Bonum Certa Men Certa

Novell Befriends the School's Bully, Fights GNU/Linux with MS-IP/Ballnux

An Unsuccessful Anti-Red Hat Deal



In previous coverage of the latest development [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13], we stressed that Novell is getting closer to Microsoft and more hostile towards other GNU/Linux vendors.



Sean Michael Kerner summarised the news thusly: "The deal will provide a margin of profitability for Microsoft and help Novell in its fight with Red Hat."

“Novell has been living in Red Hat's shadow for a long time.”Novell has been living in Red Hat's shadow for a long time. Now it finds shelter in Microsoft's belly pouch where it's whispering "attack Red Hat". Novell has, essentially, sidled with a bully to scare all those other kids in the playground.

Despite a lot of this, Novell keeps losing prospective customers to Red Hat based on merit and reputation alone. Here is a new example, as told by a $3-billion-dollar company.

When Sabre began to move from proprietary systems, the company evaluated other open source operating systems including Novell's SUSE Linux Enterprise but concluded that Novell was not as "mature" or respected as it is today and decided Red Hat was a more "proven" option, he said.


It's clear that Novell suffered from Red Hat jealously. It lived in a state of uncertainty. It became accustomed to milking the Netware cash cow, which got depleted over time, leading to trouble. Back in 2005, when Red Hat was doing pretty well, Ron Hovsepian said that open source was slowing. It was less than a year later that Hovsepian inherited the helm and Novell strategised on something different.

It's About Software Patents



Watch the following good post from Don Marti.

Well, some people don't listen to Julie Bort's advice. At Microsoft Subnet, she wrote, "At this point in the game, Microsoft should really come clean with a statement that rescinds its Linux/patent/suing threat altogether."

Good idea, but no such luck. This morning's press release haul brings "Microsoft and Novell Expand Successful Interoperability Relationship," which says,

"Microsoft Corp. and Novell Inc. are announcing an incremental investment in their relationship to meet accelerating customer demand for their business model solution, which is designed to build a bridge between open source and proprietary software to deliver interoperability and intellectual property (IP) peace of mind for organizations operating mixed-source IT environments."

Intellectual property peace of mind. Novell has a solid Linux, and punches above its weight in kernel contributions, so why does the marketing strategy so often come down to whining, "buy from us instead of Red Hat, or Microsoft will sue you?"


Interoperability? Not So Much.



Here's Peter Judge's take:

Myself, I think that virtualisation and document interchange are multi-platform by definition, so how much work is there really in those areas?


And at Linux Today:

So much for the "open" protocols MS published if they require special collaboration.


Microsoft deliberately made things incompatible by pushing OOXML with corruption and by plaguing hypervisors with a validation program that only Novell is permitted to be part of. It's very clearly an anti-Red Hat move. Microsoft and Novell are, first and foremost in this case, anti-Red Hat companies joined by an anti-Red Hat alliance and pro-software patents push.

Watch this comment (complaint) about parroting of a press releases.

I say, good job at parroting Microsoft's email, sugar-coating this alliance that is going nowhere with either Linux or Windows users. Businesses are not looking to buy into Novell's Microsoft licensing backdoors either.

Simply put, Novell is being paid by Microsoft to support MS-OOXML. That's all that's come out of this alliance -- press releases! And has anyone used Novell's version of OpenOffice? It honestly sucks.

Lastly, please, please name names of anyone you know who is exchanging MS-OOXML documents. They're not online, that's for sure. OpenOffice would be smart not to waste their time.


As Matt Asay just put it, "Microsoft wants to 'build Windows,' but how about bridges?"

Build bridges, not toll roads.

Through closed standards, aggressive patent FUD, and proprietary Office file formats and SharePoint repository, Microsoft has effectively declared war on the very idea of "breaking down barriers that prevent people and ideas from connecting"...unless you happen to be using 100 percent of Microsoft's software to do the job.

One of the biggest trends to knock down barriers to true interoperability has been open source and the open standards it espouses, yet Microsoft has sought to impose a patent toll on open source. For those interested in connecting with Microsoft's technology, Microsoft is glad to oblige, but only on its terms, with Microsoft firmly in control. Open source, however, believes in a very different kind of interoperability.


People are not happy, but press releases from Novell and Microsoft tell a different story. The worst thing one can do is repeat those stories and lend credibility to them.

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Google 'Search' is Fast Becoming No Better Than Social Control Media Infested With Bots
Google emerged almost 30 years ago as a company looking to organise the Web and direct people towards informative pages. That Google is dead.
Before the OSI Was Bribed and Hijacked by Microsoft via GitHub and Compromised Management...
The OSI isn't even remotely "woke"
The OSI Has Been Silent for Over 3 Weeks, It Has a Severe Trust Issue After Promoting Microsoft and Proprietary GitHub
OSI took a lot of money from Microsoft to become a Microsoft lobbyist
Bribery is OK If You Work for Microsoft (No Punishment Expected)
It's very troubling and a symptom of a broken society/system when particular laws or rules are applied and enforced against some people but not against others
Someone Should Remind Microsoft Lunduke That Microsoft Hires Many Sexual Criminals and Pedophiles as Well
Microsoft Lunduke on an "expedition" to find one or more perverts, then generalise to everyone in the "community"
Cash Machines (ATMs) Make Mistakes and They're Proprietary Software
Correcting mistakes is a colossal challenge
Yes, Microsoft is the Problem
"I am no MS shill."
Another Failed Use Case for Chatbots (LLM): Legal Advice and Analysis
They're just some self-discrediting toy that costs way too much to operate
 
