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CodeWeavers Release Server Version Of CrossOver
Jeremy White writes: CodeWeavers has just
launched the Server Edition of CrossOver Office. Server Edition
provides Windows applications like Microsoft Office to thin clients
and previously unreachable platforms like Solaris/SPARC. It's
designed to compete directly with Citrix and Windows Terminal Server
solutions, primarily on price (watch that TCO drop, baby). The most
delicious irony will come when we release a Windows client, and we start
serving Windows applications to a Windows desktop through a Linux
server.""
CodeWeavers makes some neat stuff. I've even got my boss to want to try out the server version when it came out. The only problem is that it doesn't support QuickBooks, which is a critical function where I work. :-( We'll see what happens.
Esse quam vederi.
Of course, the cynic in me would enquire as to how long people think it will be before they explicitly forbid this sort of thing.
Aren't Win4Lin and VMWare both already serving up Windows applications (or at least full blown Windows desktops) from a Linux server? Win4Lin has worked nicely for me for quite some time. Sqram! (sqrammi.com)
is usually quickly followed by BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA and "we have you now, mr. bond!"
I think you missed the point. Because the Office licenses are per-machine, rather than per-user (as far as I know), 1 license of Office can be used to serve hundreds of clients with a fast enough machine. It's a pretty big loophole in their licensing, but due to the lack of multi-desktop remoting in Windows I guess they never thought any body would figure out how to exploit it.
So we've got non-free software built on top of free software in order to serve up non-free software from a company that wishes to destroy free software.
I'm so confused. Can't they all just wear black hats or white hats so I know which ones are the bad guys and which are the good guys?
Curmudgeon Gamer: Not happy
I've been using crossover office for a month and already love it!
Basically I was not allowed to pop/imap into the exchange 5.5 server and have been running vmware with win2k/office. vmware is great however running win2k under linux was terribly slow. Now I simply run outlook under linux/crossover and life is good. Outlook under Linux is VERY fast!
I strongly recommend their products. I'll be keeping an eye on them in the future.
Has Comcast disconnected your Internet account? Same here. You can read about it at http://comcastissue.blogspot.com
Yeah, wait for the next 'Security Patch' to have the updated EULA. Microsoft will probably be changing their licensing very quickly. Which turns it around again and makes it useless. =)
Can all fish swim?
I thought this had something to do with John Edward..like maybe if I ran this, my server would channel my old Commodore 64.
Because the Office licenses are per-machine, rather than per-user (as far as I know), 1 license of Office can be used to serve hundreds of clients with a fast enough machine. It's a pretty big loophole in their licensing, but due to the lack of multi-desktop remoting in Windows I guess they never thought any body would figure out how to exploit it.
Try doing some basic research:
If you don't want to click the link, here you go:
Note: Every device that connects to a terminal server will need to be properly licensed for its own terminal server usage, in addition to being licensed appropriately to use other applications and servers. Use terminal servers to centrally manage and support the deployment of Office suites in your organization. Dedicate a license for Office for every computer on which you plan to use Office. Examples of computers that might run Office on a terminal server include Windows-based workstations, Macintoshes, and UNIX workstations. The terminal servers themselves do not require Office licenses, unless someone sitting at the console will be running Office.
The most delicious irony will come when we release a Windows client, and we start serving Windows applications to a Windows desktop through a Linux server.
Right there... irony. The correct spelling is soul-crushing lawsuit.
I must agree with parent, to refute grandparent that this is not a win for the *NIX community. (no pun intended)
But, I just want to add that cross platform interoperation, regardless of between where and where, is *always* A Good Thing for the whole world of computing.
I read the release, how is this different from just doing remote X and using wine?
Ie, couldn't Solaris users always ssh/telnet to a linux machine configured to use wine and run an app with the display set back to the thinclient or ssh-X forwarding?
I know I've done this linux->linux.
someone enlighten me?
The press release does not go into detail about the terminal server features of the new Cross-Over Server. Does it use it's own transport mechanism, or is it relying on X-11?
I suspect that it is using the X-11 approach and this will NOT impact the likes of Citrix. Citrix provides a great deal of functionality beyond simple terminal services. The management tools and the ability to publish applications are unrivaled and any administrator who has used them is not going to easily part with them. But, perhaps the biggest distinction is that Citrix uses a TINY amount of bandwidth when compared to X-11 or VNC. Whereas Citrix ICA protocol can work very nicely at 20Kbps VNC can easily use a couple of hundred Kbps and X-11 can go over 10Mbps for even basic applications.
