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Caldera OpenLinux 3.1 Reviewed
Patrick Mullen writes: "The Duke of URL has just posted its review of Caldera's OpenLinux Workstation 3.1. Caldera is probably best known for going against the grain in the Linux world and is the first Linux distribution to introduce per seat licensing. Version 3.1 has made a lot of advances such as full OEM testing, but is it worth the per-seat licensing?" Is this any different from other distributions' "power packs," which bundle Free software with proprietary? According to the Caldera site, you can download the ISOs as well as the source to the server and workstation varieties of Open Linux on a (eh?) "single, non-commercial license."
Not that I believe the latest and greatest is always the best, but this one seems a little light on the newer features...Kernel 2.4.2 KDE 2.1, OpenSSH 2.5.2 (doesn't this one have a known flaw in it?).
See, the problem with Caldera's per seat licensing model is not so much that it is evil (ok, it's not, it's a business thing, but it just feels wrong) as much as it is that for it to really succeed they need to actually add value. I'm not sure they really do right now, since I can download redhat or mandrake with little worries.
This would all be different if _no_ linux company offered downloadable isos...
Btw, and only mostly off topic, anyone have any opinions on gentoo based on actual experience?
-- Who is the bigger fool? The fool or the fool who follows him? --
Another one that will bite the dust soon.
If you ask me, RMS is right about Caldera. They were never serious about the open source model and can pretty much be gone. They will not be missed.
This business model is what my grandma would call "neither here nor there" (or "nisht a hin nisht a her", excuse the sp), it's not really open source, yet isn't the prevailing evil (read XP). These things resolve pretty quickly typically, I must say that Caldera has held on to the fence for a longer while than I'd expect but in the long run it combines the least attractive features of both sides: less support and closed source/high prices.
Two years ago I bought a copy of Open Linux. I was looking for a newbie friendly distribution since I was a newbie. I put Windows on one partition, and Open Linux on the other. Right off the bat I noticed that Linux was thrashing to the hard drive. It was the worst I had ever see that happening, and thought that Linux was just awful based on that experience. I later found out that the distribution I bought didn't turn the swap space on. I was so annoyed that I immediately switched to Debian, which led to an almost immediate switch to SuSE.
I'm very happy in the SuSE world now.
The middle mind speaks!
As a dedicated SuSe user, I thought I would give this a quick try and compare the two as both are KDE centric distributions.
In terms of the basic components, Suse seems to have a slight edge, shipping Kernel 2.4.4 compared to 2.4.2, KDE 2.1.2 compared to 2.1.0 and the same release of Xfree86 (4.0.3). SuSE seem to go further with shipping of Samba 2.2 and a personal firewall product, which must give them a much higher security rating than Caldera. SuSE have also been very quick to release updates for KDE, their automated update tool recently updated KDE 2.1.2 to 2.2. for me and I believe 2.2.1 is now available for download.
Both distributions integrate admin functionality into the KDE Control Center and I think Caldera have done a much more comprehensive job then SuSE on this to date. However, this can be a mixed blessing. I still prefer to drop out of X and use YAST 1 for system administration, which is SuSE's text based administration tool.This functionality seemed lacking in Caldara, perhaps deliberatly.
I have been very impressed with SuSEs hardware detection, the only problem I have found recently was with a modem on a IBM Thinkpad (although Windows 2000 also failed to detect this correctly). Installing Caldara posed no problems, altough this is based on a sample of one old IBM PC.
SuSE wins in terms of default telnet and FTP servers, but again I suspect this is a design decision. Although not enabled by default, both are very easy to configure and I find the ability to telnet and FTP to my work PC when working from home one of the strongest selling points of Linux generally.
Both graphical installers are good, although Caldera have the edge. However, I wonder how useful this is. Ideally you should see a graphical installer once and then use a PC for 3 years without seeing it again. However, if this is aimed at the corporate market it may be that people setting up 100's of PCs want some eye candy, but even then there comes a point where excessive graphics cease to be useful and simply become irriating.
The snapshots feature in Caldara looks useful and is one I hope other vendors copy.
Overall, if you are looking for a KDE centric distribution, I think SuSE still edges it, in terms of the frequency and range of packages and updates. For users who like to run and administer their own systems SuSE wins every time for me. However, for the corporate market Caldera is aiming at, where administrators like to supply users with locked down desktops, I think Caldera have done a great job and you have to wish them every success in this area.
