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Corel Linux to Access and Run Windows Apps
rawlink writes "Corel has announced that they are working w/ GraphOn to support their Bridges client software on Corel Linux. This will allow the Linux client to access Windows apps over a network connection, much the same way that Citrix does." I hope this won't be too expensive; it could instantly enlighten the minds of a lot of people wondering what the next OS for their LAN should be...
Note: This does _not_ mean that they won't use wine. This only means that they can run win32 apps _remeotely_.
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GroundAndPound.com
This would be great, and could spell the end to my use of VM-Ware... would much rather access the programs on the network than have that dsk image on my hd.
ever heard of VNC? xvncviewer works wonderfully.
Anyone out there in slashdot know where this things limits will be? Will it be able to have as much client/server abilities as X or is it going to be more like PCAnywhere? Inquiring minds wish to know.... :)
"Out, OUT! You demons of STUPIDITY!" - Dogbert
One of the main difficulties with windows apps over a network is that they have no concept of mutiple users and file permissions. For instance, the Normal.dot template in word must be writable by all users, usually resulting in some wonderful macro viruses. But my main problem is the price of Metaframe and the way that licensing is done. I believe we had to pay for NT workstation seat licenses for each connection, even though we are using the Sun clients. Bah
If you surf over to Citrix's Web Site you'll notice that there already is a linux client for this server.
Simply put, if you have a WinNT TSE (Terminal Server Edition) Server or a Windows 2000 Server you'll already have access to this with native Microsoft enhancements.
With thanks
Tenement
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So I guess this is going to be a bit like xceed otherway around. That's cool, now I can finally play minesweeper !
But at the same time I've got a few questions about their announcement.
Is it running the application with it's own memory space (ie client processor churning) or is the server's processor handling it and handing off basicly screenwipes? I couldn't find the answer to that spelled out though I admit freely to not having read every page on their website.
Does this mean that GraphOn is going opensource? Or are they only supplying binaries?
Check this story (from November): According to this "Corel Corporation will use GraphOn's Bridges(TM) software to allow access to Windows applications from Corel's(R) Linux desktops." Does this mean Corel is dropping support of WINE? As someone else has stated before, this has nothing to do with wine: Bridges is only a sort of "X server for Windows", so one can display the output of a Windoze app runner on a Windoze box.
does anyone know what the performance is like on a 56k modem? Can this possibly substitute fir being able to run locally? This still doesn't sound like a real solution to the Windoze problem - so instead of your PCs crashing, you will have 25 instances on Word97 running on your NT server and it will go down. Big deal. I don't think there can be a mass migration of Windoze users to Linux until you can run your Win32 apps LOCALLY on your Linux machine, with the full realiability of Linux and feature set of the Win32 app. Do you want to have to dial up every time you use Word or Excel? I don't think so. Do you want to be the Network Admin in charge of an NT box running 200 instances of Word2000? I don't think so.
Terminal servers promise tremendous easy of running windows clients, god knows we need that..
So having one for Linux is a real real good thing, made me wish we had an open source TS.
Greetz SlashDread
The problem isn't US wanting to run Windows apps, it's Pointy-Haired-Bosses wanting to run Windows apps!
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The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
It's always been possible to do this, thankfully someone has finally implemented it across different operating systems. This will certainly speed the adoption of Linux in business, as it will not require a complete reworking of a companys ADP strategy. A couple questions, will it only link to Windows NT Server? Will this work for different hardware, such as a Linux Alpha machine running software on a Windows NT x86 machine? Will it be Open Source?
We really need good Native apps. That's what we need. Not everyone wants to go through the expense of setting up some kind of "Mainframe" server for applications. Native apps. Let's code.
It's interesting to see how much this idea of 'run it all on the server' is making a big comeback these days. That's the way my employerer (who will remain unnamed) is going...we are deploying Citrix to run lots of software all on the server. Is it a good idea, who can say? I personally favor having the client do SOME of the grunt work even though I am also enticed by the benefits of network-centric computing. It sounds like this Corel/Graphon solution is a strictly Super-Server/Dumb Terminal solution.
