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Groklaw Guts the Novell/Microsoft Deal
walterbyrd writes "Pamala Jones, at groklaw, totally rips apart the Novell/Deal patent protection deal. From the article: 'Justin Steinman reveals that to market their SUSE Linux Enterprise Server against Red Hat they ask, "Do you want the Linux that works with Windows? Or the one that doesn't?" It's just appalling. Let me ask you developers who are kernel guys a question: When you contributed code to the kernel, was it your intent that it be used against Red Hat? How about the rest of you developers? Is that all right with you, that your code is being marketed by Novell like that? I also have questions about antitrust issues, with Microsoft being Novell's partner in such deals and sales pitches. Nothing speaks louder about Microsoft's true determination never to be actually interoperable than this conference.'"
Well its rather self-serving that an IBM employee would rip apart the Novell/Microsoft deal. Now if an uninterested and unbiased third party had something to say about the deal that would be insightful.
Using openSUSE instead of Windows since 9th of October, 2007 and liking it.
I don't mean to troll, but with the audience she's tending to, isn't this a bit like preaching to the choir?
Seriously, anyone that didn't see that one coming must have been asleep for a few years. SSDD for MS/Novell.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
..."totally rips apart the Novell/Deal patent protection deal"... Who's Deal?
Typo of Dell perhaps?
Using openSUSE instead of Windows since 9th of October, 2007 and liking it.
"Do you want the Linux that works with Windows? Or the one that doesn't?"
... but my enterprise needs computers that work and people who are competent enough to use something like pre-installed Ubuntu (hoo boy, guess they'll have to go back to school for that!)
The one that doesn't, of course.
To me, that's like asking, "Do you want the wrench that works with the Edsel, or the one that doesn't?"
I guess if I was an Edsel mechanic, that would matter. But since the Edsel sucks, and my business isn't repairing other people's Edsel's, I really couldn't care less... Yes, I am being glib, and I understand the needs of "the Enterprise"
If true, that's one hefty typo, considering that A and L are at completely opposite ends of the QWERTY keyboard.
"Pamala Jones, at groklaw, totally rips apart the Novell/Deal patent protection deal."
What's that Novell/Deal? Something along the lines of GNU/Linux?
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Classic Microsoft - leverage a partnership with a company seen as your enemy, yet try to do so to keep them at the mercy of the guys in Redmond. That's why MS has always tried to do with Apple - prop them up so they can be seen as viable, but make them your bastard stepchild anyway. This is just a more appalling trespass as they managed to get Novell in a position to market the hard work of thousands of contributors, who simply wanted a free viable alternative for those not wanting to be held to MS's will, in a way quite opposite of the motivation of that work.
I've always liked SUSE as a distro, but once the Novell deal went through, I knew it was only a matter of time until the sour taste was just a little too sickening, making it unconscionable to fathom dealing with them for the foreseeable future. There are better distros out there anyway.
Ignorance is the Agent of Fear; Fear Is the Agent of Violence - >1
"Well its rather self-serving that an IBM employee would rip apart the Novell/Microsoft deal"
Isn't it curious that the entire SCO/Microsoft legal team hasn't been able to come up with any evidence for this. But you carry on not commenting on the article and engage in a dishonest and personal attack - TROLL !!
was: Re:Self-serving
davecb5620@gmail.com
Contrary to the dreams of minority evangelists, the GPL outside of academia has only really been effective in the way Linus has used it - as an engineering choice, not a stamp of socialism. If you are contributing code under the GPL, then you are granting anyone the right to use that code however they please in accordance with the GPL - and if that means competing against your company, so be it. I'd be rather more surprised if a competitor didn't use your GPL code to gain a competitive advantage, if they could do so.
Stallman needs to either come out and say "I dislike capitalism" (and I'm not making a moral judgement on that statement) then incorporate an anti-capitalism clause in his license, or he needs to accept that firms work with the license because it is profitable for them. By extension, the various pro-GPL lawyers can either come out and declare their dislike for capitalism (in which case, they should be a lot more careful about where they practice and who they teach) or stick to worrying about the legal implications of the GPL rather than warm fuzzy feelings that some people associate with it that simply don't exist.