I chose Caldera Linux for my workstation at work.
It was the only distribution that installed flawlessly the first time I tried. My workstation's hardware components were on the HCL of all the distributions I tried, but most incorrectly detected my monitor and video card and I was stuck futzing with X trying to get out of 640x480 at 16 colors. Caldera got DHCP working during install, while other's forced me to figure that out afterwards. Some seemed to install correctly, but wouldn't boot. I could go on and on.
I only use the free software part of Caldera, but the entire package feels coherent and professional.
Another post was complaining about it 'only' including KDE 2.2 and the 2.4.2 kernel. Well, I don't know of any distributions that don't need to be updated after install, at least Caldera is just a quick patch to the latest and greatest. It also has the KDE and QT development tools installed by default, ready to go. Very cool, IMO.
I guess the licence thing just isn't an issue for me since I found the tool I needed and it works the way I expect it. In fact, I downloaded this ISO along with it's source from Caldera's website for free, so I don't know what the license issue is for sure.
This is all anecdotal of course, but I just wanted to throw some positive Caldera energy out into all of this negative.
(P.S. The other distributions I tried were Debian 2.2r3, Slackware 8.0, Mandrake 8.0, RedHat 7.1 and 7.2 beta, and SuSE demo disk. All were downloaded as ISOs from the manufacturer's website and burned to CD-R.)
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
Would you care to explain exactly how money is supposed to be made by a Linux company when one copy can be used across an entire corporation?
I think you're speaking about things that sound good in quick sound bites but in reality don't make quite as much sense as you think. Numerous companies -- including Caldera, Red Hat, SuSE, Turbolinux, etc. -- have been trying to figure out how to make this open source business thing work. All have ended up scaling back on their freebies, all have ended up closing offices and cutting staff. SuSE and Turbolinux barely have presences in the US anymore.
The money isn't coming from either software or services as much as everyone would have hoped. What you see now is the new direction of Linux offerings. The ones that are free will not be central to Linux companies' business plans. Supporting a large staff of folks to assemble, support, and market something that costs $0 (and don't give me a line about support; as I said before, nobody's making much off of that either) no longer makes sense.
If you want Linux to succeed outside of user groups and high schools, get over the license thing. Otherwise, you're contributing to the demise of Linux as a supportable, sustainable corporate technology. If it dies in that realm, you will once again see it being sneaked into back-doors like the old days, except this time there will be a negative history tattooed to Linux that will make it a lot less favorable than it was the first time around.
Caldera OpenLinux and the KDE project have two major things in common.
1) Both have been savagely attacked by Slashdot readers and members of the OSS community. Half were upset at KDE's licensing/GPL options because KDE wasn't make-a-buck friendly for companies wanting more restrictive licenses and retail presence. Meanwhile, the other half are upset at Caldera's licensing/GPL options because Caldera is making-a-buck with more restrictive licenses and retail presence. Neither is violating anyone else's license. You can never win.
2) Both Caldera OpenLinux and KDE are superior products to other alternatives. KDE just works (unlike GNOME, which is *still* a hodgepodge that varies according to distributor and is difficult to get working in the real world, even from Ximian). Similarly, I used Caldera OpenLinux on my own systems and on those I administer from version 1.2 until version 2.4 specificially because of the quality of the product. OpenLinux 1.3 was the most usable distribution of its era, bar none, and I tried them all. I've finally switched away to Red Hat 7.1 recently when needing to upgrade from eDesktop 2.4 because of mild discomfort about these licensing issues, but it was a tough decision.
Red Hat 7.1 doesn't come close. As I was evaluating options, I also tried Debian 2.2, Corel 2.0, Slackware 8, S.u.S.E. 7.2 and Mandrake 8.0.Each had its own strenghths and weaknesses... but nothing compared to the user experience with eDesktop 2.4. If the current Caldera release is similar in any way to their past releases it, like KDE, will just work out of the box -- and the user won't have to worry about a lot of those little annoying details that typically mar Linux use (broken printcap after install, broken XF86Config after install, misconfigured services, etc., etc., etc.)
I think Caldera's OpenLinux and KDE are two of the most underappreciated products to have come out of the open source community, and it's a shame.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW