novels

Back when I was asked by Chris Stone (then Novell's vice chairman) to join the Linux Business Office at Novell, I honestly could count the number of employees on one hand that had any understanding and experience of open source. Brad Nicholes was one of them. Brad is an understated guy - he's not the sort of person to volunteer to write for this In the Trenches series. No, I had to go to him and solicit his involvement. I suspect even then he preferred to write code, but he agreed to do it, anyway.

I have a tremendous amount of respect for Brad. He was the voice of experience on Novell's Open Source Review Board, having earned the distinction of "member" with the Apache Software Foundation. He provided the best insight as to how Novell's forays into open source would be interpreted. Now, of course, the company has become very active in the open source world, but Brad continues to provide expert guidance with the OSRB and elsewhere within Novell.

If you get the chance to meet Brad, you'll like him as I do. He's a great person, and a great asset to Novell. Some of the insight below is among the best we've had on The Open Road.

Name, company, title, and what you actually do

Brad Nicholes, Senior Software Engineer, Novell. I'm currently working on the Data Center Automation product. In reality, I do a lot of different things. I have spent a lot of time over the last 6 years porting and maintaining the Apache HTTP server on the NetWare platform and I am a member of the Apache Software Foundation. I have started and managed a few smaller Open Source projects and contributed to others. I have given presentations at various conferences about Apache and Open Source in general. I am also a member of Novell's Open Source Review Board which is primarily responsible for reviewing Open Source usage and licensing issues within Novell. I have found that by participating in all of these activities, my job ranges from ?in the trenches? software design and coding to project administration to having to understand and consult with management about corporate policy and procedures as well as how legal matters can affect software development (especially in the Open Source world). … Read more

This post by Microsoft (disclaiming its need to adhere to GPLv3) has me depressed. Not because of what it portends for open source, but because of how dumb it makes the company look, as Mary Jo Foley of ZDNet points out. Not to mention that it makes Novell look really dumb for trusting Microsoft to play nicely. (But then, that foolishness was never in doubt.)

Still, Novell has just released this response to Microsoft's position:

Shortly after the GPLv3 license was released, Microsoft issued a statement in which they expressed their view that Microsoft is not a party to the GPLv3 and it is therefore not applicable to them. Yesterday, they also articulated that, "to avoid any doubt or legal debate on this issue, Microsoft has decided that the Novell support certificates that we distribute to customers will not entitle the recipient to receive from Novell, or any other party, any subscription for support and updates that includes the receipt of any code licensed under GPLv3."

Microsoft's current position, taken unilaterally, is intended to eliminate any perceived ambiguity about the applicability of GPLv3 to Microsoft. Nonetheless and independent of Microsoft's position, we would like to make clear our commitment to our customers that Novell will continue to distribute SUSE Linux Enterprise Server with its full set of functionality and features, including those components that are licensed under GPLv3.

In other words, we'll carry the water for Microsoft since they really have turned out to be a terrible Linux partner. Who knew?

PJ at Groklaw rightly castigates Microsoft for backing out of its commitment. Stephe Walli goes one step further, chastising Microsoft for foolishly backing out of an entire future (which might well be perfectly rosy for Microsoft):… Read more

Microsoft on Thursday began taking evasive action to avoid being pinned down by provisions in the new version 3 of the General Public License (GPL).

The company issued a statement declaring itself not a party to GPL 3. And regarding coupons it sells that entitle customers to Novell's Suse Linux Enterprise Server, customers won't get support from Novell or anyone else for any GPL 3 software in that package.

"At this point in time, in order to avoid any doubt or legal debate on this issue, Microsoft has decided that the Novell support certificates that we distribute … Read more

The Free Software Foundation last week released the third version of the GNU General Public License-- GPL 3 (also known as GPLv3).

This CNET News article explains the new features of GPL 3, which the FSF hopes will be adopted by most open-source developers in place of the GPL 2 license. The older GPL 2 will remain available, however.

FSF founder and president Richard M. Stallman has devoted his entire career to making free software--and to making software free. A strong opponent of copyrights, patents, digital-rights management, and all other legal or technical constructs that limit the freedom of software … Read more

In this second installment of the "Open Source @" series, we're taking a look at the role of open source within one of the industry's largest open-source companies, Novell. Of course Novell is doing things with open source," some will say. However, I chose to include Novell because I wanted to give the company a chance to tell its side of the story, given all the flak (much of it from me) it has taken on its patent deal with Microsoft.

I've given Novell a forum to discuss the patent deal before but, frankly, I wanted to give the company a chance to talk about all the other open-source-related things it's doing. Even I get tired of hitting the same note all day long, every day, for the past year.

And so I asked Justin Steinman, director of product marketing, Linux & Open Platform Solutions at Novell, to comment on the state of open source at the company. What is Novell doing for which it gets little credit?

Justin responded (and sent his response in Open Document format, which I think says a lot about Novell's desktop efforts) with a long (very long!), thoughtful post. It's well worth a read.

He writes:… Read more

Just when you thought the thin client computing model was dead, you find out it was only sleeping. And, in the case of Staybridge Suites, you discover that when it wakes up in the morning it goes online with a Novell-powered Linux thin client in its room. (Note: Staybridge is the extended-stay brand of the InterContinental Hotels Group.)

This is one of the most interesting Linux customer wins I've seen in some time, both because of what it could portend for the hotel industry (a "PC" in every room so that you really can travel solely with your Treo/Blackberry/iPhone), and for what it means for Novell on the desktop: the company continues to treat it seriously and make solid wins.

The hotel and Mainline evaluated Microsoft Windows desktops, but found that SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop was a fraction of the cost, would provide a feature-rich desktop experience for guests, was a solid platform for supporting open-standards applications such as OpenOffice and Mozilla Firefox, and was an excellent fit for the hotel's thin client strategy.… Read more

Reuters is reporting that Red Hat held patent talks with Microsoft but they broke down. This is news? I've been hinting at this for many moons.

But it's not rocket science to infer that Microsoft would have approached Red Hat long before it knocked on the doors of Novell, Xandros, and Linspire. Microsoft said as much when it signed the deal with Novell, and has pined in the press for a deal with Red Hat, only to be publicly rejected.

Is there any scenario under which Red Hat will enter into a patent agreement with Microsoft? I'm … Read more

Sometimes people (and companies) get exactly what they deserve. That is certainly true today, when Charlie Martin pinged me to tell me that he's accepted a position at MuleSource. Charlie is a great person; MuleSource is a great company. Match made in heaven.

Charlie was one of the original open sourcerors back at Eazel. He then joined Ximian, and ended up as one of the key members of Novell's Linux Impact Team. He's a great addition to the MuleSource team.

Mike, and now Charlie. When do I get my recruiter's fee, Dave? ;-)

Wow. Sometimes, you read things like this and you wonder if Microsoft employees inhabit the same universe. Apparently, they haven't been following the rampant, constant security holes discovered and exploited in Windows over the past decade. Instead, they try to spin data in their favor to try to convince people that, in fact, Windows is more secure than Linux (and now OS X, which is a bit surprising since I had exactly zero security breaches in the last five years of running OS X - that's "zero" as in "none").

A Microsoft executive has claimed that Windows users faced fewer days of security risks on average last year than users of rival operating systems from Apple, Novell, Red Hat and Sun.… Read more