Seriously, so fricking what? This is how marketing works. If Linux wants to make it good in the big, bad business world, it needs marketing. Marketing involves half-truths, white lies, one-sided comparisons with competitors, massive amplififcation of small features, and a big dose of out-and-out bullshit. All Red Hat have to do is reflect in their marketing that their stuff works with Windows too - and I'm sure they already have people working on that.
This is all oriented to the PHBs out there that have been told to "investigate this Linux thing" and are afraid to step out from under the Microsoft umbrella.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
This is just the attitude that will keep Linux out of the main stream. Instead of praising the one organization that is actually gaining market share for a Linux OS, The /. community is branding them unworthy of geekdom. Reminds me of the novices asking for Linux advice being ridiculed and call noobs by the establishment.
Write your own Choose Your Own Adventure. http://www.freegameengines.org/gamebook-engine/
On the one hand, there is the M$ deal.
On the other hand, there are the Good Things that Novell has done, and does, for GNU/Linux and F/OSS.
On the third hand, there is me, and others like me, that I'm sure wonder about the MPD that Novell exhibits. To whit: I understand and agree that Open-solution based entities should be willing and able to work with proprietary companies. But it seems that in this instance Novell is going about that the completely wrong way, with the completely wrong company.
It's like there is Novell Darkside, and Novell Lightside, and ne'er the twain shall meet.
Maybe these are just the actions of a corporation that is so large that the different divisions inside of it are unaware of what others are doing, a la Sony.
"...there are some things that can beat smartness and foresight. Awkwardness and stupidity can." ~ Mark Twain
As disgusting as this might be, it's going to have very little impact on Linux. It's marketing and unfortunately even Free Software is not immune from marketing. RedHat markets as well with slogans like "more than mission critical".
While I can't defend what Novell is doing here, I do want to point out that after buying SuSE, they created an open-source community project around a distribution that was one of the most closely kept. The openSUSE project now releases free SUSE downloads - something SUSE had been against. Novell also bought Ximian which I think has a great reputation in open-source development and Novell has been continuing the work that they have done.
Is it possible that Novell needs this marketing to overcome the fact that it is a late entrant? Maybe, judging by the other things that Novell has done (opening up a formerly closed distro and continuing important work on open-source projects) it is ok to forgive them for this highly annoying example of stupidity? Maybe I'm just naive and this actually is a bigger deal.
To strain your analogy, there happen to be an awful lot of "edsel mechanics" out there.
To be fair to the "edsel mechanics", quite often they are not "edsel mechanics" by choice. For some unfathomable reason, the corporate world is in love with M$ and quite often the poor techie finds himself forced to work on edsels rather then jags.
How can Novell not care about that? They are benefiting from code that was written by people who are now not protected from patent claims from Microsoft, and Novell is making money from doing a deal with the company threatening them.
Need I say more. This deal is a shame.
-- Cheers!
"Before, Linux was this cloud we didn't get. I was high-fiving everyone I could find when Novell bought SuSe. We already won once against Novell." Martin Taylor, Microsoft General Manager of platform strategy link
Did Smith & Wesson want its gun to kill John Lennon (maybe Yoko, but not John!)? Did it ask itself this, and then do anything different? Just kidding about Yoko - her music makes blackboard screeches sound good now.
Even windows isn't working with Windows these days... what with Vista breaking so many apps that worked on all previous versions upto XP SP2. Novell making money from big corporate customers is only a very transient issue... once they figure out that Linux can work as well as Windows on servers and web-based services on Firefox-Linux desktops; they will eventually explore other non-tainted distros as well.
For a hospital where I consult, for instance, we have decided to go in with PACS-One deployed on top of Cent OS, not even RedHat. Other corporates will do likewise, once they understand what benefits Linux can bring them. This is a very transient and pyrrhic victory for Microsoft-Novell, and rightly so.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Let me ask you developers who are kernel guys a question: When you contributed code to the kernel, was it your intent that it be used against Red Hat? How about the rest of you developers?
If they wanted to contribute code to a kernel that wouldn't hurt Red Hat, they should have released it under some license that would prohibit competition against Red Hat.
