blogs.computerworld.com— With its latest Linux release Novell, Novell has made Linux about as close to Windows as it can get. Whether that's a good thing or not, depends on where you're coming from.
Mar 24, 2009View in Crawl 4
Heh, it sounds more like an assimilation than a marriage :). Xandros' main selling point has always been easy integration into Windows networks, but for whatever reason they never got a lot of attention. Good luck Novell!
WTF? I have nothing against SUSE, but this article makes it sound like SUSE Enterprise contains technologies found nowhere else. SUSE Enterprise is released roughly every 3 years and thus it contains technologies developed in these 3 years since SUSE Enterprise 10 and pretty much all of it is FOSS. Distributions with a shorter release cycle have already adopted some of those features quite a while ago, incl. Novell's own "consumer Linux" openSUSE.Ubuntu ships with Mono by default. Every major Linux distribution with the exception of Fedora ships with Novell's OpenOffice (that includes Debian; Red Hat has its own OO fork that uses GCJ for the Java components). Networking with Windows is usually done through Samba components and SUSE is no different.Apart from very rare exceptions most Linux distros are not that unique. Some features may not be installed by default on one distro, but that feature is certainly at least in the repos (Mono is available for Fedora/Red Hat, just like JBoss is available for SUSE). Enterprise distros are usually not bought for their feature set. Debian has all of that for no cost. Enterprise distros are being bought for the support the distributor offers.I have no idea how Novell's enterprise support actually is compared to Red Hat. At least on paper they look mostly the same.
I think the end sums it up best. Red Hat has almost twice the market as Novell on the server because most people who want Linux want a Unix like environment. Having windows compatibility is nice but on a strict server environment nobody with a clue runs Microsoft and so whats the point? I hope Novell sees this b/c they are actually a good company and Suse was a good distribution at one point.
I think it's a good thing for companies who want to run mixed Windows/Linux IT. I'm just wondering if all the innovations in SLED will carry over into OpenSuse ...
Vendor-supported ease of use with integration into Active Directory is a rather significant differentiator, even if the underlying technologies needed exist everywhere else as well.Generally speaking, I don't care what software can do. I care what it can do competently, effectively, and easily, and I care how much of my attention it requires in setup and ongoing operation. If I were a truly unique case, there wouldn't be so many people choosing uTorrent over Vuse.Also, while these features are present in other distributions, much of them are pioneered at Novell, so it stands to reason that the most advanced and polished implementations will likely come in Novell-released distributions.
tuxchickMar 24, 2009
Heh, it sounds more like an assimilation than a marriage :). Xandros' main selling point has always been easy integration into Windows networks, but for whatever reason they never got a lot of attention. Good luck Novell!
kamikazowMar 25, 2009
WTF? I have nothing against SUSE, but this article makes it sound like SUSE Enterprise contains technologies found nowhere else. SUSE Enterprise is released roughly every 3 years and thus it contains technologies developed in these 3 years since SUSE Enterprise 10 and pretty much all of it is FOSS. Distributions with a shorter release cycle have already adopted some of those features quite a while ago, incl. Novell's own "consumer Linux" openSUSE.Ubuntu ships with Mono by default. Every major Linux distribution with the exception of Fedora ships with Novell's OpenOffice (that includes Debian; Red Hat has its own OO fork that uses GCJ for the Java components). Networking with Windows is usually done through Samba components and SUSE is no different.Apart from very rare exceptions most Linux distros are not that unique. Some features may not be installed by default on one distro, but that feature is certainly at least in the repos (Mono is available for Fedora/Red Hat, just like JBoss is available for SUSE). Enterprise distros are usually not bought for their feature set. Debian has all of that for no cost. Enterprise distros are being bought for the support the distributor offers.I have no idea how Novell's enterprise support actually is compared to Red Hat. At least on paper they look mostly the same.
prasithgMar 25, 2009
I think the end sums it up best. Red Hat has almost twice the market as Novell on the server because most people who want Linux want a Unix like environment. Having windows compatibility is nice but on a strict server environment nobody with a clue runs Microsoft and so whats the point? I hope Novell sees this b/c they are actually a good company and Suse was a good distribution at one point.
moppsyMar 25, 2009
Is this really a surprise with Miguel de Icaza on board.
lanjackalMar 25, 2009
That's because Xandros wasn't free.
lanjackalMar 25, 2009
I think it's a good thing for companies who want to run mixed Windows/Linux IT. I'm just wondering if all the innovations in SLED will carry over into OpenSuse ...
honoredmuleMar 25, 2009
Vendor-supported ease of use with integration into Active Directory is a rather significant differentiator, even if the underlying technologies needed exist everywhere else as well.Generally speaking, I don't care what software can do. I care what it can do competently, effectively, and easily, and I care how much of my attention it requires in setup and ongoing operation. If I were a truly unique case, there wouldn't be so many people choosing uTorrent over Vuse.Also, while these features are present in other distributions, much of them are pioneered at Novell, so it stands to reason that the most advanced and polished implementations will likely come in Novell-released distributions.