Novell Results Are in: Net is Down Very Sharply (36%)

Dr. Roy Schestowitz

2009-02-26 22:52:45 UTC
Modified: 2009-02-26 22:59:25 UTC

Sell Novell

FORECASTS [1] and waiting games [2] are both over. Novell's latest results are in and they are no better than the last quarter's (revealing that Novell operates at a considerable loss).

So first of all -- let's start with the good news. Novell employees needn't worry about Ron, who received a $6.9 million compensation plan for his 'wonderful' achievements. It was similar two years ago.

But what are these achievements? Driving the company to this?

Novell Inc.'s (NOVL) fiscal first-quarter net income fell 36% on sharply lower interest income as invoicing fell short of expectations.

Here are the earnings figures:

For the first quarter, the company reported earnings of $10.7 million, or 3 cents a share, compared with $16.8 million, or 5 cents a share, in the year-ago period.

Revenue is down too:

Novell reported net revenue of $215 million, compared to $231 million previous year. Ten Wall Street analysts expected revenues of $229.95 million.

This pretty much confirms what we already know about the layoff because the company must explain to investors what it will do next. Novell has already laid off at least 25 SUSE-focused employees. They would have cost about 25 x $70,000 = $1.75m to keep per year. So they could, in principle, work for 4 years with a good wage at the expense of that "compensation" for Ron Hovsepian. How does it feel to be shafted by the very same management that sold out to Steve Ballmer, who is already busy suing Linux [1, 2]?

“Did they learn nothing from those FAT patents?”Meanwhile, elsewhere inside the company, Novell is making .NET more popular. Did they learn nothing from those FAT patents? Is Novell just another Microsoft department now? One that's producing Windows software like NetWare and some Microsoft 'plugins' or Microsoft 'addons' for GNU/Linux (Mono, Moonlight)? For that task, Microsoft must be inside GNU/Linux, hence the alliance with Novell. They get to be inside SUSE, they have indirect membership in places like the Linux Foundation [1, 2, 3] and that's just the tip of the iceberg. They gag critics that way. Even Red Hat must keep polite now.

As a side note, since everyone is talking about TomTom at the moment, it's worth emphasising that this patent situation shows precisely what Microsoft might do with Mono and Moonlight and why it wants them inside GNU/Linux (Moonlight brings Mono with it to desktops like KDE). Novell increasingly focuses on Microsoft technologies. One of our readers said one hour ago that he tried "compiling mono from SVN on [his] gentoo box and it crashes with a sigsegv in the make process."

The reader claims: "I go ask at #mono (on the gnome irc network) and miguel says 'gentoo is eternally broken'."

That's nice. On the face of it, the only thing that's "eternally broken" is Novell. And to quote other people, “Novell Is bleeding to death.” ⬆ ____

[1] The Outlook

Computer maker Dell Inc., retailer Kohl’s and software developer Novell Inc. of Waltham report quarterly financial results.

[2] Dell, Gap, Kohl's, Novell on earnings deck

Novell Inc., which provides open source software for businesses, is foreseen posting fiscal first-quarter earnings of 6 cents a share on revenue of $227.4 million. Its shares were up 1.2% at $3.34.

Comments

Myfraudsoft

2009-02-26 23:42:29

Well of course, Gentoo is "eternally broken". Any non-Ballnux distro is.
Ghazan

2009-02-27 00:07:56

You have been talking about big cuts at Novell coming this week, but nothing happened. Was your source, who you were so sure about, just wrong?
Roy Schestowitz

2009-02-27 11:54:52

Novell could axe jobs on falling demand http://www.thewest.com.au/default.aspx?MenuId=3&ContentID=127140
a

2009-02-27 12:21:36

Gentoo is broken because people who don't understand the implications of applying a specific compiler option apply it anyway. It's a known fact that GCC can break applications when aggressive optimisations are enabled. If users don't understand this, it's their fault and maybe their distros fault for not making this clear.