What Ms. Jones doesn't seem to realize is that competition between software companies is a good thing. It leads to more innovation and a better end-user experience (after all look at Microsoft Word. We had only one major office suite and we have the same interface for over 10 years with minimal changes between 98, 2000 and 2003. OOo comes along and despite its small marketshare it still provided the impetus for Office 2007 to actually make real changes to the interface. Same with IE).
all sales are Microsoft sales to some degree now.
Except they're not. Red Hat sales aren't Microsoft sales. Neither are Mac sales. Only Microsoft (which is the majority of sales) and Novell sales. People migrating to Novell due to Microsoft's teeming with them is actually a good thing. This will help get people use to the Linux environment and allow other competitors such as Red Hat to offer better deals then Microsoft which will allow even further migration away from Microsoft. Or it could cause Microsoft to eventually dump its closed-source code and pitch in entirely with open source code. Now these last two options are going to take a long time to come to fruition (with it being doubtful if Microsoft will ever dump its closed source OS), however Linux has been around for a long time and it is only slowly gaining marketshare. If the Microsoft/Novell deal does increase the adoption of SUSE in favor of Windows, then this should actually help people move away from Microsoft in the long run.
My opinion is that Novell offers MonopoLinux
This is the first Groklaw article I've read and if this hyperbole is typical of its offerings I'm amazed so many people listen to it. This is of the quality one would typically find in a slashdot rant. I thought groklaw was actually a well respected website.
Long-term, that is the death of Linux as we know it, if Microsoft were successful in getting everyone to sign such a deal.
That's a pretty big if. Somehow I find myself doubting that Microsoft's fud campaign will manage to do little more then stagnate the small tide of people moving away from Windows for a short time. Eventually if you cry wolf long enough without producing one, people stop listening. If Microsoft doesn't ever go to court but simply continues to keep the fud campaign going year after year, people will stop listening.
But taking other peoples' code and going against their wishes, as reflected in the license
Which part of the GPL v2 says that people should be able to use, modify and distribute their patent infringing code without any repercussions? As I said, the FUD campaign will only work in the short term if all Microsoft does is provide fud.
The Microsoft lawyer there says the company is "very active" in looking for ways to work with the Open Source community without violating GPLv3, arrangements "similar" to the Novell deal. In other words, that type of exact deal is blocked. They are trying to figure out how to get around v3 in some way that is similar but not blocked.
And good luck to them. Personally I hope they fail. But if they don't try, then sometime down the line someone else will. Its better the loopholes be found now so it can be revised early on before v3 gains too much widespread acceptance and we have the difficulty of migrating to v4 that we're seeing with v3.
Of course, the large customers don't understand the implications of this deal to the FOSS ecosystem, but Novell should.
What concerns are these? Given this is my first article from groklaw all I'm seeing is
Using openSUSE instead of Windows since 9th of October, 2007 and liking it.
Groklaw served its purpose - SCO has been defeated and our victory was glorious.
This seems like PJ is desperately grasping at straws, trying to find another issue to keep her and her site relevant.
Developers are free to join a project to help improve it, they are also free to abandon such projects enmass to equally stifle the products development and therefore screw those companies who are relying on the developers efforts to bring to market a good product!
Yeah... Let's see you tell upper management that they need to pay to retrain the entire user base so that they can use *your* desktop operating system of choice rather than the desktop OS that both the company and everyone else in their business space has been using successfully for over a decade. Let's see you do that so you can get fired. Sounds like someone is still in school and has never had a real job. Trust me, kid, when you get out into the real world your thinking is going to get much more realistic.
How did the Edsel / Vista thing get in this conversation?
* Carthago Delenda Est *
Microsoft has some emerging issues it has to deal with:
.NET and Silverlight competing with Flash and AJAX web apps, XML markup base for Microsoft's new standards such as OOXML and XPS, IIS7 configuration XML files etc.)