Blender And Linux Fan
Unfortunately, compatibility isn't the only bump in the road for widescale approval of linux at the end user desktop. From the standpoint of someone who has tried (generally unsuccessfully) to bring linux to the desktop at my company, the concerns were both compatibility with clients that use Windows programs, but with the end users being able to actually understand and use the OS. It won't help if there is a learning curve for users that would actually LOSE productivity getting acclimated to a new way of doing things. Now, if Corel Linux is easy enough to use, with a windowing interface that TRULY emulates Win95, it becomes a much more viable alternative. My $0.02
The article talks about letting you run all your Windows applications seamlessly over the network.
Okay, that's a neat thing to say, but what can it actually _do_? With this stuff, can I run QuakeIII over the network and get it to work on my X display? What if I don't have MesaGL installed? How does it handle displaying data? Obviously it will run in X, but is it compatible with the XFree86 4.0 stuff that's coming out Real Soon Now?
I suspect that what this will eventually boil down to is another piece of VMware-ish. VMware uses custom kernel modules in order to provide all the neccesary hooks, and these modules have been known to cause all sorts of problems, both in causing actual faults to trying to tract them down.
Showing support for a company that goes for outrageously stupid patent things is hardly something I'd want to get excited about.
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My mom's going to kick you in the face!
If you don't remember Corel sold its jBridge technology to Graphon in exchange for 25% ownership a little over a year ago. This "Bridge" technology that will allow linux clients to run Windows applications is just an extension of what Corel started. I wouldn't think it would be too expensive, given Corel's share in this company and their vested interest in seeing Linux take off.
The problems with this technology is the licensing of the products. I delt with the Citrix problem bulit a system and then had to cancel the job based on the cost of the licenses (it was a large CAD program that caused the troubles). The idea is great and the technology works, the problem is the licenseing of the products. If Corel could dop something about that, like developeing licence servers for all Windows apps that would/could help. Until the legal aspects change this technology for Windows is very limited.
One of the main difficulties with windows apps over a network is that they have no concept of mutiple users and file permissions. For instance, the Normal.dot template in word must be writable by all users, usually resulting in some wonderful macro viruses.
Good point. I think Office 2000 (and new versions of apps from other vendors, I'm sure) are much better at working in a multi-user environment. Remember that older apps didn't realise they could ever be run multi-user, so resource (e.g. file) contention wasn't really seen as a problem...
-- "I believe the human being and the fish can coexist peacefully." - George W. Bush, 29 September 2000
SOC/RO Update: Well it looks like Corel! has done it again. Following on the success of their earlier products, CorelDraw! Corel XARA!, and Corel Wordperfect Suite!, Corel! now has a new product: Corel Bridges! This revolutionary new product is positioned to bring Corel! into the proprietary operating system market with its Corel Linux! product, soon to be renamed Corel/OS! "How is this good for the Open/Source movement?" you ask. Simple, my dear, nothing is good for the Open/Source Movement! "But Macromedia is making Shockwave! Open/Source!" So what. What kind of world do we live in where companies are too lazy to write their own software. And then all the anonymous slaves that write it for them and get no money for it decide to revolt. This is always bad, in my opinion. Remember the slave revolts of the early 1800s?? Well get ready for the Great Open/Source Slave Revolt! of 2020. Oh man, are we in trouble. Flying cities will burn, hovercars will be overturned, and Smergfomzs will run wild in the streets. Oh, the humanity. And the humchuikity. President Fitkold from the planet Humchuiky will declare marshall law, and the national guard will patrol YOUR neighborhood wearing powered armor and driving fusion tanks. "President Fitkold, we have an incoming transmission." "A transmission? What is it?" "It is a set of different ratio gears arranged on a complicated mechanism to allow different torque/speed ratios for automobiles. But that is not important now. The Open/Source slaves wish to call on a truce -- on one condition." "One condition? What is it?" Well wouldn't you like to know. I suppose the point of all this is, in a weird sort of way, that we need to learn to respect others and ourselves if we are to ever truly get along with the Humchuikities. Let me give you an example. Suppose you have a box, with $3 and a dead cat named Belfry, and you put the $3 and the dead cat in the box. Now you bring this box to the supermarket in order to purchase toothpaste, but it costs $4.67. "Damn!" you say when you get to the checkout. "Will you just let me have the toothpaste?" you ask. "Umm.. No." says the cashier. "Well what if I give you a dead cat," you ask as you bring out the rotting, long-since lifeless body of Belfry. "Ok." she says as she joyfully takes the stinking carcass away from you, and begins jamming it in the cash drawer. You can hear the sound of bones cracking as she pounds on it trying to get it to fit. Then she begins slamming the drawer repeatedly in an effort to get it closed. But to no avail. "What's the hell is going on here?!" exclaims the manager. "I don't know, your cashier is having trouble fitting my dead cat named Belfry into the cash drawer." you explain helpfully. "Hmm.. Well let me see if I can help." The manager squeezes in past the cashier and helps her along out of the way as the exhausted cashier steps back and crosses her arms. "Fucking drawer!" the manager exlaims as he begins slamming the drawer harder and harder. Finally the dead cat named Belfry explodes. Well, it is about time.
