"http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.4/docbookx.dtd">

<article>

    <articleinfo>

        <title>Welcome to CentOS =RELEASE=</title>

        <corpauthor>

        <ulink url="=URL=">

        <inlinemediaobject>

        <imageobject>

        fileref="/home/centos/artwork/trunk/Identity/Images/Brands/Logos/Black/78/centos.png" format="PNG" />

        </imageobject>

        </inlinemediaobject>

        </ulink>

        </corpauthor>

        <copyright>

            <year>=COPYRIGHT_YEAR_LAST=</year>

            <holder>The CentOS Project</holder>

        </copyright>

        <legalnotice>

        <para>

            CentOS =RELEASE= comes with no guarantees or warranties of

            any sorts, either written or implied.  The Distribution is

            released as 

            url="/usr/share/doc/centos-release-=MAJOR_RELEASE=/GPL">GPL</ulink>

            work.  Individual packages in the distribution come with

            their own licences.

        </para>

        </legalnotice>

    </articleinfo>

    <sect1>

    <title>What is CentOS?</title>

    <para>

        <ulink url="=URL=">CentOS</ulink> 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.)

    </para>

    <para>

        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.

    </para>

    </sect1>

    <sect1>

    <title>Advantages</title>

    <para>

        CentOS has numerous advantages including: an active and

        growing user community, quickly rebuilt, tested, and QA'ed

        errata packages, an extensive 

        url="=URL=modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=15">mirror

        network</ulink>, developers who are contactable and responsive

        reliable Enterprise Linux class distribution, multiple free

        support avenues.

    </para>

    </sect1>

    <sect1>

    <title>Support</title>

    <para>

        The following free support avenues are available:

    </para>

    <itemizedlist>

    <listitem>

    <para>

        <ulink url="=URL=">The CentOS Website</ulink>

    </para>

    </listitem>

    <listitem>

    <para>

        <ulink url="=URL_WIKI=">The CentOS Wiki</ulink>

        (includes a dynamic 

        url="=URL_WIKI=FAQ">FAQ</ulink>)

    </para>

    </listitem>

    <listitem>

    <para>

        url="=URL=modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=8">The

        CentOS IRC Chat</ulink>

    </para>

    </listitem>

    <listitem>

    <para>

        <ulink url="=URL_LISTS=">The CentOS Mailing

        List</ulink>

    </para>

    </listitem>

    <listitem>

    <para>

        <ulink url="=URL_FORUMS=">The CentOS Forums</ulink>

    </para>

    </listitem>

    </itemizedlist>

    </sect1>

</article>