Updated versions of various software are available through the Redhat “Software Collections” system.

This provides newer versions of many components than are available with the base OS.

Some packages available in Software Collections 1.2 include:

• Developer Toolset 3.0
  • gcc/g++/gfortran - GNU Compiler Collection - version 4.9.1
  • gdb - GNU Debugger - version 7.8
  • binutils - A GNU collection of binary utilities - version 2.24
  • elfutils A collection of utilities and DSOs to handle compiled objects - version 0.155
  • dwz - DWARF optimization and duplicate removal tool - version 0.11
  • systemtap - Programmable system-wide instrumentation system - version 2.5
  • valgrind - Tool for finding memory management bugs in programs - version 3.9
  • oprofile - System wide profiler - version 0.9.9
• devassistant - can help you with creating and setting up basic projects in various languages - version 0.9.1
• git - Fast Version Control System - version 1.9.4
• httpd - Apache HTTP Server - version 2.4.6
• maven - Java project management and project comprehension tool - version 3.0.5
• mongodb - High-performance, schema-free document-oriented database - version 2.4.9
• nginx - A high performance web server and reverse proxy server - version 1.6.1
• php - Scripting language for creating dynamic web sites - versions 5.4.16 and 5.5.6
• ruby - An interpreter of object-oriented scripting language - version 2.0.0
• ror - Ruby on Rails - version 4.0
• thermostat - A monitoring and serviceability tool for OpenJDK - version 1.0.4
• v8 - Google JavaScript Engine - version 3.14.5

And their Software Collections 2.0 contains further packages such as python 2.7 and 3.3

<note> At the time of writing, we are distributing the following components:

• python27
• python33
• git19
• gcc, c++, gfortran and gdb from devtoolset-3.

Software Collections may not be available on all systems - for example, those systems “frozen” on a particular OS release for collaboration compatibility. </note>

We are now importing any installed software collections into the environment modules system, so you can easily load or unload them, including in your login scripts.

Please consult our modules section for more information.

You can use the command scl to find out what is installed, or to enable a particular collection.

> scl -l
php54
python33

> scl enable [collection1,collection2] bash
e.g:
> scl enable php54 bash
> php --version
PHP 5.4.16 (cli) (built: Oct  9 2013 18:11:47) 
Copyright (c) 1997-2013 The PHP Group
Zend Engine v2.4.0, Copyright (c) 1998-2013 Zend Technologies

There's apparently no “official” way to do this, but a redhat blog touches on the subject here:

http://developerblog.redhat.com/2014/03/19/permanently-enable-a-software-collection/

(as noted above you can also use environment modules to achieve this).