rpm-ostree
also: ostree
rpm-ostree is a hybrid package management and immutable operating system tool that combines RPM package management with OSTree's versioned filesystem approach, enabling atomic updates and easy rollback capabilities.
rpm-ostree merges two technologies: RPM (the traditional Red Hat package manager) and OSTree (a tool for managing versioned filesystem trees). It's primarily used in Fedora Silverblue, CentOS Stream, and RHEL to create immutable, container-like operating systems on traditional hardware.
The key benefit is atomic updates—the entire OS updates as a single unit, and if something breaks, you can instantly boot into the previous version without manual recovery. Instead of modifying packages in-place like traditional RPM, rpm-ostree composes a new OS image and checksum-validates every file.
Example: rpm-ostree upgrade downloads a complete new OS tree, verifies it, and sets it as the default boot target. If the update fails or causes problems, rpm-ostree rollback instantly switches back to the prior tree. You can also layer additional RPMs on top: rpm-ostree install vim creates a new tree with vim included.