Not Owning Mobile Phones
It's not about resistance; it's common sense
PCLinuxOS Had Functional Backups Before the House Fire, the Site Will be Restored in New Webhost
This is the direction we want for GNU/Linux, not some IBM sales strategy
Gemini Links 30/07/2025: Two Sides of Me and "Hooked on Cosmic Voyage"
Links for the day
Microsoft Will Continue Resorting to Crimes in Order to Keep GNU/Linux Usage Down
It is a real problem and we'll revisit it later this week
GAFAM 'Revolving Doors' at The Register and a "Bribe Price List"
"an analyst at Microsoft"
Microsoft Rapidly Shrinking (No, It's Not About Efficiency, It's About Unbearable Debt)
We'll soon see how much debt grew in the past quarter
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 29, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 29, 2025
Corruption is the Standard Operating Procedure at the European Patent Office (EPO)
The EPO is a dictatorship that stains Europe
Local Staff Committee Munich (LSCMN) at the European Patent Office (EPO) Requests an Urgent Meeting to Avoid Abolishing the Office
This is dictatorship led by the most corrupt
Slopwatch: Fake 'Linux' 'Articles' and Spamfarms/Slopfarms
at least 5 fake articles in one day
Gemini Links 29/07/2025: Wayland Unfit for Use and LLM Slop Faking One's Language Skills With Robot Communications
Links for the day
Nailing the "Hey Hi" (AI) Hype Bubble
So-called "hey hi" as they define it now is all about large companies or regimes remotely controlling the processes running on your machine and even your very own behaviour on your machine, which is in effect no longer your machine but some remotely controlled apparatus
"Four decades; Four freedoms; For all users" Now as a T-shirt
That's shown along the sidebar
Links 29/07/2025: Bad Climate and "Fair Software Licensing" Blasts Microsoft
Links for the day
Links 29/07/2025: Data Brokers Gone Wrong/Rogue and "Copyright Thicket"
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Linuxconfig.org, Linuxsecurity.com, Fagioli, The Register
Today's "Slopwatch" isn't the first article about LLM slop
We Cover Topics Other Sites Are Too Afraid to Cover (Even When They Know the Facts)
It's not that they doubt the truth, they just realise there may be consequences for talking about it
They Try to Tell Us the Free Software Foundation Inc is Dying, But Its Revenue Doubled Since the Dot-Com Bubble Burst
Being in "Activism" is never easy; but it does positive things for society
It's About the Cost of Workers, Not the Fictional Skills Shortage (That Does Not Exist, the Media Spreads False and Sometimes Self-Fulfilling Narratives)
This issue isn't limited to computing, some dub it "globalism"
Links 29/07/2025: More Pushbacks Against Slop and More Praises of Tom Lehrer
Links for the day
Gemini Links 29/07/2025: Purple Yarrow and Understanding Op Amps
Links for the day
This Monday WebProNews Absolutely Flooded the Web With Fake (LLM Slop) 'Articles' About "Linux", Google News Promoted Them as Legitimate
All of the following are fake articles attributed to pseudonyms or authors that don't exist; the images are also slop. Why does Google promote these?
Linuxiac is Not a Slopfarm, But at Least Some of Its Articles Are Machine-Generated Fakes
what we said about it was correct
Expect More Microsoft Layoffs
"Are more job cuts coming?"
Microsoft Behaving Like It's Running Out of Money to Pay Salaries
Does that seem like the behaviour expected from a company which claims it is "worth" trillions?
LWN Downtime Due to Linode, Not LLM Bots
"I’ve received an email letting me know that there is a potential for data loss."
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 28, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, July 28, 2025
Nonfree Software in My Bank, by Richard Stallman
Updated 8 hours ago
Links 28/07/2025: Science, Health, and Conflicts
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Healthy Self-Image With Autism and a "New Life"
Links for the day
Links 28/07/2025: COVID-19 Sped up Brain Aging, "Circumvention is More Popular Than Compliance"
Links for the day
Richard Stallman is Usually Right Because He Thinks "Outside the Box"
he is able to observe society (mores and norms) as somewhat of an outsider
LWN Has Been Down for a Long Time, Another Casualty of LLM Bots?
Time will tell. How much time though?
Slopfarms Versus 'Linux' (and Against People Who Write Real Articles About GNU/Linux)
LLM slop in slopfarms by Brian Fagioli and Redazione RHC
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray and Running pkgsrc in a FreeBSD Jail
Links for the day
Microsoft Turns News Sites Into Spamfarms
Is the site The Register MS the next IDG?
The Register MS/The Register US
On Saturday I contacted them for a comment (before issuing criticism)
Hacking revelations at Vatican Jubilee of Digital Missionaries
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 27, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 27, 2025