:)
- the threat of a free OS commoditizing what they worked so hard to keep unique in Windows
- the emerging of accepted open standards that turn Microsoft's proprietary alternatives against themselves and wall them from the rest of the world
- the emerging of plenty of companies ready to deliver free OS components and support to Microsoft's corporate customers (which will directly affect Microsoft's bottom line and the industry trends in adoption of Windows)
Microsoft's business strategists have done a careful and detailed analysis of their situation and arrived at the infamous "patent deals". They have drawn the decision chart and figured, there's no way for them to lose, no matter how the market or their competition moves.
Possible outcomes & side effects:
- The patent threats split Linux community and cause unrest in corporate clients who consider adopting Linux for their servers or even desktops.
- Novell and the other distros in the patent deal are rejected by the community and Microsoft eliminates one of its more dangerous competitors should Linux' adoption really take off. -OR-
- Red Hat and the other distros OUT of the patent deal get destabilized and abandoned by the corporate clients and Microsoft gets to "coown" the Linux code together with Novell by means of the patent implementations all over the code. They can't just buy Novell now since it'll destabilize their Windows brand, and cause antritrust lawsuits. But should Windows go down next 5-10-15 years, you can be sure Microsoft will be talking to merge with Novell and offer their Linux distro with all the windows IP in it.
In essense Microsoft either gets to split the OSS movement, eliminate some of their stronger competirors, and improve the Windows brand and adoption, or gets a second route to quickly enter the market with Linux OS should Windows go horribly down, by utilizing all their Windows IP inside the Linux system.
What about standards:
- Where Microsoft has their own standard opposed to an open competing standard, they try to promote it to a full standard (OOXML, Exchange server integration with SUSE, ActiveDirectory integration with SUSE etc., XPS)
- Where Microsoft doesn't have their own standard, they adopt the publicly accepted standard, and extend it in attempt to create added-value dialect (RSS with own extensions in IE7,
So Novell's deal helps Microsoft make better penetration of Microsoft standards and technologies as something that comes standard with Linux. We're talking about Mono, Moonlight, Exchange integration, Samba integration and all those technologies which might have alternatives outside the Microsoft world.
This is marked to the public outside as interoperability effort. It sure is improving interoperability, but at the cost of putting more and more MS IP in Linux's distributions.
So was Novell wrong to sign the deal? If they had the pure intention to move the OSS community and help Linux as a whole, it was wrong. But as a company that competes against *OTHER* Linux distro companies, it was half right.
Right now if you see above all the outcomes from this deal (which are all good for Microsoft) there's 50/50 about who will survive (the non-patent deal Linux companies, or the patent deal Linux companies). Novell and RedHat are on the opposite sides of a gamble that'll play out in the next years.
While they're the gamble players, Microsoft is the casino. Never mind who wins, the casino always wins. Good job, MS
"From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs."
By making you redistribute your changes under the GPL, that's what the GPL does. The BSD license is libertarian: "Do what you want with this."
Software is probably the only place in the universe such a theory could work, too. Because you can make a copy of software and leave the original intact. You can't do that with any other type of resource, so the "from each according to his abilities" and the "to each according to his needs" parts of communism fail - demonstrably and miserably.
But because in the software world, making a copy doesn't disturb the original in any way, that concept does not fail at all - it actually works really well. All because one can take a software resource without actually taking it from someone else.
Beyond perceived deceptions and the toying of Microsoft, Novell is making money off open source developer's backs, so is RedHat, so a myriad of other companies that deal with any open source offering. I think if the article didn't pinpoint the Microsoft deal, its context could be expanded to cover the point of why people work hard for free and others make money. That doesn't seem ethical either. If open source falls it's not going to be solely because of Microsoft. It's going to be because the companies who make money from open source will gradually drive away the good developers who got nothing from it. Sure the odd developer will be picked up and paid for the effort but overall the synergistic nature of open source cannot support this load.
Dude, the keyboard isn't flat, it is an oblate spheroid. Flat keyboard are so 1490's :)
Not to defend Suse/Novell, but if Suse claims its distribution offers better Microsoft interoperability than Red Hat's distribution, that certainly seems to be within Suse's rights.
Does Pamela not think Red Hat slammed Suse's product before the Microsoft agreement?
I'm sure Linux vendors and promoters have used sales pitches claiming Linux is better than other open source operating systems like various BSD variants and Solaris. And I am sure the reverse is true.