While a very nice step, this only has implications for shops using NT or W95/98 right now for desktops, that are thinking about moving to Linux. I would like to see this personally, since I have to reboot my machine once a week to use a Windows accounting package (this would save me that, but then again WINE or VMWare would do as well).
Other than that - allowing application locked shops to move to a heterogeneous network - this announcement is no big deal (but I still like to see them 8-)
No. VNC is a screen scraper. GraphOn (like Citrix Metaframe) is a multi-user remote application server.
-- "I believe the human being and the fish can coexist peacefully." - George W. Bush, 29 September 2000
"integrate GraphOn's Bridges(TM) connectivity software into Corel® LINUX® OS."
What sort of support will there be for other distributions? I think this is one of the problems with Corel, they just seem to be only interested in promoting their own brand not Linux as a whole. And this being a GraphOn press release don't you think they'd want to promote the fact they'll be supporting more then just one distribution?
I think they'd start to suspect and look at you funny when everyone else is getting bluescreens 10x a day and you're just sitting there being all productive and stuff. If you're smart put the BSOD screensaver on that linux box.
mcrandello@my-deja.com
rschaar{at}pegasus.cc.ucf.edu if it's important.
Just some thoughts, and no real conclusion. I guess I'll stay here on the fence, and throw some more support/feedback to the WINE folks.
Jon
I think not...(*poof*)
I am the head network administrator for a DSP design house with three locations around the U.S. Right now, NT is our primary desktop OS. However, as our tools become available on Linux, our users are gradually asking for it. Right now about 10% of our end users dual boot Linux (one of them is running it exclusively). I'm personally excited to be in a position to help these pioneers along. Although our network is based on NT file, print, and authentication services (sorry, that predates my employment) we also have a NIS+ domain for our E450's and I've been tying the new Linux systems into that domain. The feedback has been excellent. Our users have a true "roaming desktop" under Linux. They can seemlessly tie into the filesystems in the Sun farm. Our VCS jobs run faster under the same hardware running Linux than on NT (a matter of HOURS faster). The next big push I'm sticking my neck out on is eliminating Microsoft Visual SourceSafe for source code control, and migrating to CVS. Most of the network is accessible from any OS but the source control system is still M$-only. Once that wall breaks down, we'll see more Linux on the desktop. And yes, it's ready. It runs WickedFast on our P3 machines (as opposed to "acceptable" for NT 4.0). Most of the apps we need run and run well on this platform. And it is a very graceful network neighbor that makes my job a lot easier.
Corel seems to be billing this as support for Windows applications under Linux. This isn't quite correct. They even go so far as to say it provides support for Windows applications with no additional hardware. That's blatantly incorrect. Not only do you need additional hardware, you need a whole PC! This is nothing more than a Windows Terminal Server solution. You have to have an existing Windows PC sitting around somewhere on your network and run the applications off it. GraphOn merely "exports" the display of those applications to the Linux client. Big whoop. This isn't the problem most people are interested in having solved.
Thomas Dorris
I'm not sure I understand the enthusiasm here. Linux running M$ apps, why? With all of the complaining about M$ that occurs here, why do so many people see this as a great thing? Isn't the whole point to keep Linux separate from anything M$? I'll admit I use M$ products because I really don't have much of a choice, it's what I know and have used since DOS 5.0 and I don't have the cash to build a Linux only machine, but this seems so *against* everything that open-source stands for. Can someone clarify?
