The National Library of Korea is the national representative library under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. Since its establishment in 1945, it has played a pivotal role in the intellectual and cultural development of the Republic of Korea by performing core functions such as collecting and permanently preserving domestic and international materials, compiling the national bibliography, training library professionals, and providing digital content services. Its affiliated institutions include the National Library for Children and Young Adults and the National Library of Korea, Sejong.
Today, NLK houses a vast collection of approximately 14 million items. Since the mid-2010s, it has been driving a large-scale digital transformation to strengthen its digital library systems. Ensuring the stable preservation and security of national knowledge resources within this environment has become one of its most critical challenges.
At-a-Glance
In the period of digital transition, the information systems of the National Library of Korea (NLK) were operating within a complex hybrid infrastructure consisting of a mixture of physical servers and cloud environments. Facing End of Support (EOS) for its core operating system, CentOS, the SUSE Multi-Linux solution achieved groundbreaking results, including over 60% reduction in infrastructure management costs and a 7.2 month payback period, all without requiring modifications to existing middleware or applications. With these results, NLK overcame the constraints of massive data volumes and aging OS environments, ensuring the stable preservation and continuous delivery of national knowledge and information resources.
Overcoming CentOS EOS in a complex hybrid environment
Following the migration of most workloads to virtual servers, the CentOS platform became dominant. When CentOS reached End-Of-Support (EOS), NLK procured SUSE Multi-Linux Support to ensure continued OS security until June 2028.
“The introduction of SUSE Multi-Linux Manager has increased the efficiency of Linux server management and enabled us to respond quickly to risks.”
Solving technical issues with SUSE solutions
The IT department at the National Library of Korea conducted a comparative review of various OS support alternatives to resolve technical issues—which exposed them to potential security threats and made the adoption of new technologies difficult. After comprehensively considering investment costs, service scope, and the availability of domestic reseller support, they determined that the comprehensive support offered by SUSE Multi-Linux Support and SUSE Multi-Linux Manager was the optimal choice.
SUSE Multi-Linux Support provided continuous security patching and enterprise-grade technical support for End-of-Life (EOL) CentOS versions at half the cost of alternative solutions. Crucially, it secured stability and guaranteed long-term support without requiring modification or enhancement to currently running middleware and applications, which allowed for flexible planning of future migration.
Lacking a Linux management platform, NLK also adopted SUSE Multi-Linux Manager to efficiently consolidate and manage over 235 instances in its on-premises environment. This enabled automated patch management, consistent policy enforcement and visibility within a complex environment.
The Project Officer at IT Infrastructure Division of NLK, states, “Considering the volume and importance of our data, and compatibility with aging middleware and applications, upgrading our current state with SUSE Multi-Linux Support was the optimal solution.”
The impact of SUSE solutions
The information systems of the National Library of Korea (NLK) have been operating in a complex hybrid environment based on CentOS infrastructure, but after adopting the SUSE Multi-Linux solution, it significantly enhanced the stability and efficiency of its IT infrastructure. The current infrastructure operates on an on-premises VMware virtualization environment with physical servers from Dell, Sun and HPE.
SUSE Multi-Linux Support is in its initial implementation phase, currently utilized for integrated management and operational automation of existing Linux-based business systems, system monitoring and executing workloads for internal testing.
Reduces operational costs by 60%
NLK also considered alternatives like Rocky Linux, but this would have required extensive modifications to middleware and existing applications, potentially leading to higher costs and longer timelines. In contrast, SUSE Multi-Linux Support secured stability at less than half the cost of other EOL support solutions, delivering measurable ROI with a 7.2-month payback period while minimizing additional development expenses.
All workloads previously running on CentOS remained fully compatible without requiring package changes. Simplified Linux server management enabled a significant reduction in overall system operation resources.
The Project Officer emphasizes, “SUSE Multi-Linux Support simplified management, reducing resource needs significantly.”
Delivers visibility into system performance and security
SUSE Multi-Linux Manager enhanced monitoring and issue detection capabilities across NLK’s entire infrastructure. It also provided real-time, centralized visibility into potential vulnerabilities that could arise from free OS-based middleware, reducing the time and effort required for deployment and inspection processes.
The Project Officer states, “The introduction of SUSE Multi-Linux Manager has increased the efficiency of Linux server management and enabled us to respond quickly to risks.”
Providing long-term, tailored support
“NLK must maintain stable CentOS-based operations while also building long-term capabilities in Linux expertise, security and compliance,” explained the Project Officer.
SUSE significantly improved NLK's operational efficiency through continuous technical support optimized for the customers’ needs. SUSE’s enterprise support includes providing essential security patches for CentOS systems in EOS status, a stable Long-Term Support (LTS) policy and expert technical consulting for future system migration and automation. This ensures the optimization and stability of the deployed solution, reduces operational costs and management burdens, and supports NLK's IT personnel in securing long-term operational and maintenance capabilities to maintain a high level of internal technical expertise.
What’s next?
SUSE Multi-Linux Support and SUSE Multi-Linux Manager provided the stability, security, and efficiency necessary for the National Library of Korea (NLK) to continue its digital infrastructure innovation for the future of knowledge and information.
SUSE anticipates that its stable Long-Term Support (LTS) policy and customized technical support will serve as a core foundation for flexibly addressing future challenges, including the establishment of new systems, migration, and automation. Based on the trust built by successfully resolving the challenge of the CentOS End-of-Support, SUSE plans to further strengthen its partnership and continue digital infrastructure innovation in the future.