The amazing thing is that CmdrTaco has enough time on his hands to change the OP title to something more appropriate (compared to how it appears in the Firehose), and expands the link to contain more words, but can't be bothered to fix the three other typographical errors that all occur within the first 10% of the OP.
Seriously, Im glad this discussion is on slashdot, because you sure as hell arent allowed a dissenting opinion on Groklaw. Any dissent immediately results in a post deletion by Pamela Jones.
I want a Linux that works with Windows.
But if I invest in Novell's (Suse) Linux(TM), will my Windows work with Linux? Or will I have to buy the Novell version of Windows for that to happen?
Those of us old enough will remember when Microsoft had certain licensing deals with Compaq, and if you bought a Compaq server, you also had to buy Compaq Windows NT, which was quite a bit more expensive than the Redmond version. If you tried to get around this by just buying the server and installing Microsoft's Windows NT, you'd find yourself with a dead machine - the BIOS actually checked the Windows version, and if it didn't have the Compaq magic number, would refuse to continue loading it.
I can foresee a time when Windows will check to see if it is connecting to an "authorized machine" - presumably, to improve security - and that it will simply fail to connect to a Linux box, unless it is running an MS-approved version. (aka, Suse).
The only reason why Microsoft tolerates Novell is because they realize that Linux has replaced UNIX in a lot of corporate environments. As soon as Linux becomes widely used on the desktop, Microsoft will treat Novell as they've treated all of their past partners. Novell seems not to understand this - they can market their version of Linux only to the extent that Redmond blesses it, and that is truly sad.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
They want Linux split to be able to taint the product, Microsoft got what they wanted. Novell stupidly falls into the trap.
For someone who's sucked more out of the community than has made any contributions, your opinion is worthless.
Yet Another Dumb Automotive Analogy.
"my enterprise needs computers that work and people who are competent enough to use something like pre-installed Ubuntu".
I really hate to point this out but Windows 2000 and XP do work. In an enterprise setting where they are behind a fire wall and locked down correctly Windows XP and 2K work pretty well. Add in the huge amount of custom software that many enterprises have written over the years in VB and you have a system that works well for many companies. So yes Linux is technically a better OS than Windows XP/2K but Windows isn't an Edsel.
I am interested just how Suse works better with Windows than other Linux servers do. This could be nothing more than marketing spin or Novell does have access to some hooks that other Linux providers don't
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Nice self-deprecation, although I did read your (now modded down) post below that claimed PJ was an IBM employee. So, I find your claims of this being the first Groklaw article you've read somewhat suspect.
No sig, sorry.
Hi Linus,
This one is a short letter. My expresso awaits for me. Its reallty this simple bro: take away from Novell the right to use the Linux trademark. Just threaten them to do so, theyll start behaving right away.
This are not just my 2 cents, im pretty shure most here will agree to me that this course of action is legal, tough and will get all vendors to play decently.
NO SIG
"free software; open source; freedom to choose; freedom to use software anyway you want to"
"As long as you only choose my way of thinking! If you are not thinking the same way I am you are against freedom!"
I'll give you whining Microsoft bashers credit for so perfectly following the US administrations ability to rename and make up things so that it fits your agenda. Way to fight FUD with better FUD!
Hypocrites.
one common goal - Problems that I've then disappeared Website Third, you And Michael Smith
The one that doesn't. The one that does will be loaded down with all sorts of bloat to cope with 20 years of shitty programing by 3rd rate "engineers" who's design briefs consist of a calendar with launch dates on it. Being compatable with that dog pile is no way to make a quality product. Which isn't a big deal for Novell, obviously.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
Nice analyses, except for one thing: it's only relevant for the USA. In the rest of the world, there is no patent question. In Europe, for example, MS is forced to open up their protocols, US patents or not. Even if the Novell/MS deals blows all American Linux-companies out of the water because of the patents, Linux will be legally used & developed all over the world. Novell GPL'ed Suse completely, so any Suse/windows compatibility will be used by all. If MS tries to prevent this, it will be kicked in the nuts by the EU. China and India will just laugh.
