­form­ance of a Linux container that boots up in a matter of minutes. If security is par­tic­u­larly important to you, we recommend checking out our article on Security-Enhanced Linux (SELinux).

Despite its numerous ad­vant­ages and virtually un­beat­able per­form­ance, not many users are familiar with Clear Linux, as is also the case with the basic Linux operating system.

Initially, Clear Linux OS was limited to cloud usage and only received further op­tim­isa­tion in security and per­form­ance. The operating system can now be used on desktops and boasts good usability and an at­tract­ive desktop en­vir­on­ment. Clear Linux features a cus­tom­ised version of GNOME, similar to Ubuntu 20.04. You can also customise the standard desktop.

High security and per­form­ance are present when using the desktop version which also offers at­tract­ive packages and window man­age­ment based on GNOME. However, in the future, Intel will once again be focusing on cloud and server op­tim­isa­tion and is reducing the amount of cus­tom­isa­tion that can be done to the interface. That said, the fully func­tion­al desktop will continue to exist thanks to a generic GNOME im­ple­ment­a­tion.

As pre­vi­ously mentioned, Clear Linux OS is char­ac­ter­ised by its high per­form­ance and lean yet secure container format. However, the operating system offers even more features:

• Kernel Direct Access (DAX): By using the kernel function, Intel minimises memory con­sump­tion for each container. The system does not load files into the memory but instead bypasses the page cache and performs read and write op­er­a­tions directly in the non-volatile memory.
• Function multi-ver­sion­ing compiler option: This feature ensures higher speeds for ap­plic­a­tions that are not optimised for multiple command sets.
• Mixer tool: This tool allows Intel to create cus­tom­ised versions of Clear Linux OS. The official Clear Linux team also uses this software to produce updates and releases. As a result, you can use different server functions of Clear Linux and of other dis­tri­bu­tions. The prices vary based on the level of cus­tom­isa­tion.
• Telemetry function: Using this function, Clear Linux auto­mat­ic­ally collects data about Common Vul­ner­ab­il­it­ies and Exposures (CVEs). Any personal in­form­a­tion and findings about you as a user are not recorded. This function enables de­velopers to identify security problems right away, even before they can affect users. It is an optional function and can be disabled.

There is a wide range of different Linux dis­tri­bu­tions available based on the Linux kernel that are perfectly adapted to a variety of re­quire­ments. Linux has been run as an open source project from the very beginning, so the source code for the kernel is freely available to all de­velopers.

Clear Linux is not a general purpose dis­tri­bu­tion since it is primarily designed for the cloud. There are also other dis­tri­bu­tions that are designed for cloud computing, such as Ubuntu, CentOS, and Oracle Linux. However, Clear Linux is primarily geared towards de­velopers and other IT pro­fes­sion­als.

Most Linux dis­tri­bu­tions manage and update data via a package system. Clear Linux OS also uses the popular RPM format for binary packages. However, Clear Linux groups packages in bundles for specific purposes that are updated together. This approach falls somewhere between tra­di­tion­al package man­age­ment and atomic updates. As a result, each automatic update creates a new version of the operating system. This process also involves the recently developed package manager swupd which is used for ver­sion­ing at the file level.

This brings us to the next dif­fer­ence between Clear Linux and other dis­tri­bu­tions. Each version and component of Clear Linux OS has a unique version number. The system only downloads the com­pon­ents that are actually required. This means that Clear Linux also performs better than other Linux dis­tri­bu­tions when updating the system. Ad­di­tion­ally, the detailed version iden­ti­fic­a­tion for all packages and bundles makes it possible for system ad­min­is­trat­ors to ac­cur­ately document and correct security fixes and tests.

In the following video titled ‘Why Clear Linux’, the man­u­fac­turer sum­mar­ises what makes this per­form­ant operating system stand out from the rest:

We have already gone over the unique features and ad­vant­ages of Clear Linux in detail: security, per­form­ance, and cus­tom­isa­tion. Below are some of the ad­vant­ages of the operating system:

• Fast updates: Clear Linux OS updates quite quickly and easily. Delta updates are pro­por­tion­al to the modi­fic­a­tion that was made. Operating system de­pend­en­cies are resolved during the update.
• Rolling release: Intel con­stantly updates Clear Linux and makes the latest version available for download on its website.
• Downloads: Clear Linux is an open source software and thus can be down­loaded free of charge. Intel also offers ad­di­tion­al software for the operating system for download on its store.
• Security: Through its mix of Clear Con­tain­ers and the telemetry function, Clear Linux offers excellent security.

Its dis­ad­vant­ages include:

• Neglects desktop usage: While Intel does provide a generic GNOME im­ple­ment­a­tion, it is no longer optimised.
• Op­tim­isa­tion for Linux: Clear Linux is es­pe­cially per­form­ant on Intel hardware. Some have cri­ti­cised its cus­tom­ised design stating that it is sig­ni­fic­antly worse when used with other hardware. However, these cri­ti­cisms do not hold much water now that a variety of tests have been conducted which show that Clear Linux performs sig­ni­fic­antly better than Ubuntu and Fedora on other devices.
• Chrome updates: In Clear Linux OS, this is not done auto­mat­ic­ally, as is the case with Ubuntu for example.