Novell’s Justin Steinman went so far as to say that Ubuntu lacked "enterprise quality" support options, making it suitable for the "technical enthusiast" community. Steinman, in his best Larry Ellison impersonation, also indicated that Novell is in "serious conversations with several leading hardware OEMs" about preloading SLED for "broad enterprise use".
“As proponents of open source and Linux, we’re happy to see Linux being preloaded onto consumer desktops.”
But Steinman then downplayed its significance. “I wouldn’t necessarily refer to the Dell-Ubuntu deal as ‘major.’ Dell is only going to load Ubuntu on three machines targeted at the technical consumer market, and the only support option available will be through online technical self-help forums, which will be monitored by the community,” he said.
However, Jane Silber, Canonical’s director of operations in London, told eWEEK that the company will provide commercial Ubuntu support for customers who choose to buy this through the Dell Web site when available.
But, for Novell, Dell’s announcement is nothing more than the loading of Linux onto desktops aimed at the technical enthusiast community—the same community of people who voted on Dell’s IdeaStorm Web site. These are not Novell’s target customers for the Linux desktop, Steinman said.
“Our target customer is the enterprise business user, and so we’ve focused SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop squarely at the business market,” Steinman said.
“We believe the Linux desktop is ready for mainstream deployment in the enterprise, and that means you need to have enterprise quality support—something that Ubuntu does not offer.”
Novell, Steinman then claimed, was in “serious conversations with several leading hardware OEMs” about preloading a Linux desktop that will be targeted at broad enterprise use.
“When we release SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop on a preloaded machine, it will come with the enterprise support that our customers require to run their businesses. Stay tuned for more details,” he said.
When Novell signed the deal with Microsoft, it implicitly acknowledged — whether deliberately or not — that Linux is ‘unclean’, that it requires protection from patents. The two deals which followed, namely the ones with Sansung and with Fuji Xerox, seem to indicate that not the kernel is being targetted; rather, it is some related software. Heavily-patented technology such as .Net makes Mono come to mind. The following is a nice video which demonstrates the nightmare one faces when entering the universe of patents.
So let’s review the situation: Dell is prepping Linux desktops. Red Hat is prepping potential desktop PC news. Hmmm. Coincidence, right? Could be… but I suspect otherwise. Red Hat’s strong position on corporate servers makes it a natural option for administrator workstations from Dell. And it’s possible to imagine Dell offering a mix of Red Hat and Ubuntu Linux on certain desktops and notebooks.
Where does that leave Novell (NOVL) SuSE Linux? I’m still digging around Dell’s desktop and mobile businesses for the answer to that question.
Maybe Dell just doesn’t want to pay the "Windows tax" at all anymore, not even through Novell SUSE.
Through the agreement, Fuji Xerox will obtain access to Microsoft’s patents for Fuji Xerox’s existing and future product lines, including products that incorporate proprietary source and open source software, such as Linux.
“open source software, such as Linux”
If Samsung gets counted as well, that makes three. Microsoft has apparently learned its lessons from the Novell deal. It no longer makes loud noises or issues any spontaneous threats.
Nevertheless, it does not mean that all is well. It could merely be the calm before a storm. It is important that any deals which involve patents are looked at carefully. There is no reason in the world why Linux should be included in patent deals, but Microsoft may be trying to build a strong and compelling case to serve as precedence, one company (victim) at a time. Could it be just too far-fetched?
Looking at the language in the press, there are subtle inconsistencies, but never any clarifications. It may be vague by design, to increase the doubt and uncertainty factor. From “Linux-based products” in one case, here we have “open source software, such as Linux”. Nobody has ever bothered to explain what products are involved. Justin Steinman declines to comment, putting the blame on the SEC.
Yesterday we witnessed another example where Microsoft makes no specific claims on Linux, but nonetheless, it requests its share of ‘protection money’ for what it calls “Linux-based products”. This time, Samsung is the company to be named and shamed. The deal with Novell might differ in terms of scale. Nevertheless, it’s an equally-appalling deal. Neither Novell nor Samsung actually own Linux, so ‘admission of guilt’ is completely and utterly out of place. Samsung is not even based in the United States where software patents have validity.
