Highlights * Hardware enablement The release continues to enable new hardware from Red Hat partners, encompassing processors and chipsets launching in 2011, I/O (iSCSI & iSNS) and multimedia, combined with numerous driver updates. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6 provides updated installation media to allow easier installation on new OEM platforms using the newly enabled hardware. * Virtualization improvements Several virtualization feature updates are provided in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6. These include support for sVirt (SELinux virtualization), which enables Mandatory Access Control (MAC) profiles to be applied to virtual guests, enhancing overall system security. Additionally, new I/O fencing capabilities enable Red Hat Enterprise Linux virtual guests configured with the High Availability (HA) Add-On to be supported when layered on a Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization infrastructure. This provides customers with greater flexibility when deploying highly available virtualized and cloud computing environments. * Updated Domain Name Service (DNS) packages With updated DNS packages, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6 improves the cryptographic signatures that are valuable for high-security installations, such as in the government sector and environments where signed DNS domains are expanding in importance. * Expanded PHP web application stack support By incorporating the new PHP 5.3 release, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6 provides customers with the ability to utilize the latest PHP technology prior to upgrading to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6. * New printing capabilities Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6 provides support for new printing capabilities by supporting the OpenVector Printer driver and by including support for the latest models of printers from HP. * Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 backports Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6 includes a number of features that bring some improvements introduced with the release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 to 5.6. These include support for the Ext4 file system and incorporation of features, such as the System Security Services Daemon and gcc 4.4 compiler, that are compatible with the respective versions in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.