Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server RHEL 8 Update Version 8.1 / 8.1.1

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.1 introduces new application streams, security tools like `fapolicyd` and `udica`, kernel live patching, FRR routing, and major storage, identity, and virtualization enhancements. It also documents known issues, deprecations, and the RHEL 8.1.1 quarterly content update.

• New security tooling: udica for generating SELinux container policies and fapolicyd for application whitelisting/blacklisting.
• OpenSCAP and scap-security-guide now support SCAP 1.3; OpenSCAP reports are improved.
• OpenSSH 8.0p1 includes fixes for CVE-2019-6111, CVE-2018-20685, and CVE-2019-6109 and increases the default RSA key size to 3072 bits.
• Kernel live patching (kpatch) is available to consume Critical and Important CVE fixes without rebooting.
• SELinux policy updates add confinement for boltd, a new bpf policy class, and fixes for several SELinux access-control issues.
• Security hardening updates include rngd running without root privileges, libssh using system-wide crypto-policies, and additional glibc malloc corruption checks.
• IBM Z system boot signature verification is supported with Secure Boot on z15.

• Installer fixes for Kickstart, image building, rescue mode, repository handling, and root password changes.
• Networking and routing fixes including PMTU discovery for VXLAN/GENEVE, improved ipset behavior, and better PTP accuracy.
• Kernel and kdump fixes for early kdump, SME/SEV vmcore capture, debugfs access, and crash-kernel memory handling.
• Identity Management fixes for FIPS mode, expired certificates, Samba integration, and SSSD timeout and group-membership behavior.
• Virtualization fixes for nested virtualization, PCI hot-plug, cloud-init provisioning, and VM boot/display issues.
• Storage and filesystem fixes including LUKS2 online re-encryption, VDO deduplication portability, and ext4 support updates.

• New module streams: postgresql:12, php:7.3, ruby:2.6, nodejs:12, and nginx:1.16.
• GCC Toolset 9 is introduced, along with updated LLVM, Rust, Go, SystemTap, Dyninst, and Valgrind/DHAT tooling.
• FRRouting (FRR) replaces Quagga as the routing protocol stack.
• New IdM capabilities include Healthcheck, Ansible roles/modules, CRL master commands, and support for Windows Server 2019 trusts.
• RHEL system roles gain a new storage role; postfix and SAP roles are available as Technology Preview.
• Web console improvements include SMT controls, firewall zones, service search, and expanded VM management.
• Rootless containers and the toolbox utility are fully supported; podman is upgraded to 1.4.2.

• Wayland has limitations in RHEL 8.1, including no multi-GPU support, no X11 utilities like xrandr, and reduced support for some legacy apps.
• Several installer and Kickstart scenarios are known to fail or require workarounds, including auth/authconfig, reboot --kexec, and self-signed HTTPS sources.
• SELinux disablement via /etc/selinux/config is unreliable; use selinux=0 on the kernel command line if full disablement is required.
• Some crypto and TLS scenarios are limited in FIPS mode, including TLS 1.3 in NSS and certain PKCS#11/OpenSSL cases.
• Virtualization issues remain for some Hyper-V, VMware, Azure, and POWER guest scenarios.
• OpenSCAP and SCAP remediation have several limitations, including offline VM/container scanning and some remediation ordering problems.

• RHEL 8.1 is distributed with kernel 4.18.0-147.
• To install new module streams, use yum module install <stream>; examples include php:7.3, ruby:2.6, nodejs:12, and postgresql:12.
• For in-place upgrades from RHEL 7, supported architectures include 64-bit ARM, IBM POWER little endian, and IBM Z.
• The dnf-utils package has been renamed to yum-utils for compatibility.
• Network scripts are deprecated; ifup/ifdown now rely on NetworkManager.
• TLS 1.0 and TLS 1.1 are deprecated; use update-crypto-policies --set LEGACY only when required.
• The podman-machine command is unsupported; use Podman directly from the command line.

• RHEL 8.1 release notes
  https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/8/html/8.1_release_notes/

Product Information

Vendor: Red Hat

Product: Enterprise Linux Server

Product type: Software

Application category: Utilities

Platform: Linux

Variant: RHEL 8

Version: 8.1 / 8.1.1

Vendor release date: Nov 5, 2019

Original release notes: View on vendor site

Published on updatealert.io: Aug 8, 2026