Network software maker Novell continued its move into the Linux market with the release on Tuesday of its first Linux-based desktop services package.
Novell Moving Deeper into Linux
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Novell has finished a port of eDirectory for HP-UX! Seems like things are looking up for NDS/eDirectory once again.
I don’t know whether I understood everything written in the ‘continued’ link. But there is an interesting sentence (snipplet) that I like to quote: ‘rival Red Hat’. How can Novell see them as rivals ?
Look SuSE vs. Red Hat can be seen as ‘rivals’ two different Distributions. Novell bought SuSE thus it can be seen as Novell vs. Red Hat now. But the curious thing is that the so called rivals Novell as well as Red Hat are working for the same Desktop.
Doesn’t this throw stones in their ways ? I mean as soon as Novell contributes to GNOME and Red Hat does the same as soon they start contributing each rival. Pirelli and Michelin would sit on the same table and handing over their Top Secret tire formula to each other.
Rivals does not allways mean they are enemys, more like friendly competition, like two football teams, they don’t want to kill eathother, just to use eachother to sharpen their skills. healthy competition is a good thing…
What does this mean to us that use the SuSE distro???
Shall we move on to another… “Slack” maybe, or “BSD”?
Anyone.
Why immediatly jump ship just because a company bought SuSe? I mean really, at least give Novell a chance first before running away.
The article was posted by Cnet, not written by Novell…I don’t think Novell views RH as an adversary…Novell really won’t make much money on selling linux, plain and simple…they want the service contract of the linux installs and they want you (given user or company) to use their management software.
I think Novell won’t mind if a customer of theirs wanted RN on their systems. They’ll give them RH and pick up the service contract and throw RH a few bones as well.
SuSE give Novell a bigger, more resounding presence in Europe…they made a big investiment in a big Linux player in the EU to show EU businesses they mean business and want to work in the EU long term. They also acquired some excellent linux development experience which will aid future development of their Linux software platform.
But RH is no adversary of theirs…if anything, a partner. The more widely linux is deployed the more Novell’s products and services will be in demand. On the other hand, the strong presence Novell’s products (software and services) will help push linux further into the enterprise market, meaning more linux sales for RH.
Now I know Novell will probably sell SuSE first to their own principal customers but some customers are going to want RH anyhow, and then there is all the secondary business, Dell and other computer vendors may select to ship RH; IBM ships both RH and SuSE on many servers. HP is getting more and more cosy with debian. From the perspective of Novell future core business, management software and support, it’s all fish in a barrel when comes to the distro running underneath their products. Of course, their are limitations to how many distro’s Novell can support so I think fair to assume they will actively and dogmatically support SuSE (their own blood) and RH at a minimum, with debian as a likely third in the future (possibly in a coordinated release with HP and/or others).
I actually see Novell (along w/ SuSE) and RH getting very cosy in the near future.
IMHO Novell acquired SuSE so that they could have a Linux Kernel and Distribution upon which they can certify Netware 7.0, which is intended to have the traditional Netware services (edirectory, file&print etc) available on both the Netware kernel and Linux, I guess with the ultimate aim of dropping the netware kernel (in Netware 8.0 maybe?).
They will still certify their product on the other major distributions, but they need to bundle their own Linux when they sell someone “Netware”. It would look pretty bad if they had to say. “Right – you’ve just spent $50000 on these network services, now go and download Debian or something”. It needs to work out of the box without additional software required. Likewise, Ximian was purchased for Red Carpet.
The desktop capabilities they have acquired are just a side effect of achieving their server strategy. What this really means for the ongoing evolution (no pun intended) of the desktop attributes from SuSE and Ximian are anyone’s guess at this point, but I suspect it will come to languish after a while.
I am far more interested in what Novell will do for the Linux desktop.
A Netware client (or I guess an eDirectory client is the new lingo) for multiple platforms (Win, Mac and Linux) that doesn’t require excessive hacks on the desktop PCs, especially that can support centralized configuration management would be a big win.
Novell have been transitioning away from providing any client at all since the release of the Native File Access Pack. The server just pretends to be whatever the client wants: NT, Netware, Macintosh, *nix. Even Zenworks can be deployed without an agent by using the “middle-tier” server for application delivery.
Of course, at this point admin workstations still need the full blown client, but they are trying hard with things like iManager and RemoteManager to eliminate even this requirement (they’ve got a long way to go yet IMO)
Novell in the past has NEVER given the slightest bit of attention to the desktop market. The Linux crowd thinking this is a great thing for desktop Linux need only look at the past. Look at the other great programs Novell have bought in the past…. ALL of them have failed horribly after a Novell purchase. Can someone name a single one that didn’t?
Novell has ALWAYS put an incredible emphasis on desktops: after all, their whole philosophy has always been to help manage the desktops, along with the network. The idea behind NAL (Novell Application Launcher) and after that, the much more advanced ZENworks, was to simplify desktop management. You login at any computer, and voila’, your applications and settings move with you. And if you have a problem, ZENworks can fix missing DLLs automatically or you can have a remote access (much like Tivoli, but with more features) to your desktop.
All the application and desktop settings (including all the necessary and user-customized registry keys) are stored in the NDS (eDirectory) for easier, top-down hierarchical administration on a business unit, group or individual basis.
iFolder and iPrint are just the icing on the sweet cake.
Ximian, which is novell owned just hired Robert Love, a well known kernel hacker to help with kernel – desktop integration.
http://www.gnome.org/~jdub/blog//1071415406
http://www.advogato.org/person/rml/diary.html?start=44