Caldera IPO?

Richard Finney wrote in to send us a a CNet news bit over at Netscape that talks about Linux IPO hub-bub with comments about Caldera, VA, and LinuxCare.

profits vs. loss

[Suydam]

I was wondering if anyone knew whether these companies (RH and Caldera) are profitable right now? or are they more like Amazon, that is, expecting to sustain losses for some time before becoming profitable.

Re:Has /. a problem?

[unitron]

Considering all the wires involved in the Internet I'm not sure that "off-air" is quite the right phrase. (I object to "Ethernet" for the same reason.) Perhaps "off-line", "down", or the old broadcast term "to go dark".

to fix the quote...

[cswiii]

"OS/2 and Windows NT are proprietary systems. The interface and design are controlled by a single corporation, and only that corporation many implement that design."

s/many/may/g

I'm really torn....

[cswiii]

Red Hat? Caldera? Which is the lesser of two evils?

I'm leery about this Linux IPO craze. Certainly, corporate embracing of Linux is a Good Thing (tm), and these IPOs might further interest in Linux all the way around. However, stock == stockholders, who thus have a say in what occurs at the company.

Granted, Linux will always be free. But if one Linux distributor becomes the de facto standard within industry, software with dependencies for a given distribution will inevitably occur.

Consider MS-Windows: There's the platform, and then the Office components, etc., which are used with it. Sure, you can find other programs if you don't want to use Office. But how much can/will this slow down your communcation and growth.

If one player becomes the dominant force in Linux, I fear that the same thing will happen. Granted, if distro-specific dependencies become prevalent, people will write alternatives. But if a corporation or person feels nonetheless complied to use a given distro, so that they won't 'lose ground', hasn't a major aim of Linux advocacy thus been abandoned?

Directly from Red Hat's Linux Undercover:

"OS/2 and Windows NT are proprietary systems. The interface and design are controlled by a single corporation, and only that corporation many implement that design."

Yes, regardless of the corporate interests of Red Hat and/or Caldera, Linux will always be free. But remember, (free == libre, != beer), 'Free' becomes a relative term, when one has to adhere in order to exist? What incentive/purpose is there for the user to use Debian or Slackware at home, if at some point, all the software he'll have to use/program/debug at work will only work with Red Hat?

Money to be made

[rwilliams]

With RedHat, Caldera, and others going IPO there is some money to be made with linux. With Corel porting many of their fine applications to Linux, I wonder if/when we will get Intuit to convert Quicken to Linux? This is the last Windows app I use.

Re:I'm really torn....

[mopsuestia]

That is why it is so important to push standards such as FHS. Linux distibuters should be encouraged by users to adhere to commonly agreed upon standards. Users should also put pressure on commercial software producers to write software that adheres to those standards.

One thing that I find very reassuring is that Corel has chosen Debian upon which to build its distrobution. Debian is very interested in adhering to standards and once potato (Debian 2.2) is stabilized it should have full FHS compliance [debian.org]. I can't guarantee that Corel will share that interest, but it is at least moving in the right direction. And with Corel Office, Ventura, and Draw being ported to Linux (and probably tailored for their distro), I think other Linux distributors will have to comply to those standards in order to allow their userbase to use those important apps.

I think the corporate world, stock holders and all, will actually help unify Linux rather than fragmenting it. Sure there will be more distro's popping up, and that's okay. But if they want to be able to take abvantage of the big non-OSS apps, then they will have to comply with standards.

CLDF

[gralem]

If Utah's own "Caldera" is about to go IPO, what is the Utah company called "Caldera" that is CLDF???