I really think MS made the big mistake here. They didn't expect the verdict in the EU antitrust case. They didn't expect their clients to almost pay for a downgrade to XP. They didn't expect the resistance against OOXML to have any succes. They didn't realise the windows-linux interfaces could be developed and out of the bottle this fast. Linux only got better, and 96% of the worlds population doesn't give a shit about the IP threat.
Trust me, I work for the government.
The openSUSE project now releases free SUSE downloads - something SUSE had been against.
No they required a high level of technical skill to install Suse.
I do not use Suse after Mickey$oft mettled with it.
...then he invented the O/S...then he invented the internet...then he invented windows...now he has invented linux...very interesting indeed.
Hedghog
Given that the license is largely the brainchild of Richard Stallman who has emphasized again and again that what's interesting to him is FREEDOM I'd say that the license is explicitly and intentionally designed to promote that freedom. I highly doubt that the propping up of patents which restrict that freedom was part of the intent.
I'm wondering if Microsoft wants anything to be interoperable. We practically have to pull strings to get different version of MS Office to work with itself. XP and Vista have serious issues when sharing resources (such as printers). Vista network and audio step on each other for performance. These are just a few examples of Microsoft's own products.
-- http://thegirlorthecar.com funny dating game for guys
Yep, that's exactly it. The FOSSie community is in love with IBM because they are giving them the anti-MS hate speech they so crave (as well as throwing several tons of money and an armada of lawyers behind it)... but at the same time are ignoring how IBM is seeking to own Linux (just like they will probably end up owning the OLPC). Control = Ownership, even if you want to leave a thin veneer of independence onto it.
The FOSSie community pays absolutely no attention to the fact that huge corporations are using them as a stick to try beating MS. But if MS were to just vanish... the FOSSie community has already sold it's soul, and has squandered any real claims to freedom in their all-consuming, hatred-driven "war" against all things Microsoft.
The day teh Lunix community rejects goofballs like Stallman and corporate overlords like IBM and Sun is they day they can start claiming some kind of real and meaningful freedom. But of course, they never will, because it would mean they have to do for themselves and stop making excuses... and over a decade of blaming Microsoft for all of teh Lunix's shortcomings never trained them for manning up and being their own guy.
Does anyone have a citation for this quote? There is no link to it from Groklaw. I searched Google for both the quote, and also for Justin Steinman to see if I could find it printed anywhere. I could not find anything. Other than Pamala Jones' I cannot find anyone elses reporting this statement. I do remember an article last week, but in it Mr Steinman does not say that Red Hat does not work with windows, only the Suse is reccomended by Microsoft. Saying he is dissing Red Hat is quite a jump from there.
Insert Generic Sig Here:
Novell joining msft to clearly defy the intent and spirit of the GPL is your idea of "marketing" ? At best, and mean at the very best, this sneaky deal is borderline legal.
Lets say, hypothetically, that I had a patent that I'm reasonably sure that Microsoft had violated, and would stick in court. Would I immediately go to the courts and demand compensation from Microsoft? Risk being litigated into the ground? Or would I instead turn against their customers, picking them off one by one, generating precedence, terrorizing their userbase and turn the market upside down? Yet we're not seeing this happen. Instead what we do see is people turning to the ones with the big bucks and making a licensing deal. Quick returns and all that.
Well, that's just my 2 cents.
Starbucks, Harbuckle of Breath.
The GPL is about as communist as:
"We The people"
or
"E Pluribus Unum"
Ever here of an old fashioned frontier barn raising?
Let's see about this "Windows just works" thing - yes, Windows apps are generally quite stable these days, and the system rarely bluescreens. However, on my 1 GB laptop with XP, running quite a few browser/office apps but nothing unusual, and fully patched as a corporate laptop, I have had the following issues
- have to forcibly reset the system every few weeks when it completely locks up - most recently this morning when I tried to do a standby and the whole system locked up
- install a new ATI driver to solve a bluescreen a few weeks ago - seems OK now, but I've never had a video driver crash on Linux
- on Saturday, found that every time I tried to run Windows Explorer, it crashed, taking down the main Explorer task bar - so I couldn't even browse filesystem to see what is wrong! Luckily I could work around this to discover that a particular copy protection DLL, which put itself in the temp directory, had been deleted by temp file cleanup, causing the crash. But why doesn't Explorer lock such DLLs? Of course, the copy protection DLL wouldn't be needed with open source apps, so this is something of an app bug.