Sure a Citrix implementation costs a fortune, mostly due to the fact that Microsoft requires three different licenses including a Windows license, a Terminal Server license and then Terminal Server CALs. It's damn expensive but, companies that really need that kind of functionality can easily afford it and once it's in, they won't part with it.
True, but you don't need a Windows 2000 server license and a Terminal Server license and Terminal Server CALs for every MACHINE that connects to the terminal server. These licenses cost a LOT more than the Office licenses that you'd have to buy as well.
Before anybody jumps in to defend Microsoft, this was exactly the same approach Microsoft used several years ago to mop the floor with Novell. Just put an NT box in front of a Netware server, and you only have to pay Novell for one user license.
Given the history of this tactic, it seems amazing that Microsoft would leave the same loophole in their own EULA.
Although I fully appreciate the technical value of thier achievments I fail to see how this lowers my TCO ???? I'll still need to pay MS for the Office Licences and since most MS customers are under volume or site agreemensts this doesn't appear to be any cheaper that running a normal Terminal Server.
... but I think the Linux community (of which I am a proud member) can be a little blinded by thier technical prowess and forget that some of us have to justify the costs to our bosses. If its not a CLEARLY a cheaper solution, then no sale.
...
Why continue to chase Microsofts tail when better solutions could be developed that dont involve thier products at all.
I am not flaming
Congrats none the less
Here's an unplesant thought of how they could make it illegal. In the next release of Office, make it dependent on some sort of DRM technology in the Windows operating system. If they did this:
1) Because that is security related, Microsoft could keep the knowledge of how this interface would work under the exceptions outlined in their settlement.
2) If Codeweavers was to reverse engineer it, Microsoft could claim that their implementation was circumventing an access control and take them to court under the DMCA. Moreover, since Codeweavers actually sells these products, they could actually be brought up on criminal charges.
Number two might make for an interesting court battle, assuming codeweavers has the resources to fight it.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
Very true - if you need to buy any more licenses, that is. This software will allow you to do two things:
1 - use the Office licenses you already have in perpetuity. No Licensing 6.0 style "software as a service" pay-me-now-and-pay-me-later is needed - it is, after all, Linux.
2 - pool the Office licenses you have, making better use of a valuable resource. Say you have 100 employees and 70 Office licenses. You can pool those 70 licenses on Crossover Office Server, and likely keep every one of your users happy. Not everyone has Word/Excel/Access open all of the time, so it makes very good sense to pool them in this way.
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
Licensing Microsoft Office in a Windows Terminal Server Environment
Mostly talking about Microsoft's terminal licensing here. Read the EULA for Office and you will see a license only allows you to use it one at a time so you still will need to buy a bunch of licenses.
We used to run network installs of Word, Excel, etc. on 3.11 diskless workstations. The license was set up for concurrent use if you installed it this way. We had x number of licenses and some 3rd party software that would popup a box when x+1 copy tried to run. It would ask if you wanted to wait or send a message to one of the users currently in it and listed the current users.
I believe there has been some rewording since the 16bit days. Anyone have current EULA info?
I will happily continue using SuSE 8.1 running Crossover Office (or just WINE) + TightVNC. I have used it in place of Windows 2000 Terminal Services in two production projects thus far and the customers love it. Don't get me wrong, I like what they have done with server edition as I believe it will appeal to the "enterprise" class customers who feel that money spent equals money well spent. Kudos to the guys at CodeWeavers. Crossover Office is spectacular.
ER
This product is used to serve up (via X) MS Office apps to multiple clients, as has been possible for years using a Windows Server and running MS Office over the network, a standard procedure in many companies. This makes it easy to upgrade, apply service packs, etc, as all you have to do is update 1 copy on the server, rather than all users copies on their workstations.
This product executes the Office app under wine on x86 Linux, and sends it to any given X server. Presumably, you could run a Win32 PC X server and run MS Office from an x86 Linux server to a Windows desktop, although, this would obviously be somewhat counterproductive.
Since wine only runs on Linux (and FreeBSD, to some extent) on x86 processors, as mentioned in FAQ #3 on the wine development site, this means that users of Solaris, LinuxPPC, sparc Linux, and other commercial UNIX users were left out in the cold as far as being able to run MS Office. Now, however, you simply need to set up a server with this product, install MS Office, and then setup accounts, etc. Users can simply run the program, and Word, et. al. will appear as a regular window on their X desktop.
PS. The level of what works/what doesn't varies a little among the Office family; Word & Excel are best, PPT/Access don't run as well, the last I checked. IE & Outlook are supposed to be great. (at least as great as said products can be
For a Citrix server you need the following licenses:
Windows 2000 Server License
Windows 2000 File & Print Client Access License (per client)
Windows 2000 Terminal Server License
Terminal Server Client Access License (per client machine, non-concurrent)
Citrix Server Client Access License (per concurrent user)
Application License (per concurrent terminal session)
yup.. that's what I meant ... low-level, high-level mixup, silly me.
