Freddie Kavanagh, Novell’s chief technology officer for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, gave attendees an update on the progress of Open Enterprise Server and Novell Linux Desktop, the two major products intended to bring together Novell’s legacy customers with technology acquired from Ximian and SuSE. Both are expected by the end of this year, although Novell expects OES to make more of an immediate impact than the desktop.
Novell Releases Updated SuSE Linux
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
“Ximian graphical enviroment”
Well so much for KDE..
Well so much for KDE..
Uh, if you had read previous news postings you would realise that KDE is still supported as well as Gnome. I admit that although they claim to be supporting them equally, they’ve obviously put more money into GNOME. I imagine because it’s more enterprise friendly (licensing, Accessibility, etc.)
“The desktop will use tools from SuSE such as the YaST configuration manager and Ximian’s graphical environment, and will be tuned to work with Novell’s OES platform, Kavanagh said.”
Er…? Novell really has to come out and CLEARLY state what their strategy is.
So is NLD going to be Gnome-centric and SUSE continue to be KDE-centric?
“Ximian graphical enviroment”
So Ximian Graphical Environment means Ximian Desktop 3 now? Well, you’ve got much better eyesight than I have that’s for sure
. They’ve obviously kept Ximian Desktop 3 (now known as vanilla Gnome 
) an incredible secret 
:
Version 9.2 offers some enhancements to the 2.6 kernel, the KDE 3.3 and GNOME 2.6 desktop environments…
You people make me laugh, you really do.
Novell’s spokespeople are so screwed up they don’t know what on Earth they’re saying half the time. They’re getting fed press releases from Suse as well as the Ximian people and they’ve simply tried to glue them together.
I admit that although they claim to be supporting them equally, they’ve obviously put more money into GNOME.
Yes, they quite obviously have put more money into Gnome – and got bugger all in return. Neither did Ximian or Eazel or any of their investors, come to think of it:
“We’re making a very nice profit with SuSE Linux Professional,” he said. “We’re selling about 200,000 units worldwide every six months, primarily in Germany, the U.S. and the U.K. With [Version 9.2], we’re re-entering the French market.”
This is about Suse Linux, primarily based on KDE and the work done with KDE by Suse.
Novell’s chief rival in the enterprise Linux space, Red Hat Inc., abandoned its consumer Linux distribution in April. Michael Tiemann, vice president of open-source affairs at Red Hat, subsequently explained that “the retail model wasn’t working for us.”
This is about Red Hat Linux, primarily based on Gnome and the work done with Gnome by Red Hat – now defunct.
Now. If I had some money to invest, what desktop would I invest it in? It’s a difficult one…..
Novell really has to come out and CLEARLY state what their strategy is.
They have already. Don’t believe press releases from spokespeople. They’re glued together at the last minute and never make sense – the press releases, not the spokespeople that is
.
So is NLD going to be Gnome-centric and SUSE continue to be KDE-centric?
They’ve publicly stated that NLD will support and give a choice of KDE or Gnome. However, Chris Schlaeger also hinted in his interview that they may make a choice later depending on how popular either desktop is with people and enterprises (i.e. not OSNews posters
):
We are working on our next generation Enterprise Desktop currently called Novell Linux Desktop which will feature a KDE desktop as well as a GNOME desktop. In the enterprise market the situation is still very open regarding which desktop will have the greater following. For a Linux provider like Novell it is a great opportunity to offer both desktops to our customers and see where the market is going.
Jack Messman, Chris Stone and even Miguel de Icaza has said they will support both. How long is anyone’s guess, but we can enjoy the ride. That’s if it actually goes anywhere.
The “choice” argument is crap, it just goes to show that internal politics between Ximian and Suse have not been sorted out.
First, there are already dozens (literally) of stable distros that go the “kitchen sink” route, some with corporate backing (ClubMandrake etc). To offer another one is pointless.
New CIOs evaluating linux will not know KDE from GNOME from a hole in the ground. They will be evaluating how fast these things can get people working in an environment that is close enough to Windows to minimize training costs. They want something that just works…believe it or not there are people who do not obsess over issues like KHTML v Gecko…nor do they want their admins obsessing over this either. No CIO is interested in seeing sysadmin time get flushed down the toilet tweaking everyone’s desktop du jour. They might as well stay with Windows in this case.
Novell should present a desktop that offers the core apps people want with serious standardization and minimal room for error. Red Hat is much smarter in this sense, they were right to boot KDE. I am not saying GNOME is better, but you have to make a choice.
Now I will get flamed by the “choice advocates”. Understand that I am saying that if you want total flexibility, run Debian or another system that actually supports this mentality in a coherent fashion. For Novell going down this road is suicide, their product will go nowhere.
This isn’t about choice anyway, its about who wags a bigger dick in Novell’s HQ: the Ximian guys or the Suse guys. Once that contest has been decided you will definitely see the distro “pick” an environment.
From what I understand, Novell will ship the desktop with KDE and GNOME then let the customer decide what they wish to standardise their enterprise on.