There are many OS projects out there who won't deal with gentoo related crashes for exactly this reason.
Dan O'Brian

2009-02-27 12:33:54

Your friend Balrog also refused to take suggestions on how to get it to compile.

Pretty dishonest overall, not that anyone expects any less of you and your trolls.
Ian

2009-02-27 13:16:19

One that’s producing Windows software like NetWare

I just tried to install Netware on windows. It didn't work.
Roy Schestowitz

2009-02-27 13:25:40

IPX/SPX, Windows drivers, etc.
Balrog

2009-02-27 13:44:39

I was looking for suggestions in the first place (or I wouldn't be there). I didn't get any useful information overall; apparently no one knows / no one cares. Obviously, the Gentoo people blame Mono (I asked at #gentoo too) by saying it's probably buggy code (it sure seems that way).

All I got from #mono was that Gentoo was doing something weird, which after checking the ebuilds, wasn't true, and the patches Gentoo applies are bugfixes that are already incorporated into trunk. Just my two cents. I want something that works, and if it doesn't, there is a need to fix it.
Ian

2009-02-27 13:56:21

IPX/SPX, Windows drivers, etc.

IPX is basically dead. Novell isn't a hardware company, so what drivers are they making? I don't understand what you're angling at?
Roy Schestowitz

2009-02-27 14:15:30

Client side mostly.

A lot of the networked environments they target are just enabling Windows clusters, at least based on my personal experience. "Windows software like NetWare" was a quickly-thrown-in phrase that I wrote in IRC and then passed over very sloppily for a blog where the key part was "Microsoft ‘plugins’ or Microsoft ‘addons’ for GNU/Linux."

Novell is still dependent on Microsoft and Windows. It complements the empire of an abuser. And that was the key point.
Acai

2009-02-27 14:16:09

It’s a known fact that GCC can break applications when aggressive optimisations are enabled. If users don’t understand this, it’s their fault and maybe their distros fault for not making this clear.
Ian

2009-02-27 14:18:41

You're not wrong then. But you're also ignoring the fact that almost all of their customers run Windows on the workstation. Are you advocating Novell stop support Windows? If Novell considered that at any point in the near future, they might as well just lock the doors and call it now.
Roy Schestowitz

2009-02-27 14:23:54

It has always made Novell an odd bedmate for S.u.S.E.
Ian

2009-02-27 15:03:25

When you think about it, not really. NetWare was a dead end without a major rebuild and lacked 3rd party support. Novell's desktop strategy isn't very clear, but their server strategy is, which explains Suse.
Dan O'Brian

2009-02-27 15:17:54

Balrog: First off, it's pretty dishonest of you to:

1. complain when svn won't build (svn, by its very nature, is in flux) 2. not mention which revision on which branch you are even talking about 3. not mention which gcc flags you used (for mono /and/ the rest of your system, e.g. glibc, etc) 4. compiling software on gentoo is asking for problems. according to google, people have problems compiling KDE and the stability of KDE apps (and no doubt other apps) on Gentoo systems.

Once again, purposely trying to fail - just like Roy's other friend who purposely tried to fail to build Moonlight so that he had an excuse to fail. And... just like him, you chose to build from svn.

Dishonest? Or just retarded?

I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to decide.

If you really want Mono or Moonlight, and you just *have* to compile your own instead of using packages, why not at least use released versions? Preferably source packages put together by your distro maintainers.
Anonymous

2009-02-27 16:42:39

> Novell could axe jobs on falling demand

You're avoiding to answer Ghazan's eligible questions. You have been touting imminent huge layoffs. So where are they? Or will you for once admit that your site is only about spreading FUD?
Roy Schestowitz

2009-02-27 16:49:00

Be patient. My source was reliable.
saulgoode

2009-02-27 16:52:45

If you really want Mono or Moonlight, and you just *have* to compile your own instead of using packages,...
Isn't that *required* if anything other than Microsoft's proprietary codecs are to be used?
Roy Schestowitz

2009-02-27 17:03:21

..Which would be wiser now that Microsoft is suing Linux and looking for infringements inside it (e.g. FAT)?