- every few days I have to restart because Windows says 'insufficient memory to complete operation' - this is on a 1 GB box with a huge pagefile, and I'm only using 1.5-2 GB total! What on earth happened to virtual memory???
Meanwhile on my Ubuntu box, the admin is really zero now I'm using Feisty - my HP printer was discovered on the network by the HPLIP setup tool, and just worked. The only lockup I had was when Google's Picasa went mad and used 100% CPU, and even then I could kill it from an SSH login, so I didn't even need to restart X.
The point is that Windows does work, but it takes a huge amount of effort to keep it working, unless you have a very vanilla or locked-down system where you run only one or two apps and don't install third party software. Linux, and particularly Ubuntu or other distros with good package management, enables you to install a huge number of apps very easily *and they keep working*. My uptime on my Ubuntu box is regularly up in the months, but on my Windows box it's down to a few days, mostly due to the lockups.
BTW my Windows laptop above is behind a firewall but it isn't locked down fortunately. I'm sure a locked down Windows box is stable, but with Linux you can have a configurable, extensible system that can still be centrally administered for the core components and apps.
SuSE's whole 'we work better with Microsoft' is mostly marketing spin, and the Novell/Microsoft deal is incredibly dangerous. SuSE does apparently work well with MS networks, but so do some other distros, and there's nothing (apart from this sort of patent deal) preventing any distro picking up on SuSE's improvements.
Microsoft is not doing the Novell deal to help the Linux world - over time it will try to limit and encumber Linux with all sorts of required licenses, to control more and more of the Linux ecosystem.
What planet have you been on man?
For one thing, I don't believe you, this statement really makes me question your intentions.
"better ways of doing things eventually just replace the inferior things" - Linus Torvalds 09-08-07
What would the possible marketing effects of having a public deal with Microsoft be for Novell? Would you not expect that they would exploit any such deal based on interoperability? Of course they are going to market it that way.
This is an obvious marketing approach that was visible with the first mention of a deal with Microsoft.
Yes, Novell is presenting the main thrust of the Microsoft-Novell deal as being interoperability. But another way of stating the same thing is "embrace, extend, and extinguish". Microsoft has focused on competing with Open Source. In typical Microsoft fashion competing with Open Source means destroying Open Source. Part of Microsoft's attack on Open Source is that Microsoft paid Novell to participate in a plan to embrace, extend, and extinguish Open Source. Open Source is a producers co-operative and Novell is a member of that co-operative. If this attack succeeds in destroying the Open Source co-operative then Novell will end up in the position of having no product to sell.
Open Source has no choice but to defend itself against Microsoft's attack. In particular we have to defeat the Microsoft-Novell agreement. If Novell insists on hugging Microsoft then Novell runs the danger of becoming collateral damage in the war between Microsoft and Open Source.
Since Novell is being paid to help Microsoft embrace, extend, and extinguish Open Source then all of Novell's actions become suspect. Novell actively campaigned for OOXML in the fight between ODF and OOXML. Novell tried to get one of their employees appointed as head of standards at the Linux Foundation. Novell is actively introducing Microsoft proprietary standards into Open Source code in the Mono project and the Xen project. And there is the major problem that the Microsoft-Novell agreement is an attempt to use Microsoft's patent portfolio as a bludgeon to impose a Microsoft tax on all of the other distributions starting with Red Hat as the first intended victim.
Novell has contributed a lot to Open Source. But since the Microsoft-Novell agreement we are forced to view every Novell action through the lens of suspicion. As an example:
Novell has recently announced that a Novell employee will be paid to work full time on coordinating projects to write open source device drivers for Linux. On the face of it that is a great idea and a valuable contribution by Novell to Open Source. On the other hand the Microsoft astroturf gang made an effort about two years ago to promote the idea of writing Linux device drivers to Windows interface standards. That way the same driver could be used in both Windows and Linux. We ignored the idea.