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I just wish I could c:\format Internet
If anybody out there is successful at this, please figure out how to distrib it anonymously enough that the MS lawyers can't find you. ;-)
"Una piccola canzone, un piccolo ballo, poco seltzer giù i vostri pantaloni."
My office has been taken over by iPod people.
Cute. Here we keep hearing about how maybe Linux is an OK server OS but Win* is the only choice of the desktop, and what happens? We get a big push towards using an NT server with Linux desktops!
Actually, we've been doing something similar to support legacy X apps (OK, X makes this much easier.) We have legacy servers sufficient for the workload, and the obsolete apps run on them transparently (the local jobs are just RJE scripts.) Given the gorking huge pile of legacy WinCode, this is something that corporate admins are going to need someday regardless.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
Pointy-HAIRED-Bosses. Can you say "Dilbert"?
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The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
I wouldn't necessarily classify Microsoft's OS efforts as 'dangerous'. The biggest risk we run using NT around the office is the worry that one of our developers is going to get so sick of NT crashing during compiles that he/she sticks his/her head through their monitor :-)
'Supremely frustrating' is the phrase I'd most commonly use.
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The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
Specifically, Corel is involved in WINE so they could easily port their apps to Linux. They are by all accounts almost done with this for their first round of apps (they recently split their tree from the WineHQ one so they could do beta testing without us all possibly breaking their stuff - we'll remerge once they ship :). They are even paying Wine's leader (Alexandre Julliard) money to fix Wine's last major architectural problem (only 1 address space for all processes) despite the fact that the problem doesn't directly affect their applications.
:)
(as an aside, the Wine team has seen interest from some other "name-brand" commercial software vendors about using WineLib to port their stuff now that Corel's done the hard part - we may have enough apps to conquer the desktop sooner than you think
As has been stated before, GraphOn's system has completely different goals and is more like WinFrame or VNC than Wine.
-Ian "wine-devel" Schmidt
*smack*
Click on a few links and find out what we're talking about. Then come back and share.
Thanks,
-Brent...and while I'm at it, you spelled 'bosess' incorrectly.
Stones.... glass houses.... ?
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The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
Is this only going to work on Corel Linux? Are Corel now trying to do a Micro$oft on the Linux market?
I love stacking my barbecues in the shed at the end of summer - you can't beat a bit of grill on grill action.
Microsoft and Citrix are actually rivals in this thin-client technology. Citrix produced the ICA protocol, which was much better than the original RDP protocol Microsoft made for their Terminal Server product. However, Microsoft is due to take this market back with their new version of RDP. This means Citrix would be better moving into more diverse markets.
This is where it gets wierd. Citrix HAVE produced a Linux client, and some Linux roll-outs in the enterprise sector are actually based on this. But it's a really old version, and much more limited than the DOS/Win16/Win32 versions they have brought out. There are also web and java versions of the client, but Citrix are really shooting themselves in the foot by not paying more attention to this ripe market. Come on Citrix, update the client!!!
insignificant sig
This is how Corel could do it:
Release your own version of Linux, all open source
Release attendant proprietary apps, all closed source
Rig the app so it'll seg fault all over the place if it tries to run on another OS, because of some inconspicuous changes in, say, the libc library.
However, Corel would not get very far because it wouldn't take much for the libc coders to figure out what it is in the code that makes the app run right. It would take a lot of comparing and diffing between the corel libc and the normal glibc 2.1 and patching in the diffs and then taking them out one hunk at a time to see which hunks are needed to keep the app stable.
Of course there are other theories:
Corel might lock up some part of the Corel Linux OS kernel/core OS as closed source. Not possible. They're locked into the GPL.
Corel's apps might work with other Linux distributions with the appropriate library patches, or just right out of the box, and thus this whole thing might be a false scare.
My hat is off to RedHat. They have managed to have it so all kinds of new commercial apps (like UT) rely not on RedHat, but glibc 2.1 - which is, basically, the only reason I see for getting RedHat 6.1.