We would like to present a few examples which we have not mentioned before. They show that such acts of bullying, retaliation, and extortion are merely part of a long-lasting pattern. Last week, Intel introduced a Linux-based ultra-mobile personal computer (UMPC). The following day, the New York Time seemed to have hinted at a sudden change of heart.
That software effort does not have the support of Mr. Otellini, who is concerned about incurring Microsoft’s wrath, the executive said. The two companies have a long history of tension over who controls the hardware and software direction of the “Wintel standard.” Intel has said it is supporting both operating systems.
It appears as though plans have changed as a result of this. It’s reminiscent of what happened with Lenovo when it would introduce Linux-preloaded laptops last year. While this may not seem so serious, let us look at another old E-mail from Microsoft, brought to you by the Comes vs. Iowa case which, according to some breaking news, led to settlement with Microsoft software coupons (the same ol’ ‘funny money’ settlement).
[Microsoft:] so as long as they continue such attacks on us, i cannot give them win95 beta, they are NOT just another oem.
So there you go. Even in the past, Microsoft used its corporate power to scare or ‘punish’ other companies. What about Dell, who have just introduced PCs with Ubuntu GNU/Linux preloaded? (last night they also restored Windows XP options, at Vista’s expense)
These are old articles which show that time after time Microsoft played the ‘bully card’ in order to get its way. It would be unsurprising if Samsung came under pressure by Microsoft. There is little or no reason to suspect that Samsung approached Microsoft and sought coverage for its use of Linux.
We may never know what is happening behind the scenes, but last year, before Novell entered collaboration with Microsoft, Ron Hovsepian who is now CEO said the following:
“Microsoft Corp is using scare tactics to exert pressure on PC vendors not to explore the potential of desktop Linux”, according to Novell Inc president and COO, Ron Hovsepian.
The link to this article is now broken, but I have my local copy of this statement.
This is bad. It turns out that Samsung caved in to pressure and signed a cross-licensing deal with Microsoft, simply because it uses Linux.
As with Microsoft’s recent deal with Fuji Xerox, the software maker specifically notes that the deal will allow Samsung to offer products using Linux without concern that Microsoft will sue it or its customers.
As usual, there’s no mentioning of which patents are involved. At times like this we must realise what Novell has opened a door to.
Update: According to the press release, “Samsung and its distributors and customers may utilize Microsoft’s patents in Samsung’s products with proprietary software, and Samsung will also obtain coverage from Microsoft for its customers’ use of certain Linux-based products“. Linux-based products are not Linux itself. Begin to wonder about technologies like Mono.
Microsoft’s patent game is designed to force open source to compete on its terms. Mark made a hugely salient point on this: Microsoft has been a disruptive force in the software industry by building complex software and essentially giving it away for peanuts.
In turn, it is being challenged by open source, which is free. The difference, as Mark said, between $0.00 and $0.01 is huge. And that difference is not flattering to Microsoft, even despite its lower price points than its fellow proprietary competitors.
But if Microsoft can place a patent tax on all open source software or, at least, the open source software most threatening to its business, then it provides an effective way to inhibit open source disruption. (See above: this applies most forcefully when an open source vendor goes 100% open source and, hence, 100% disruptive. “Free” is the best tool to pound Microsoft with, not “mostly free.”) Take “free” away from open source, and you remove some of its allure, and much of the distribution benefits it has.
In other words, Microsoft’s patent tax is not designed to protect its intellectual property, but rather to protect its preferred, comfortable way of doing business. Novell was its dupe in this charade. Hopefully, others won’t follow suit, and Novell will pull out of the agreement. There is no way that this patent agreement is good for anyone; it is only good for protecting 20th Century software business models.
As a reminder, Mark shuttleworth started to a storm in a teacup when he invited Opensuse developers to join his team. He did so by posting to the primary Opensuse mailing list last year.
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