So now we have to question Novell's motives in paying to support Open Source device driver projects. We cannot blindly trust Novell to be acting in Open Source's best interest instead of carrying out their embrace, extend, and extinguish obligations under the Microsoft-Novell agreement. Are they working on device drivers in a good faith effort to contribute to Open Source or are they trying to introduce device drivers written to Microsoft proprietary standards into the kernel?
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Steve Stites
Pamala Jones, at groklaw...
Is she any relation to Pamela Jones?
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"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
To start with, Novell is not selling the kernel as better than Red Hat's, as it is the same. What they are selling is that the SUSE distribution, that has some thousands of packages besides the Kernel (including propitary code) is more compatible with Windows than others.
If you live in a submarine, then maybe you don't care about interoperability, but most companies do because they have a mix environment.
please, stop treating us as UNINFORMED IDIOTS!
I wouldn't want the code I've contributed to be used against another Linux distribution. The bottom line is I don't think we should have to pay for interoperability, it's something that should be expected due to standards and what not. Is that not the whole reason standards were put in place, to make it so that applications could implement them and freely exchange the information?
Please read Pamela Jones' referenced article. The quote you are asking about is taken from a netcast linked in the first paragraph in Pamela's article. The page with the link to the netcast is here, clicking on this link will launch the mp3 file with that netcast. Those same links are pasted in their respective orders below, in case any one needs to copy and paste:
http://www.peapodcast.com/msc-oss-sig/index.html#osssig-2007-09-26-18-00-48
http://www.peapodcast.com/msc-oss-sig/MTLC-MS-Novell-2007-09-26.mp3
One thing that I really liked about this netcast: At one point, one of the Microsoft guys makes a huge concession, without really realizing it, because he states it so much as a matter of fact, and so much as an after thought. He says something like, "yeah, most of the students coming out of university are trained on Linux. I was a computer science student, and so I appreciate how great it is to be able to see the source code."
As IBM said in its GNU Linux commercials, "the future is open."
Another interesting thing: one of the Microsoft guys says "We've got the largest Linux server farm west of the Rockies!" All of these quotes are summaries, not verbatim quotes. Listen for yourself if you want the exact quote.
And yet another interesting quote by one of the Microsoft guys. "We walk around talking to our engineers, and they say, 'open source is such a cool way to get feedback. No wonder developers like to work in an open source environment.' " Again, that is a summary. Please listen for yourself to get the exact quote.
People just want to start pointless arguments.
Who cares if Novell wants to run attack ads against Red Hat? Where does it say in OSS that companies built on it have to love each other?
If the ads don't help Novell's pocketbook, they'll go away. If they do help, a Linux company get more business and Linux gets into more shops. That's a plus for Linux. If the ads work, Red Hat will try to become more interoperable with Windows. That's also a plus for Linux.
At the moment, some companies running Linux and Windows want interoperability. Eventually they're going to see that it's a waste of time and money - i.e., that Windows is a waste of time and money - and they might as well switch to Linux entirely. Then the issue becomes moot - and Linux wins again.
The problem with PJ is that she's too much into the adversarial nature of law. Everything is a big moral issue and needs to be fought over.
Ignore all of this. It's a non-issue. Microsoft is still losing against Linux and will continue to do so for the next ten or fifteen years until there is no Microsoft.
Relax and enjoy the show.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
Need refs plz for us drawfags.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
PJ's a l33t pwnrogue!
This has to do with sneaky under-handed deals, defying the spirit of the GPL, stealing the work of volunteers, and assisting msft with their illegal activities.
I'm a huge corporation. I decide to file a law suit against you for no good reason. You can either settle, and leave yourself nearly bankrupt, or you can fight and certainly go bankrupt - not to mention spending the next ten year in court. BTW: unless you have about $100 million you don't need, you can forget about suing me back.
That is all perfectly legal. So it would be cool with you, right? Nothing unfair, or unethical, about it, correct? The USA "justice" system is designed to allow this kind of massive abuse.
The analogy I provided is very similar to the way msft, bsa, riaa, and the mpaa, operate. And this msft/novl deal is designed to fully exploit the borked US system.