CentOS 5.9 has been released. Here the announcement:

We are pleased to announce the immediate availability of CentOS-5.9 for
i386 and x86_64 Architectures.

CentOS-5.9 is based on the upstream release EL 5.9 and includes
packages from all variants including Server and Client. All upstream
repositories have been combined into one, to make it easier for end
users to work with.

This is just an announcement email, not the release notes. The Release
Notes for CentOS-5.9 can be found on-line at :
http://wiki.centos.org/Manuals/ReleaseNotes/CentOS5.9 and everyone is
encouraged to look through them once. Also worth browsing through are
the CentOS FAQs at http://wiki.centos.org/FAQ

+++++++++++++++++++++++
Upgrading from CentOS-5.8 ( or any older CentOS-5 release ):

If you are already running CentOS-5.8 or an older CentOS-5 distro, all
you need to do is update your machine via yum by running :

'yum update'

Running 'yum list updates' before doing the update is recommended, so
you can get a list of packages that are going to be updated. To check
you are indeed on CentOS-5.9, run : 'rpm -q centos-release' and that
should return: 'centos-release-5-9.el5.centos.1'

If you are running CentOS-5.8 and have the CR repo enabled, a simple
'yum update' will still move your machine to 5.9. But since the CR repo
already contained all the 5.9 updates, there will only be a handful of
rpms that need to be installed for the 5.8 to 5.9 upgrade. If you are
not running the CR repo, we highly encourage everyone to install and run
this repository on their machines. More details on the CR repo can be
found online at http://wiki.centos.org/AdditionalResources/Repositories/CR

+++++++++++++++++++++++
Downloading CentOS-5.9 for new installs:

When possible, consider using torrents to run the downloads. Not only
does it help the community and keeps mirrors from running up high
bandwidth bills, in most cases you will find its also the fastest means
to download the distro. There are currently over a hundred people
seeding CentOS-5 and it's possible to get upto 100mbps downloads via
these torrents.

Via BitTorrent :
CD:
http://mirror.centos.org/centos/5.9/isos/i386/CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-1to8.torrent
http://mirror.centos.org/centos/5.9/isos/x86_64/CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-1to9.torrent

DVD:
http://mirror.centos.org/centos/5.9/isos/i386/CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-DVD.torrent
http://mirror.centos.org/centos/5.9/isos/x86_64/CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-DVD.torrent

md5sum's for these torrent files:
9dede6aef0b2724089a249021de35ea6 CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-1to8.torrent
4aa13343d33db778b9472f8168aa300e CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-1to9.torrent
b550bd14a993c9801e18a9b320966cba CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-DVD.torrent
b00041071a12f3e4377ad2bae0a3d51a CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-DVD.torrent


sha1sum's for these torrent files:
765b578facd7da42704ccd37ef4e498d40376785 CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-1to8.torrent
3f750a2c780aff30c982358c8727ec4a540389ef CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-1to9.torrent
d2bd38a60ea03a4370bbbd91b4e909a48c89835b CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-DVD.torrent
11326c888ad0290f5ccc7d4e26c2540438f56c35 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-DVD.torrent


While torrent files will do their own content checks, and only the right
torrent will register and download from torrent.centos.org - its very
important for your own security that an md5/sha1sum check is done on the
.torrent file itself, and ensure that only the torrent.centos.org
tracker is being used. Sha1sum's are more secure than md5's. Whenever
possible, use sha1sum's instead of md5.

We now have native ipv6 torrent capability as well, if you have an ipv6
network, please give that a try. These torrent files have been setup
to attempt both ipv4 and ipv6 trackers.

- -- Via direct download:
Due to bandwidth considerations the CentOS Project does not publish ISOs
directly from our network machines. However direct downloads are
available from external mirrors over http, ftp and rsync. A geoip
based list is available at http://isoredirect.centos.org/centos/5/isos/
to give you the best predictable match ( and only lists mirrors that are
updated already, so you don't need to waste time looking for a sync'd
mirror )

Some mirrors also publish DVD images that can be downloaded directly.
Refer to the mirrors list page at http://www.centos.org/mirrors for more
details Mirrors that offer DVDs are clearly marked on the page.

+++++++++++++++++++++++
sha1sum for these ISOS:

i386:
b2c69ce018af739b2b47c4654409baaa046b8cba CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-1of8.iso
1d7335f99442c51e9d88ee13a375811f73a1e2bf CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-2of8.iso
4c3a2cfa69be55ff9fed1d12266ac6ca8ab5b42c CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-3of8.iso
a405498a0f7018e6636b85669d6e4f17b1d56752 CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-4of8.iso
6105288bc0250b52419c4e18c8827b06692a2d27 CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-5of8.iso
7f088afa2830a63f19b639fcaf38f25e7b99be2a CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-6of8.iso
8918bc15e1df5eaf2cd45acea6c3eb7b054cf394 CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-7of8.iso
26c0025982bcb160727569c2a4bdef97cd68c87d CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-8of8.iso
78f976b190ce44716eb672f71203df978474dfb4 CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-DVD-1of2.iso
ebf065a98b59cf59d43503a0e0dcc4aec5f68cae CentOS-5.9-i386-bin-DVD-2of2.iso
6a168565584972f2491959c22528ae6c34629e76 CentOS-5.9-i386-netinstall.iso


x86_64:
e5a0577ab9df5668b68094479b893095e12d1b81 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-1of9.iso
3add747ab3e9d6795b13c701dd59014401a94cee CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-2of9.iso
4f3c4ebf4d69d8bf5db100cc3364923d9df1a0b5 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-3of9.iso
d17fe2d84556349373ab1342ced0c3e5a9ed465e CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-4of9.iso
c6b30bb6ef7e0e6d9661f9aaef7b39418d16797a CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-5of9.iso
dc65e64eae9b7f18cbd48099c751628d84819da1 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-6of9.iso
08734fbddbb8f333cc5a006d6b707edbcb4d1f42 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-7of9.iso
51f7dcf07a981f2127761cb4c683227146c313e7 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-8of9.iso
9a513ac462d60597dc4b969f14a9a44c19a15839 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-9of9.iso
c12e01b546f00a965b8414abf0860b08d0bba3c9 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-DVD-1of2.iso
67636b62b95fa15e7d565fb01d5b382b66bfd80e CentOS-5.9-x86_64-bin-DVD-2of2.iso
fa90a5b066f0e8918c9b9b3a18637051da4e3434 CentOS-5.9-x86_64-netinstall.iso


+++++++++++++++++++++++
Note about media:

There has been a change in the number of disks needed for CD and DVD
media. Refer to the Release Notes for more information on how this might
impact your install.


+++++++++++++++++++++++
Getting Help:

The best place to start when looking for help with CentOS is at the wiki
( http://wiki.centos.org/GettingHelp ) which lists various options and
communities who might be able to help. If you think there is a bug in
the system, do report it at http://bugs.centos.org/ - but keep in mind
that the bugs system is *not* a support mechanism.

Some Friendly URLs :
http://www.centos.org/
http://wiki.centos.org/
http://lists.centos.org/
http://bugs.centos.org/
irc://#centos@irc.freenode.net


+++++++++++++++++++++++
A big thanks to everyone who contributed towards this release, including
the translation teams, the qa team, the artwork team, the CentOS
Developers and all the users out there.

Enjoy!

  CentOS 5.9 released