See this article for details.
Balrog

2009-02-27 17:48:49

@Dan O'Brian: I was compiling from SVN to test out the new .NET 3 support and Silverlight 2.0 support. I'm not complaining about the build failing, but about their refusal to help and telling me to ask at #gentoo (where those people tell me it's a bug in Mono).

I have used release versions, and yes, the do work (fine in Gentoo, by the way), but that's not the point here. SVN is there for testing, and if it doesn't work, troubleshooting is necessary so the maintainer can fix the problems. Seems like this wasn't the case in this situation. I used the 'moon' branch from SVN, latest rev. My gcc flags are quite standard (I'm using regular 'make' by the way).

@saulgoode: Yes, you need to compile from source to use ffmpeg codecs, but not from SVN. (The ebuild for Moonlight in the gentoo portage tree doesn't have an option for proprietary codecs, by the way.) Silverlight 1.0 support does NOT require Mono, so that makes it easier. But to test the new features that are supposed to be coming soon (basically .NET 3.0 support and Silverlight 2.0 support), you need SVN mono and SVN moonlight. I understand it may be broken, but dismissing the problem and blaming the distro people isn't going to fix it.
Gentoo User

2009-02-27 17:57:21

Be patient. My source was reliable.

That wouldn't happen to be the same "source" you used here, would it?

By the way,

How does it feel to be shafted by the very same management that sold out to Steve Ballmer, who is already busy suing Linux

Your callousness is appalling. It's easy to sit there and pontificate like this to normal people who have nothing to do with your grievances when you don't have a job to lose, a family to feed or apparently any other sort of responsibility beyond writing a blog and pretending you're important, isn't it?
seller_liar

2009-02-28 13:19:34

Mono (and some other mono packages) from stable release fails a lot .Sometimes , Mono and mono packages does not detect the dependencies correctly (gtk-sharp, gtkhtml, ligdiplus and other monodevelop).

Result : all autconf tests passes, but the app does not run.Or autconf does not find dependencies.(Mono packages does not use similar PATH)

Monodevelop installs but does not run if some dependence have not found.The big problem is the monodevelop autconf runs 100% , but fail when try to run monodevelop

