[KLUG Members] Novell and Linux

[Tony Gettig]

I've been off the list for a couple of weeks. That pesky parenting
thing. Yeah, cloned myself again. That makes 7 little network engineers
to raise. Sorry if this topic has been covered already, but here's my
$.02 anyway. :)

At the annual NetWare homecoming event called Brainshare, Novell
announced that NetWare version 7.0 will run on either the NetWare OR
Linux kernel. Customers have the choice. What that means remains to be
seen. NetWare 6.5 is in open beta right now. One online article I read
said Novell is looking at 18 months from now for the release of NetWare
7. 

One of the things they've done is created Novell Forge. Yep, you
guessed it, just like SourceForge, but all Novell. It's great to see
they have 166 projects in there as of today, comprised of not only ports
of common Unix utils but also new Novell specific projects. The
difference now is much of it is being developed under the GPL. 

While I am ecstatic Novell is taking this radical approach to the
future of their business, recreating something like SourceForge might
not have been a great move. My initial thought is if they are going to
embrace the open source model, then they should consider the methods and
avenues that have helped Linux prosper, like Freshmeat and SourceForge.
Why reinvent the wheel? Why create your own "club" for your flavor of
open source?

So the question in my mind is this: if it looks like Linux, smells like
Linux, and tastes like Linux, why wouldn't I just run Linux and avoid
the licensing hassle? My gut feeling is that the NetWare OS will be
around but considerably less relevant. Their big push will be their
eDirectory on Linux. Managing the information of thousands of objects
(users, workstations, printers, volumes, filesystem ACL's, etc.) is
pretty darned slick with their directory. Their cash lifeline will be
their directory, not their OS. 

And THAT is where we all know Linux is headed...operating system
domination. But not in the sense that we attribute to the empire of Bill
the Gates. Maybe "domination" isn't the best choice of a word. How about
"operating system freedom" instead? I know many people said this a few
years ago, but the next few years are going to be very interesting to
watch as Linux grows...even more!

Tony Gettig