And I think it my even have been better than that... I think it may have been more like, "Draw a listbox at x,y with width w,h with these items in it", because you saw VERY little network traffic after a dialog was shown. But I have no idea how it actually worked.
Since Citrix is commonly used in conjunction with Windows clients to run remote programs, this program being Microsoft Office on some occasions, replacing Citrix with a cheaper solution and replacing the Windows clients with Linux (free), you can (duh) save money.
Lets look at a simple setup, where you have a Citrix (the XP edition, not the MetaFrame 1.8, which has a much higher intitial cost but is cheaper to add licenses too - $4,900 for the English, Win2k in fact) server providing access to Office 2000 to the type of crap systems you see on secretary workstations and library consoles around the nation: a Windows 95/98 machine with 64 megs of RAM and a 2.4 gig hard drive. A Citrix "starter" (5 licenses) runs you about $1900 bucks. The Office license is like $300-$400. The Windows client is dirt cheap or "paid for", but will still find a way to consume tech support time somehow. Oh, don't forget the cost of the Windows or Unix license for the server itself.
On the other hand, the CrossOver Office server is $1,195. With a Linux workstation and a Linux server, you dump the cost of the Microsoft licenses and can make the workstation into a true, no hassle thin client. You can then expand this equation: A 25 user licenses + Citrix runs you $5800-$8000, depending on the version. CrossOver Office would be $2,380 with 25 user licenses.
They could charge exhorbitant fees for full "security" auditing of software before signing it so that Office et. al. can run on it ("We have to protect the security of these key applications.").
This would require Codeweavers to pay up for each distro that they support, paying MS to audit the security of the product. And they in theory would require new audits for each revision. Hell, they could charge separate fees for different build options.
As of the last several M$ seminars I attended, they told us that Office was indeed now licensed per warm body, and sometimes PLUS a lic. per networked machine. (At least, as best the M$ rep could explain it. It's so damn convoluted that he confused himself while making the attempt. Boiled down to trying to collect *both* per seat and per user license money.)
The examples were: If you have one machine used by one secretary, that's one license, but if the machine is accessable AT ALL by anyone else (even if they don't actually use it), you need a lic. for each and every such person. If you have one home machine with two users, you're required to have two licenses. (Yeah, like that's going to happen.)
Needless to say this got much growling from the audience.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
From the top of the page you posted:
"This document addresses the most commonly asked questions about licensing Microsoft® Office in a Windows terminal server environment."
Terminal server refers to a specific microsoft technology. It is doubtful that using a non-microsoft technology would invoke these restrictions at all. Besides, you could always use an earlier version of office that didn't contain the above license restrictions.
-- Give me ambiguity or give me something else!
The ideal is to kick out all M$ proprietary licenses and go with strictly OSS applications. The reality is that most corporations cannot stomach the instant switchover. Sure, OpenOffice (and others) do a pretty good job of pulling up office docs. The're just not perfect, especially on a heavily scripted M$ environment. So, what's the answer?
Bring out Linux desktops that can run the native Linux apps and connect to the Crossover Server to get to the old proprietary apps. This puts Linux on the desktop immediately but allows them to go through the slow migration that is necessary to keep their businesses in operation!
Idealism takes time. The only way to be a true idealist is to first be a pragmatist. Patients and good innovation will win the day!
--==-- I've found Karma to be a relative thing... Ya know, the kind you invite to Christmas...
Note. Using Crossover is not a Windows Terminal Server environment. At all. Windows Terminal Server is a specifically defined product.
You do not need any license to connect a PC to a linux X server. There is a great deal of ambiguity as to whether the current licensing would require one office license for each concurrent user, or one for each piece of hardware that will display it. The version of office is ALWAYS run on the linux machine, it is just displayed and captures mouse/keyboard input from elsewhere.
Now, device is defined by Microsoft to mean anyplace it will contact any piece of hardware, but it is non-trivial to draw the line. Does a diskless client require a license ? How about if multiple people use wireless keyboards, monitors, and mice, but run it off the same machine ? Is then each wireless device required to have a license? Or just each combination (keyboard, mouse, monitor)? Or is the whole wireless net that all talks to one machine considered under one license?
Now, how is a thin linux client different from a wireless keyboard/monitor/mouse combination?
I think it would be fairly easy to convince a judge that per device licensing in a networked environment is completely ambiguous, whereas concurrent user licenses are straightforward.