The fact is, one enterprise may say, “no problems, we prefer KDE, there for that is what we will standardise right throughout out organisation” and another will choose GNOME; Novell is simply being pragmatic, give the customer a choice and allow the customer to decide what is best for their organisation rather than ramming a particular “road map” down the throats of the customers.
I for one applaud that move, however, what I would love to see, however, is SUN purchase Trolltech, invest $200million into qt, get qt C++/C/Java/Python bindings all working, allow free usage for commercial development, and create a RAD IDE around qt so that applications can be easily created via drag and drop with minimal code typing.
Sun is now allied with microsoft, they dropped their lawsuits against microsoft so that M$ can let Sun breath and exist.
Sun is now aiming at Linux by open sourcing their own OS and being available on x86 architecture.
I don’t get it. People were not very pleased with the IP action of SCO vs. Linux users, but they still flame Novell for putting KDE on a second level. SCO being a major investor in QT makes me for one choose against applications and environments that use the (great) QT toolset.
SCO is not a major investor in Trolltech. The majority of Trolltech belongs to the Trolltech employees.
In point of fact, SCO has no investment in Trolltech at all. Trolltech is majority owned by the employees, with a small amount (8%?) owned by the Canopy group, who incidentally have put money into SCO, too. They’re tech investors. I can’t say I like Canopy that much, although there is plenty of rumour surrounding them.
But they have no power to control Trolltech, and the Trolls make a great product.
Oh, and just to repeat what I’ve said many times before:
The only thing the QT licencing prevents you from doing is producing low-market shareware. It’s great for *everyone* else.
And yeah, Novell have very clearly spoken on this topic in the past. No matter what the Gnome-fans would like to believe. They purchased SuSE, and want to keep both desktop environments. They picked up Ximian for Red Carpet and help in improving the Gnome in SuSE to bring it up to the standard of their KDE.
They want a balanced product that appeals to all the market.
They purchased SuSE in the first place because of their tools (mainly QT-based) and their distro’s market share (mostly KDE users). They don’t want to write off that investment; they want to expand their market share! You don’t do that by pissing off all your current large user base by going Gnome-only and making your distro a clone of Red Hat. That’s the only sure-fire way to ruin your market share, and Novell/SuSE aren’t that dumb.
Too bad the exchange connector *requires* webdav to be running on the exchange server. A wise move would be to remove this requirement.
Ludovic
—
http://perso.hirlimann.net/~ludo/blog/
Too bad the exchange connector *requires* webdav to be running on the exchange server. A wise move would be to remove this requirement.
—
exactly how?. the exchange protocol is completely proprietary, webdav is open standard
Why all the negative comments?
If I had to dream up the perfect setup for a corporate network wide install of Linux.. IF I got my way and everything worked the way I wanted it to.. it would be like this.
Domain wide logins with roaming profiles, easy setup of printers, nearly transparent (to the user) network storage. (Netware 7?) Simple to backup and even restore. support logon scripts based by entire groups.
Client systems would all be Linux they would be based on either SuSE of Debian and they could easily be “ghosted” on any client machine from a floppy or cd, and autotune themselves for the hardware upon first boot.. Easy to backup, update and manage. Since I’m dreaming they would also share computing recourses (OpenMosix)
The Desktop would be a Ximi’nized version of Gnome 2.8 With Ximian’s OpenOffice. Nautilus would be able to browse Netware volumes based on the users logon credentuals automatacaly. There would be an automatic ?Jabber messenger (Gaim or Gossip + Netware) and autosort the users into groups provided by the domain, at any time you could see schedules for others in your workgroup by right clicking on there name, and e-mail, IM, chat or send a file to them.. You could also browse other departments based on ACL’s That messenger would also sync with Evolution. The only webbrowser would be Galleon with a Squid proxy. They would also be totally impervious to all spyware and virus programs. Users would have no control of the underlying system and they would not be able to install any software.
For the real work.. I would use Web Services, most likley Java Server Pages for database access.. depending on what they do of course. (currently I work in a school, so that would be all the faculty would need..)
And that would just about be my network.. This Novell Linux Desktop looks like its headed in that direction, so I’m excited about it, I cant wait to see how close it comes..
>> The fact is, one enterprise may say, “no problems, we prefer KDE, there for that is what we will standardise right throughout out organisation” and another will choose GNOME
arrrggghhh, how many times does it have to be said? these people have never heard of KDE or GNOME. they want something to replace windows quickly and cheaply.
any CIO who understands the difference between KDE and GNOME is an enthusiastic follower of the field who likely already tried a linux migration with a choice-oriented distro.
if i were doing venture capital for any of these firms, i would hit the little button that triggers the trap door in the floor under the presenter as soon as they mentioned “choosing between KDE and GNOME”…for a business oriented distro this is a non-starter folks! enough with “discussing” this topic, anyone who thinks you throw two entirely distinct desktop environments at a CIO who is migrating from Windows is JUST WRONG, no debate, no counterargs.
System admins who aren’t able to decide which desktop to use (ideally after looking at the used technologies) shouldn’t be allowed to admin any systems at all.
Let the clueless management “decide” for Novell Desktop and then let the more informed (since they actually have to work with it) IT staff make the choice between GNOME and KDE offered by Novell Desktop upfront. Sounds perfect to me.
Switching from Windows to Gnome or Windows to KDE. What the hell is so hard about that? We’re always hearing how it going to cost millions to train somebody how to use this desktop or that desktop…what are we talking small children here? It’s one thing if Bob at Bob’s Seed and Feed can’t figur it out, butanybody who would them call themself a “professional” or “corporate” shouldn’t take long to familiarize themself with either of these. It’s not that friggin’ hard.
There is a different between something being announced and it being released…. I mean why don’t you create a story that says Duke Nukem Forever Released, if you cannot tell the difference?
No more fake news please.
Sys admins can choose the desktop they want to use on their personal machines, but they have no business choosing what anyone else uses. The people absorbing the cost of providing and maintaining the desktops — of which those sys admins are a substantial chunk — get to make that call. The sys admins should be asked for input, but technical issues are usually not primary in deciding what software to roll out.
[QUOTE]>> The fact is, one enterprise may say, “no problems, we prefer KDE, there for that is what we will standardise right throughout out organisation” and another will choose GNOME
arrrggghhh, how many times does it have to be said? these people have never heard of KDE or GNOME. they want something to replace windows quickly and cheaply. [/QUOTE]
Not really, i think people seek for innovating solutions which doesn’t come the hard way.The choice between KDE and GNOME is merely one of cult.I sincerly hope to have the choice of choosing multiple dm’s for a long time.
>> Let the clueless management “decide” for Novell Desktop and then let the more informed (since they actually have to work with it) IT staff make the choice between GNOME and KDE
uh-huh, so now the sysadmins are making a desktop integration decision for an entire company. BZZZZZZT.
they’ll be back on Windows in thirty days or less after people get tired of sysadmins playing around with the package du jour. this is like having a meter maid design a road network. no, they just police it.
i give up, the osnews crowd is going to go to its grave thinking the receptionist at FooBar inc really wants to evaluate the merits of IceWM, BlackBox, AfterStep and GNOME.
>>”…the osnews crowd is going to go to its grave thinking the receptionist at FooBar inc really wants to evaluate the merits of IceWM, BlackBox, AfterStep and GNOME.”
People keep pushing something that is free and, they claim, better than Windows.
If that something costs nothing and really is better than what you’re using now, why are people still using Windows?
To avoid thinking about that, they make up conspiracy theories and indulge in demeaning slander of users.
any company which would consider moving to a new operating system without even bothering to do enough basic research to find out about KDE and GNOME (it took me all of half an hour the first time I tried Linux) is not a company on whose survival I would bet a small tin of beans.
voice over IP is clearly the future of telephony. It beats current telephony systems in every single respect, including price, already.
why, then, does the whole world not already use voice over IP telephony? my statement above must not be true!
do you see where I’m going with this?
Nope, I don’t see where you’re going.
Here are three reasons why VOIP that explain why I don’t use it:
1. It doesn’t work when my ISP is down. OTOH, I can’t recall the last time the phone company had an outage.
2. No 911 service.
3. VOIP costs more than what I am currently paying for phone service.
So, whether or not VOIP is technically superior to good ol’ POTS is not important to me. POTS meets my needs. Any technical superiority or elegance in excess of what meets my needs represents something that I do not need to pay for.
That’s the way many perople — especially businesses and large organizations — have to look at IT xpending. Arguments that Linux or KDE or Gnome or whatever are technically superior to Windows are not important if Windows is already in place and meeting their needs. That approach is tantamount to arguing that a corporation should replace its fleet of 3-year old Ford vans woth Lexus SUV’s because the Lexus is a technically superior vehicle.
Many reasons exist to use Linux. For an individual, like me, technical superiority is a factor. But, that’s not the case with organizations and businesses.
To really make inroads against Windows, Linux needs to offer capabilities that people want and that Windows does not supply. Otherwise, Linux is just playing at the margins by following trying to beat MS at it’s own game.
[QUOTE]Version 9.2 offers some enhancements to the 2.6 kernel, the KDE 3.3 and GNOME 2.6 desktop environments…[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE]You people make me laugh, you really do.[/QUOTE]
What’s there to laugh about? Suse will at least include gnome 2.6 and kde3.3.Allthough i love to use fvwm2 and kde.
De Facto,they included the YAST source of both kde3.3 and gnome2.6 in the directory supplementary/.. of the major SuSE mirrors.Add the additional installation source and
you are just a few minutes away ( depending on your bandwith)of an kde3.3+gnome2.6 update without the dependency hell and ,YAST is better integrated in SuSE then apt for SuSE is.I wouldn’t install YAST on my debian PC either 🙂