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
Actually the current version of the Unix clients aren't all that outdated. The biggest missing feature is the "Program Neighborhood" functionality; that basically alows you to login to the Neighborhood and get a list of available applications for your account and, I believe will automatically log you on when you run the app. Without this functionality all of the individual apps must be made available in a world-readable list. Now, about my subject. . . Citrix is developing a new web-client, code-named "Charlotte," that will include Program Neighborhood functionality. (I plan to test the beta next month if I'm not pulled off for another project.)
From my experience: 1- Reading Corel's licenses. 2- Installing Corel's (downloadable) version of Linux. 3- Looking at Corel's partnerships. 4- Trying to understand Corel's long-term visions. I've come to the conclusion that Corel is not interested in Free or even Open Source software. Nor are they interested, per se, in the success of Linux. Their motivation seems to be related ONLY to destroying the Microsoft monopoly. This isn't a bad thing, necessarily, it's just that I think it's important to remember that Corel's motivations are not the same as our own, or at least MY own.
...They are even paying Wine's leader (Alexandre Julliard) money to fix Wine's last major architectural problem (only 1 address space for all processes) despite the fact that the problem doesn't directly affect their applications.... we may have enough apps to conquer the desktop sooner than you think :)
This is great. There are a couple of windows apps that I find is very difficult to leave behind, like Eudora, Agent, and Lotus Organizer -- mostly because I'm a fuddy-duddy and used to them. The mo-better these work through WINE, the mo-closer I am to platform bliss. I have precisely -zero- desire to run these thru Graphon or VNC tools; I want 'em on my linux laptop. The only criticism I've had for the WINE dev crowd is that y'all need to publicise your achievements more -- but I see that the website is much more informative & friendly than it used to be.
J
I think not...(*poof*)
Yes we all know that Microsoft is so successful because of "good marketing" and OS/2 and everybody else failed because of "poor marketing". Quite an incisive analysis.
The truth is OS/2 was hamstrung by some technical issues, product positioning issues, pricing issues, IBM's dubious relationship with the rest of the PC industry, and so on. (I could go on, but OS/2 is way off topic). All issues related to marketing, certainly, but nothing that affected the actual promotion of the product.
The fact is IBM carpet bombed people with free or cheap copies, had huge TV ad campaigns, the OS/2 Fiesta Bowl football game, and huge influnce. Every person who was in IT in 1990 was well aware of OS/2. It had limited to large deployments at virtually every large corporation. This whole "poor marketing" wrap just makes it sound like it died in obscurity, which certainly isn't true.
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Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
This is a slap in the face of the collective OSS community. Not only is this product propietary, it's also PATENTED! This is a serious conflict of interests. I just hope Linux won't suffer too much from Corel's latest move.
Oh please, show me a BETTER equivalent of PowerPoint, Excel, Word and Access in Linux. Star Office only takes about 2 minutes to load, then tries to take over the entire desktop, and crash at the same time.
They make proper choices, most people can handle using Word with their eyes closed.
And you're using Linux, I wouldn't be talking about stability, ever had the file system crash on you multiple times? Ever seen X croak consistantly?
The problem for Linux is that you still don't get packages which point and click install. Everyone is still doing their own thing, from custom scripts (Oracle, Adobe) to DIY tarballs. Right now, as far as OS platforms go, there isn't one Linux, there's several, and Red Hat, SuSe, Debian and Corel all have their own agendas. No-one apart from the Linux vendors uses RPM, and not all of them do.
We still have people running around producing libc5 distros, which may be cool and geeky but it doesn't help unify Linux when everyone else is using glibc.
Against this backdrop, we have 95% of Win32 stuff which will point and click drop onto anything from Win95 to Win2K, and it even puts the latest version of Internet Exploder and 17 buggy DLL's on for you at the same time.
When you only have 5% market share, fragmenting that won't get you anywhere.
What Linux needs is a standardised install API that all software vendors can use, supported by all major distros, that will drop a piece of code on any x86 Linux system, and ensure it will work, right down to adding window manager menus and performing dependency checks.
You have to decide where your dog is in this fight - if you are happy for Linux to continue to be a fringe OS that requires serious hacking skills to run, then the status quo is fine. If you want to use it to take on the Redmond monopoly, then a standardised platform is essential.
