Novell News

More on the open source project front … Novell has released additional source code to the iFolder project. Now it’s the iFolder server components that are open source. The project has previously included the iFolder clients for Linux, Macintosh and Windows. The server components include the full iFolder server, with administration, policy management and the Web access module for access to files anytime, anywhere. Interest is growing in the project as the number of registered users has more than doubled in the last few months. The open source community has contributed to documentation, client builds for various Linux desktop distros, and testing of the clients. By making more iFolder code open source, Novell expects the project to progress even faster and help get the complete iFolder solution into more hands that will benefit from it. More info on what iFolder is and does can be found here.

To manage its Microsoft environment, M&T Bank evaluated 10 different software vendors and selected Novell ZENworks to manage its 2,000 ATMs and more than 15,000 desktops. With remote management from a central location, the bank no longer has to dispatch technicians to update each ATM — a cost savings of $500 for each visit. With centralized desktop management and remote control, the bank reduced PC-problem travel expenses and dispatches by 20 percent. That’s a solution you can take to the bank.

Novell is participating in today’s Linux on Wall Street conference at several levels. First, we put out a joint release today with Reuters at the show about support for the Reuters Market Data System on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server. Obviously, something like this is demand driven, so it’s nice to know that financial service firms are asking for Reuters data on Novell’s Linux. Second, we’re sponsoring the event and exhibiting at the show. And third, Carl Drisko, one of our top Linux and open source guys with great experience in the financial services arena, is participating on the closing panel at the show.

Who doesn’t want to hold a world record? Sun Microsystems’ Sun Fire X2100 servers just set two new world-record benchmarks for real-world mechanical computer-aided engineering (MCAE) applications. The servers were running 64-bit SUSE Linux Enterprise Server from Novell. Read more about it here.

Novell announced today it has acquired e-Security, a leading security and compliance company. This move will help strenghten significantly Novell’s security offerings by providing real-time compliance monitoring capabilities that link closely with our existing identity management offerings. For those of your who like to listen, rather than read, your news, we’ve got a few audio options for learning more about the deal. The webcast of the press conference is available here. The guys over at Novell Open Audio have also put together a couple of podcasts on the deal. This one provides an overview of the synergies we see. The other, which features e-Security founder and CTO Reed Harrison, specifically addresses e-Security customers. Both highlight the value the deal brings to customers. Have a listen.

The OpenDocument Format Alliance has grown to 138 members around the world, after starting with 36 members just last month. That’s according to an announcement from the ODF Alliance today. Novell is all about open standards, which is why we’ve been part of the alliance since it formed, working with other members to help ensure that public sector information, records and documents are accessible across platforms and applications, now and in the future. That’s done through the promotion and use of OpenDocument format. Our standard document format within Novell is now ODF, the default in OpenOffice 2.0. Take it from an average Joe who creates, sends and receives a lot of documents, internally and externally … ODF works as advertised.

We’ve had a lot of calls today on the Financial Times article – subsequently picked up by the wire services and others – about Oracle’s possible moves in the Linux space and potential interest in Novell. As a policy, Novell doesn’t comment on rumor and speculation, and we won’t be talking about this. Our energies remain focused on our core businesses around Linux and open source and security and identity management.

This article seems like a fairly damning admission from Microsoft about the current state of the security challenge on a Windows platform. I wouldn’t think the proposed solution is one too many administrators would like to try. And there’s little to suggest that this situation will get better before it gets worse. Linux certainly has proven itself more immune to viruses and malware than many other platforms. Add on AppArmor, and you’ve got a very secure platform for running your business. This seems to me like a better way….

There has been a lot of talk this week about Microsofts recent virtualization announcements. First thing to point out is Microsoft recognizes that Linux is ready for the enterprise. Customers are demanding it, and Microsoft has acted. With SUSE Linux Enterprise 10, we will ship the Xen 3.0 hypervisor the first enterprise-ready Linux virtualization product to reach the market. And while Microsofts interim Virtual Server does software emulation of hardware, we are taking a hypervisor approach, which provides more reliability and greater performance, among other benefits.It’s always nice when Microsofts announcements show validation for Linuxs role in the enterprise. Kind of makes you feel all warm inside, doesn’t it?

We’ve had a number of inquiries about Novell’s take on today’s announcement by Red Hat that it is acquiring JBoss. Here’s our statement:Novell is committed to delivering a full open-standards-based infrastructure stack to our customers. Our model is to build, buy and partner to deliver and support that stack and to continue to allow customers to choose the best mix of proprietary and open source technologies based on open standards. To date, we have partnered with and supported many proprietary and open source alternatives for application servers, including IBM Websphere, BEA Weblogic, JBoss, Tomcat and Geronimo, to name a few. We have a contract in place with JBoss and we plan to continue to honor that contract. Our approach in helping customers define their Open Enterprise is completely customer driven. We will continue to offer and support the components of the stack that customers request.