Merge pull request #2523 from pranavkumar74980/release_1.7.1

changes for vllm to support on ubuntu 24.04

Merge pull request #2416 from sbasu96/release_1.7

Updated FreeIPA version for 1.7

Merge pull request #2396 from sbasu96/release_1.7

Updating documentation for 1.7_beta

Merge pull request #2316 from SanthoshT2001/release_1.6.1

Release 1.6.1 changes for libssl task removal

Merge pull request #2296 from abhishek-sa1/release_1.6

Proxy configuration fix

Merge pull request #2261 from Milisha-Gupta/release_1.6

Utility for adding kernel parameters to OS

Merge pull request #2246 from sbasu96/release_1.6

Release 1.6 Doc updates