Changing One's Name Won't Change One's Past: People who have earned a bad reputation are not magically "entitled" to reset
People Who Assault Women Are Not Victims of "Distress": It seems like an American tradition. In a country with almost 50 presidents, not even one was a female.
Adoption of Gemini Protocol Still Growing: Gemini Protocol is being obscured by the media - it doesn't help that Google 'hijacked' the word "Gemini" - but people still manage to find out about it, download a client, and use it
Brett Wilson LLP "Takes it Personal" (Character Assassination, Not Professionalism). Everybody Can See That.: On behalf of violent men
Pissing Contests and Pissing Off Everyone: people who came from Microsoft are trying to vex and divide the community
Microsoft Repeats the Mistakes Made by the EPO After We Exposed a Major Microsoft/EPO Scandal 10 Years Ago: That scandal was all over the media, not just in English
The Firm That Picks on Techrights is Accustomed to Working With Criminals: Techrights never did anything illegal. So why is it being picked on by people who work with criminals?
Microsoft Said the Mass Layoffs Were for "Investment" in "AI", But It's Also Laying Off the "AI" and "Copilot" Staff: Months ago we showed many so-called "AI" people were getting the boot and this time it's the same
DryDeadFish is Dead, Long Live DryDeadFish: We kept checking, hoping it can recover from some temporary technical issue
For Quite Some Time Already Microsoft Attracts Crackpots, Scams, and More: Occasionally we talk about the situation at IBM as there are many parallels
Links 14/07/2025: Chatbots Broken Again, McHire LLM Shows Limits of the Hype: Links for the day
Slashdot Media Turned Linux Journal Into a Slopfarm and Now Slashdot Actively Promotes Anti-Linux Slopfarms: Yes, "no-nonsense" apparently means actual nonsense
Links 14/07/2025: Arresting Photographers, Threats to Revoke US Citizenship Over Criticism: Links for the day
More EPO Leaks on the Way: We hope that Mr. Rowan will actually try to refute what we say and show, not merely point the finger at the messengers
Decommodification is a Corporate Strategy Against Communities: systemd is led by Microsoft and hosted by Microsoft
copyleft.org 'Hijacked' by the People Who Attack the Person Who Created Copyleft: So far there's nothing "tasteless" in copyleft.org, but that can change at any time in the future
Asking People to Take Down Articles and Videos Only Makes These More Popular and "Viral": If you do something bad, one of the worst things you can possibly do it try to silence those who speak about it
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 13, 2025: IRC logs for Sunday, July 13, 2025
Two-Thirds Towards FSF Goal, Richard Stallman to Give Talks in Europe: There are 67 left before reaching the target
Gemini Links 14/07/2025: Politicised Tech and "Leaving GitHub": Links for the day
The Demise of LLMs: We've just checked BetaNews again. They've dropped all the slop and went back to human authors.
Gemini Links 13/07/2025: Sonpo Museum of Art and FCEUX: Links for the day
Links 13/07/2025: UnitedHealth's Censorship Campaign, Australia Wary of China: Links for the day
Firing Away With Nonsense: Or fighting fire with fire
Links 13/07/2025: Climate Crisis, GAFAM Poisoning the Water: Links for the day
Turns Out LLMs for Code Don't Save Time and Don't Improve Quality: Neither legal nor useful
The Microsofters Will Have an Obligation to Compensate Us: This story isn't just about Microsoft. It's also about corruption, there are many women victims, there is abject "abuse of process", and many more scandals to be illuminated in years to come.
Reproducing at the EPO Instead of Producing Monopolies for Foreign Monopolies With Their Price-Fixing Cartels: Does the EPO recognise the need of well-educated Europeans to bear kids?
Valnet Inc. Dominates Real (Not LLM Slop) GNU/Linux Coverage in 2025: And likely in prior years, too
Free Software Foundation (FSF) Fund Raiser Goes on: Later this month we'll expose another OSI scandal
EPO Staff Representatives Issue a Warning About Staff's Health and Inadequate Care: Even the EPO's own stakeholders (money sources) are openly protesting against what the EPO became
Links 13/07/2025: Partly Assorted News From Deutsche Welle and CBC: Links for the day
Gemini Links 13/07/2025: Board Games and Battle Styles: Gemini Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, July 12, 2025: IRC logs for Saturday, July 12, 2025
Plunder at the Second-Largest Institution in Europe: cuts, neglect, health problems, even early deaths
Links 12/07/2025: Political Developments, Attack on Opposition, Climate Actions: Links for the day
Gemini Links 12/07/2025: Melodic Musings and Small Web July: Links for the day
Links 12/07/2025: Jail in China for Homoerotica, South Korea Discriminates Against Old Workers: Links for the day
If Only Everything Was Rewritten in Rust, We'd Have No More Security Issues?: Nope.
Links 12/07/2025: Birdwatching and Fake/Misleading Wall Street 'Valuation' Figures: Links for the day
Gemini Links 12/07/2025: How to Avoid Writing, Apps for Android: Links for the day
Using SLAPPs to Cover Up Sexual Abuse and Strangulation: The exact same legal team of the Serial Strangler from Microsoft and Garrett already has a history fighting against "metoo"
EPO Staff Committee on Harassment in the Workplace: slides
Adding the Voice of Writers to UK SLAPP Reform: The journey to repair antiquated (monarchy era) laws will likely be long
EPO Takes More Money From Staff for Speculation (Pensions), Actuarial Study Explains the Impact: "The key change in this year’s Actuarial Study, due to cascading the new “risk appetite” from the financial study, is a significant increase of the total pension contribution rate of 5.7 percentage points, up to a total of 37.8%. This is driven by an unprecedented decrease in the discount rate of 105 bps down to 2.2%."
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, July 11, 2025: IRC logs for Friday, July 11, 2025

Novell Results Are in: Net is Down Very Sharply (36%)

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts