Summary: More waste of paper from Novell (attempts to grab just existing GNU/Linux users) and increasing intersection with Microsoft in the form of Mono

FOR the past few months Novell has been publishing quite a lot of papers whose purpose is to help poach Red Hat customers. Novell really ought to focus more on poaching UNIX and Windows clientèle, but all of its latest whitepapers that appear in the news feeds mention Red Hat, Red Hat, Red Hat. It is typical and predictable given the nature of the Microsoft deal, which many perceive as an "anti-Red Hat deal." Last week in Linux Planet an article was published that's titled "Is Novell Selling FUD or Linux?"

Over at CNET, Matt Asay -- being a former Novell employee -- argues that Red Hat too used FUD against Novell. He writes:

But for me, it was Red Hat's swipes at its competitors that are possibly more momentous. It's not that Red Hat never criticizes competitors: in 2006, for example, Red Hat declared the imminent death (wrongly, as it turns out) of Novell.

Novell was apparently close to death indeed, but then it became somewhat of a Microsoft subsidiary, selling itself to someone else's interests. In the 'Microsoft press' we found this just a couple of days ago:

Windows: Coming to a Mainframe Near You

[...]

Industry veteran Wayne Kernochan, a principal with consultancy Infostructure Associates, highlights Mono, an open source project first conceived by the former Ximian Inc., to create a version of Microsoft's .NET framework capable of running atop Linux, several flavors of BSD, Mac OS and Windows itself. Six years ago, Novell acquired Ximian and became Mono's steward; then, just months later, Novell acquired German Linux pioneer SuSE.

That chain of events paved the way for the Mono of today, which runs in z/Linux.

More precisely, Kernochan explained, Novell markets a Mono Extension for its SuSE Linux Enterprise Edition (SLES) 11, which runs on System z. This combination -- namely, of SLES 11 and Novell's Mono Extension -- makes it possible for SuSE shops to run .NET applications on top of System z. And that, Kernochan maintains, makes for an intriguing proposition.

Novell helps Windows come to the mainframes, which is why things ought to change. As a quick reminder, Microsoft loves Mono. It is about making UNIX and Linux assimilated to Microsoft. Mary Jo Foley has just made this post, giving a lot of publicity to Microsoft's ally Novell/de Icaza.

Novell’s Miguel de Icaza is at it again. His latest project is Mono Tools for Visual Studio, which is now in a closed Beta 1 release. “There are some common stumbling blocks that keep .NET applications from being able to run on Mono. These can be due to using parts of the .NET framework that Mono does not implement or implements differently, or reliance on native platform code like user32,” according to the new site for the tools. The tools allow developers to scan their apps for Mono compatibility, test them on Windows and Linux and package them up to run on Linux.

Here is the page in question. Novell is in some ways augmenting Microsoft's Visual Studio. Novell truly helps Windows [1, 2, 3]. It even holds events together with Microsoft or Microsoft MVPs, hosting jointly .NET and Mono. Miguel has just advertised this in his blog and other Mono developers on Novell's payroll do so too.

Embracing Novell is almost like embracing Microsoft. ⬆

"Our partnership with Microsoft continues to expand."

--Ron Hovsepian, Novell CEO