Finally, we can have a LAN with just 1 computer running all those Win/32 apps. This might be a good start. If only some game publishers like ID and Activision would start importing their games to Linux compatible format. That would be the final punch for Windows (but I'm sure MS will buy the US government and forbid Linux or somethin').
I only say Goddamnit because Microsoft bought God(TM)
"If anyone needs me, I'm in the angry dome."
At this point, no one even knows if the Corel app in question is Corel specific...its VAPORWARE still. The press release can be read to interpret that it is a corel only feature. (It could also be market-speak)
You are asking if a licensing restriction that is the only legal way they can stop the use of their code on system that aren't theirs, on software that is vaporware, exists.
>What are they going to do if I run the app in another Linux?
They can sue you. If the software is licensed ONLY for Corel Linux and you are running it someplace else, you would be in violation.
>Monitor me?
Its their software. They can put in monitoring code if they wish.
>Bust me?
If you violated the license, then you have to stop using the software or do what it takes to become back in license compliance.
>Sue me?
Yes. What part of license violation are you having a hard time understanding? What part of contract violation are you not groking?
>Please. Let 'em try.
Odds are however it is not worth the time of Corel to "Take some license breaking Anonymous Coward to court and have a judge explain to her the ideas behind contract law, and bust the arrogant, in their face software pirate."
If it was said on slashdot, it MUST be true!
I strongly suggest everybody to double check any statements made by Corel. They have been hyping their stock price via lots of Linux related press releases. But the truth is, earnings have gone way way down. They are not selling anything and their CFO had to quit last month. I don't believe anything Corel says anymore, sorry, and I do not think they are an ethical company.
~~~Please pass the salt, I hate unsalted MD5s
So, unless you can run Windows and Linux simultaneously on your PC, you're out of luck.
Corel has been doing a great job popularizing and developing Linux OS. Wall Street does not like Corel since its analysts have been in love with M$ monopoly. You sound like a scared M$ shareholder and shame on you to post in this place. You'll find more friends in MSN, CNBC or MSNBC NG's. Besides, this NG is not dedicated to discussing stocks
...considering Corel is the original developer of GraphOn's "Bridges" program. When Corel was working on it, they called it "jBridge", then they sold it for a 25% stake in GraphOn.
Corel gave legitimcy to Linux in back in 98. I do not really care why. If Corel did not do what they did would the IBM, SGI, Inprise, Oracle, Dell, Compaq, snowball been rolling like it is now? Corel was the first name that had recognition to people outside the industry. Corel even has forced Adobe to take notice. During 1941 I would get along with the most loyal son's of Stalin.
A clear example of MS leveraging its (hopefullly soon to be eroding) monopoly position.
No, you could have switched your NT servers to Linux or something, then kept WP, Lotus, and cc:Mail/Notes for the WS
This MS FORCED us to do this, is a bunch of bull, you're not obligated to run these products from them. If you don't like any of MS Licensing with NT Terminal Server, then don't run it. Then you have solved your problem
You don't need to go to lawschool to read this stuff; a decent command of English and logical reasoning is sufficient, and as an engineer, you better learn how to read and write patent claims.
use windows very seldom lately. want to keep it that way. maybe I will just order star-office or something and forget this conversation ever took place. bridges? we don't need to stinkin' bridges. paul
i thought this was what WINE was!
i hope i'm on the right track because i expect loads of angry mails if i'm not :-0
As someone who develops on Solaris and HPUX in an overwhelmingly Windows centric software development house I can tell you that if your NT machines are crashing during compiles then you've got serious hardware and/or driver problems.
I can understand if you said that crashing the VC++ compiler is easy. It is. But NT crashing during compiles points to memory hardware problems (or NIC and HD problems if compiling on a network share).
No.
Ever seen X croak consistantly?
Properly configured, no.
Any more questions?
>A license approach to making it 'corel linux only' would be practically unenforceable.
That does not mean they can't take this option however.
If it was said on slashdot, it MUST be true!
Any more questions?
You could try answering all my questions first.
I don't think so. You might be able to run something like VMware to boot an NT session, and then connect from the Linux session to the Windows session, but there wouldn't be much point to that, since you could already run Windows programs from the VMWare windows session.
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Steve Molitor
smolitor@erac.com
"Emacs is the Computer"
Stephen Molitor steve_molitor@yahoo.com