Bonum Certa Men Certa

Novell News Summary - Part II: SUSE Studio, IDC, and Inland Revenue (NZ)

Lizard skin texture



Summary: News about SUSE, accumulated over the past week



IN RECENT weeks we have witnessed a lot of coverage of Novell's "me-too" product, which enabled us to build Bloatnux. There is still some coverage of that (probably successful marketing job from Novell) and it is mentioned here very briefly. A long review came from Steven Lawson, who mostly wrote praises:

The studio works on a system of templates. You choose a product on which to base your distro from openSUSE 11.1, SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 and SUSE Linux Enterprise 11.

Then you must decide which desktop environment you're going to have. The options include:

Just Enough OS GNOME desktop KDE desktop (versions 3 and 4) Minimal X with IceWM

[...]

SUSE are to be applauded for providing the Linux community with such a service, though I do wonder how they will handle the inevitable flood of interest and subsequent network strain once the product comes out of its beta stage and becomes available to the general computer-using public - assuming that is the intention, of course.

Further, wouldn't it be great SUSE Studio's success - and it deserves to succeed - prompted similar efforts from the likes of Ubuntu, Fedora and Debian?


Here is another new review and two more that are noteworthy:

i. A Walk Through SUSE Studio

SUSE Studio is a new Web based service for creating Linux appliances based on openSUSE, SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop, and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server. It allows users to build custom Linux distributions including selected software packages and configurations.


ii. The Excellent SUSE Studio (and tips)

My only gripe is the SUSE Studio itself is closed source. Hope you’re listening, Novell!


Well, Novell does a great deal of closed source, so people's gripes might not change anything.

The Register is still offering free publicity to SUSE and Novell's marketing chief has used the pay-to-say IDC to promote SUSE on the client side.

Dragoon's confidence was buoyed by an IDC report released this week which predicts that Linux related revenue will grow from $567 million in 2008 to $1 billion in 2012 and $1.2 billion in 2013. Although 2008 was a rough year for many companies, Linux revenue industrywide grew more than 23 percent, according IDC.


This is the same IDC which is marketing Windows and showering it with praise whenever Microsoft pays the bill. Even the very same analyst (Gillen) does this doublespeak, which makes a classic contradiction. Later on in the weekend we'll show just how morally corrupt analysts can be. Here is more on that that study.

That executive summary also said that "the big get bigger," with Red Hat and Novell accounting for the lion's share of commercial Linux support revenues, and more interestingly, in many regions of the world Red Hat and Novell have the majority of unpaid but installed Linux licenses, as well.


Do not be insulted when the very same firm attacks GNU/Linux. It all depends on who's paying and what for.

Here is a new article about SUSE and RHEL in the datacentre. It is mostly comparative.

While RHEL and SLES are technically similar, there are some significant differences between the two companies and their strategies. How will these differing strategies affect you, the IT manager, short term and long term? We take a look at some of the important differences between Novell and Red Hat products and strategies, and draw some conclusions on when and how these differences can affect your data center strategy.


This new report from IDG in New Zealand suggests that there is a chance of SLED coming to Inland Revenue.

Ongoing relationship with Novell "confidential", Inland Revenue says

[...]

IRD’s CIO Ross Hughson said at the time that completely replacing Microsoft on the desktop was “a possibility, but I wouldn’t say it’s a probability at this stage”. He said the business was “up for grabs”.

IRD runs Novell’s SUSE Linux on many of its servers


Why doesn't Inland Revenue use a distribution which is not burdened by Microsoft? Is there any particular reason for the tax office to favour Microsoft-taxed distributions of GNU/Linux?

Recent Techrights' Posts

SoylentNews Grows Up, Registers as a Business, Site Traffic Reportedly Grows
More people realise that social control media may in fact be a passing fad
 
Garden Season Starts Today
Outdoor time, officially...
More Information About Public Talks That Richard Stallman Gave This Week in Europe
Two talks in Switzerland
Engadget is Still a Spamfarm, It's Just an Amazon Catalogue (SPAM/SEO), a Sea of Junk Disguised as "Articles" With Few 'Fillers' (Real Articles) in Between
Engadget writes for bots now, not for humans
Richard Stallman's Talks in Switzerland This Week
We need to put an end to 'cancer culture'; it's trying to kill people and it is even swatting people
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, March 28, 2024
IRC logs for Thursday, March 28, 2024
[Meme] EPO's New Ways of Working (NWoW), a.k.a. You Don't Even Get a Desk at Work and Cannot be Near Known Colleagues
Seems more like union-busting (divide and rule)
Hiding Microsoft's Culpability in Security Breaches and Other Major Blunders (in the United Kingdom, This May Mean You Can't Get Food)
Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) is vast
Giving back to the community
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 28/03/2024: Sega, Nintendo, and Bell Layoffs
Links for the day
Open letter to the ACM regarding Codes of Conduct impersonating the Code of Ethics
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
With 9 Mentions of Azure In Its Latest Blog Post, Canonical is Again Promoting Microsoft and Intel Vendor Lock-in, Surveillance, Back Doors, Considerable Power Waste, and Defects That Cannot be Fixed
Microsoft did not even have to buy Canonical (for Canonical to act like it happened)
Links 28/03/2024: GAFAM Replacing Full-Time Workers With Interns Now
Links for the day
Consent & Debian's illegitimate constitution
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
The Time Our Server Host Died in a Car Accident
If Debian has internal problems, then they need to be illuminated and then tackled, at the very least in order to ensure we do not end up with "Deadian"
China's New 'IT' Rules Are a Massive Headache for Microsoft
On the issue of China we're neutral except when it comes to human rights issues
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, March 27, 2024
IRC logs for Wednesday, March 27, 2024
WeMakeFedora.org: harassment decision, victory for volunteers and Fedora Foundations
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 27/03/2024: Terrorism Grows in Africa, Unemployment in Finland Rose Sharply in a Year, Chinese Aggression Escalates
Links for the day
Links 27/03/2024: Ericsson and Tencent Layoffs
Links for the day
Amid Online Reports of XBox Sales Collapsing, Mass Layoffs in More Teams, and Windows Making Things Worse (Admission of Losses, Rumours About XBox Canceled as a Hardware Unit)...
Windows has loads of issues, also as a gaming platform
Links 27/03/2024: BBC Resorts to CG Cruft, Akamai Blocking Blunders in Piracy Shield
Links for the day
Android Approaches 90% of the Operating Systems Market in Chad (Windows Down From 99.5% 15 Years Ago to Just 2.5% Right Now)
Windows is down to about 2% on the Web-connected client side as measured by statCounter
Sainsbury's: Let Them Eat Yoghurts (and Microsoft Downtimes When They Need Proper Food)
a social control media 'scandal' this week
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, March 26, 2024
IRC logs for Tuesday, March 26, 2024
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
Windows/Client at Microsoft Falling Sharply (Well Over 10% Decline Every Quarter), So For His Next Trick the Ponzi in Chief Merges Units, Spices Everything Up With "AI"
Hiding the steep decline of Windows/Client at Microsoft?
Free technology in housing and construction
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
We Need Open Standards With Free Software Implementations, Not "Interoperability" Alone
Sadly we're confronting misguided managers and a bunch of clowns trying to herd us all - sometimes without consent - into "clown computing"
Microsoft's Collapse in the Web Server Space Continued This Month
Microsoft is the "2%", just like Windows in some countries