OpenSUSE Leap Offers SUSE Fans a New Open Source OS

Fans of SUSE Linux Enterprise, the Linux-based open source operating system, have a new option for obtaining a community-supported derivative of the OS in the form of OpenSUSE Leap, which debuted this month.

SUSE Linux Enterprise, or SLE, is a commercial Linux distribution designed — as its name implies — for enterprise use. OpenSUSE has long been available as a community-based alternative to SLE, but previous versions of OpenSUSE diverge substantially from SLE.

OpenSUSE Leap is a new Linux distribution that will be based more directly on SLE than previous versions of OpenSUSE were. It provides another option for the SUSE community, according to OpenSUSE developers, while also simplifying development and maintenance of the codebase.

“By basing openSUSE on SLE (SUSE Linux Enterprise), the core of Leap will be maintained by SUSE engineers,” OpenSUSE developers say. “That means it will get fixes and security updates from SLE.”

OpenSUSE Tumbleweed and OpenSUSE Factory, the other two major OpenSUSE versions, remain available. They include community-supported add-ons that expand on the SLE codebase at the core of OpenSUSE Leap.

The new Leap offering means the SUSE community now has an OS option equivalent to CentOS, the open source operating system that derives from Red Hat Enterprise Linux in the same way that OpenSUSE Leap derives from SLE.

Leap also diversifies the SUSE ecosystem by providing users with an additional community-supported option. That will likely appeal to Linux users who like Canonical‘s Ubuntu OS because of the many flavors in which it is available, as well as its robust line up of both enterprise- and community-focused editions.