Recent Novell Session (Score 2, Interesting)

I was recently at a Novell/IBM/VMware session in Omaha, NE last Thursday. Novell harped on nothing but their detication to Linux and how they are integrating Ximian with what they are offering. It appears they want to be one stop shop from client to servers. Also it appears they are accumulating quite the zoo (penguin, monkey, and chamelion). First, about Ximian. Red Carpet is here to stay. IBM uses it extensively in several of their deployments, and Novell will continue to fulfill those obligations. From the looks of it, Red Carpet is probably going to be on the Linux side what Zenworks is on the Windows side for desktop management. Mono is also going to be integrated, helping balance out dirXML. I did notice however that Gnome+Ximian additions is probably going to be the main desktop choice when Suse is fully integrated with Novell later on in 2004. KDE will still be supported, but will not be the preferred support choice. I found it very nice that Novell is doing support calls for Linux - any Linux - even if you aren't a Novell customer. Just have to pay up on the support calls - but the support will be there. I have found Novell tech support to be the best out of all the vendors I've had the (dis?)pleasure of talking with. For support for Suse and Redhat, it was repeated several times that both platforms will be supported equally. As for other distos, they said it was just a problem of having to code install routines for all the 150 or so products they have. They'll probably run, but just getting them installed is the hard part. Next I found it interesting that Novell is in the process of converting all their corporate workstations to running Linux this spring. This means moving all their management, Groupwise, Instant Messenger, etc to run on Linux. Novell has had several Linux products out for more than year or so. Linux Enterprise Services 2.0 is in beta, and was handed out on CD to try out. I think it can also be downloaded on their website (haven't checked though). One question was asked on SCO, the rep's response was that, "Novell is still asking that SCO give definite proof of their copyright and patent claims." The IBM reps that were there mostly harped on how good their hardware was in combo with VMware - basically marketing humdrum. The VMware stuff was interesting with their ESX and GSX products (such as migrating running virtual machines between physical boxes without bringing down the virtual machine) - but was also more marketing.