CentOS is an Enterprise-class Linux Distribution derived from sources freely provided to the public by a prominent North American Enterprise Linux vendor.

CentOS conforms fully with the upstream vendors redistribution policy and aims to be 100% binary compatible. (CentOS mainly changes packages to remove upstream vendor branding and artwork.) CentOS is free, however, we ask for a small contribution. CentOS is a project of the cAos Foundation.

CentOS is developed by a small but growing team of core developers. In turn the core developers are supported by an active user community including system administrators, network administrators, enterprise users, managers, core Linux contributors and Linux enthusiasts from around the world.

CentOS has numerous advantages over some of the other clone projects including: an active and growing user community, quickly rebuilt, tested, and QA'ed errata packages, an extensive mirror network, developers who are contactable and responsive, multiple free support avenues including IRC Chat, Mailing Lists, Forums, a dynamic FAQ. Commercial support is offered via a number of vendors.

CentOS exists to provide a free enterprise class computing platform to anyone who wishes to use it. CentOS 2 and 3 are fully compatible rebuilds of RHEL 2 and 3 respectively. CentOS 2 and 3 are reproduced from RHEL sources that are freely distributed by RedHat.

Redistributed packages and sources comply fully with RedHat's redistribution requirements. CentOS 2 and 3 are designed for people who need an enterprise class OS without the cost, support, certification, or brand name of RedHat.

Here are some key features of "CentOS Live CD":

· easy maintenance
· suitability for long term use in production environments
· friendly environment for users and package maintainers
· long-term support of the core
· active development
· community infrastructure
· open management
· open business model
· commercial support - offered by a partner vendor