12.19.09

Novell News Summary – Part II: SLES in IBM Mainframes and HP, Other Ballnux Distributions (Bada)

Posted in GNU/Linux, HP, IBM, LG, Novell, Samsung, SLES/SLED, Xandros at 8:50 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: News about Free software that Microsoft is “taxing” using unnamed software patents (Ballnux distributions) with the consent/cooperation of the distributors

ANOTHER week goes by and later on we will show that Novell is losing its “Linux” focus. Among the news we can find SUSE mentioned, but not as much as it used to. Here in The Register there is news about Red Hat abandoning Itanium (it’s about time). Tim uses this as an opportunity to describe what he sees as an opportunity for SUSE.

Unless Novell plans to continue to continue to support Itanium boxes with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12, of which, by the way, Novell has said very little. For all we know, SLES 12 wasn’t going to support Itanium chips either. Perhaps Red Hat pulling the plug on Itanium with RHEL 6 will give Novell a niche it can support, much as it already does on IBM’s System z mainframes: Novell claims to have sold 85 per cent of the Linux licenses on Big Blue’s big iron.

SLES is quite big in IBM's high-end mainframes — a fact that is mentioned here as well.

SLES will be running on Blades in another place:

For business intelligence and customer relationship management, Pernod Ricard uses Cognos, Informatica, CPWorks and Oracle Cubes. This meant any new solution would have to fit into the IT family. After consulting with technology services partner AkurIT and reviewing various solutions, Pernod Ricard opted for new IBM blade hardware running on Novell Suse Linux Enterprise Serverm, which comes with built-in Xen virtualisation software and that worked well with the company’s Windows-based servers.

Another potential area of growth for Novell is a new HP initiative, which is described in:

• Hewlett-Packard Partners With Microsoft, Novell And Red Hat To Streamline Sun Migrations – Update

• HP Partners with Microsoft, Novell, Red Hat in Courting Sun Users

• Sun customers migrating to HP

• HP swooping in on Sun customers

• HP tempts Sun users with Linux and Microsoft discounts

• HP expands partnerships in ongoing assault on Sun install base

• HP Eyes Sun Migrations

• HP, Microsoft, Novell and Red Hat Deliver Solutions to Simplify and Speed Sun Migrations

HP (NYSE:HPQ) today announced it has partnered with Microsoft, Novell and Red Hat to provide customers with service offerings, incentives and training programs that streamline the migration from Sun to HP-based solutions, while reducing total cost of ownership.

• HP Enlists Partners to Help Steal Sun’s Customers

While IBM has its Migration Factory program to help in the process, HP has the former EDS (now called HP Enterprise Services) — and now can add Microsoft, Novell and Red Hat to the list.

• HP steps up drive to nab Sun customers

Hardware giant HP has enlisted the help of vendors Microsoft, Novell and Red Hat to help it continue taking customers from rival Sun Microsystems.

Here is Novell’s PR team bragging about SUSE Studio:

SUSE Studio has been named by eWEEK Labs as a 2009 Enterprise IT Product of the Year. According to eWEEK, each year they name products that stood out in their testing in the past 12 months. The focus on products that “raise the technology bar in their category; innovate in some significant way; better align IT with business needs; and, in general, make day-to-day life easier for IT professionals.”

Cornelius wrote some more about SUSE Studio:

Easter eggs are fun. A special kind of them are winter easter eggs (do you still call this easter egg?). In the spirit of this tradition we added some snow to SUSE Studio last week. Now when booting a virtual appliance in SUSE Studio’s testdrive today, the openSUSE boot screen was all snow with some penguins wandering around. What a splendid coincidence. I guess you can call this a virtual easter egg. Fun

Xandros

Xandros is hardly in the news at this stage. Not-so-exciting news for Xandros in this post:

I just got myself an Eee PC 900A. I augmented the RAM to bring it up to 1.5GB and am considering a hard drive upgrade. It was running Xandros Linux, but I didn’t like it much. So, I upgraded it to the Easy Peasy Ubuntu Linux, made specifically to run on Eee PCs. It works for me. I love this little netbook. It fits in my totebag. It has Wi-fi. It’s great for using the web. Would I recommend one of these for just anyone? No. It’s more of a “geek’s” netbook. For everyone else, I would get the Acer Aspire One netbook.

Samsung

The announcement about Bada is a little old by now, but some sites are still catching up.

Samsung has launched the Bada mobile platform, envisioning an ocean of applications from developers. To encourage such apps, Samsung is offering a $2.7 million Bada competition. Twitter, EA Mobile, and Gameloft have signed on as Bada development partners. An analyst said Samsung may have trouble convincing consumers and developers to accept Bada.

Fabrizio Capobianco points out that “Bada starts with bad”, which he thinks is a bad way to start. Bada is almost phonetically similar to “Ballnux”, which means that the distribution is taxed by Microsoft (Ballmer). There are other issues:

First of all, it is yet another platform. How many do we need?? Enough already… There is a reason why Funambol decided to acquire an Ajax framework. The future of mobile development is web apps, locally installed with sync and push… We are fed up with any language which is not Javascript+HTML+CSS.

Bada is C++. Developers have had enough of C++, they need something cool to feel their time spent in front of a computer is worth it. I know it is geeky to talk about languages, but Windows Mobile is not going anywhere, also because people like to use Java. And Objective-C is kinda cool.

Samsung phones are coming to the UK and buyers should be aware that their rebadged phones (H1/Vodafone 360) are helping Microsoft’s plot against Linux, using imaginary software patents.

The H1 is Vodafone’s first handset designed specifically for their new Vodafone 360 service, the other being the M1. Both handsets are made by Samsung (the H1 being designated the i8320), but only available from Vodafone. The H1 is also a LiMo handset – it runs on a Linux-based operating system, which again, is new.

LG is another company that participates in Microsoft’s Linux racket. It has this new phone, but there is no evidence to suggest that it contains Linux. █

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