Speaking of Linux and the spirit of open source

It's almost shameful how paltry Novell's understanding of open source is. I don't say this to denigrate anyone personally, but when I read things like this from Groklaw I just can't understand how Novell manages to say "open source" with a straight face.

I'm all for using open source as a capitalist weapon. But this is the opposite of that. It's an attack on open source by a company that claims to espouse it. And it relies on deliberate falsehoods to propagate its still anemic success.

Pamela writes:

Justin Steinman reveals that to market their SUSE Linux Enterprise Server against Red Hat they ask, "Do you want the Linux that works with Windows? Or the one that doesn't?" It's just appalling. Let me ask you developers who are kernel guys a question: When you contributed code to the kernel, was it your intent that it be used against Red Hat?

It truly is appalling, and shows that Novell has never truly grok'd the spirit of open source (or even the letter). Justin's comment is 100 percent false, and he knows it's 100 percent false. He's not stupid. But this comment indicates a willingness to trade truth for cash, and that is wrong. And not merely because it's still a pittance compared to what the pureplay Linux vendor is pulling in.

Pamela writes further:

How can Novell not care about that? They are benefiting from code that was written by people who are now not protected from patent claims from Microsoft, and Novell is making money from doing a deal with the company threatening them. All the money they are making is hence tainted. They didn't write that code 100 percent, after all. They didn't write most of it. I don't think anyone cares if Novell wanted to sign some deal about Mono or Moonlight or any code they actually did write. But taking other peoples' code and going against their wishes, as reflected in the license, is not acceptable and it never will be. Money doesn't make it right. Broader acceptance of Linux now doesn't make it right either, if it threatens the long-term survival of Linux by altering the Open Source development model in a way that prevents Linux and FOSS from flourishing.

Novell doesn't need to urinate in the pool from which it hopes to build its future, but that is precisely what it is doing. It can and should do better.

[daverosenberg]

Pathetic attempt to be relevant

It is so disappointing and pathetic that this is the path that Novell has taken. At
this point I would prefer less Linux adoption to anyone choosing Suse.

[sprogg2001]

Get off your high horse

Novells employees will not be paid with feel-good-wishes from the FOSS community Novell is a business and is out to make money and SO is Redhat, why bomb-blast them because they market their product and play to their strengths, seriously wake up and realise that this is commercial company that gives a lot back into the FOSS community than most realise.

[Matt Asay]

I agree that Novell gives back a lot

But giving it patent headaches arguably removes most of the good that it does. Helping to stifle open source at the same time that you help it is the wrong strategy for everyone except, perhaps, Novell and Microsoft. This is self-centered move and self-centered marketing that is beyond the pale.

If Novell were to say, "Our Linux and services around Linux are better," I'd be all for that kind of marketing. But muddying *all of Linux* (and, by extension, open source) and then saying, "But ours is pure because we entered into a deal with the company that is trying to kill open source through FUD" is just wrong. But what got me in this podcast is just how gleeful Justin is about the strategy. It betrays anemic understanding of community.

[jsteinman]

The MSFT-NOVL Partnership

Matt, you are right -- I am pleased with the results of Novell's partnership with Microsoft. Our SUSE Linux Enterprise business is up 243% year-over-year for the first three quarters of our fiscal year and that's a good thing. At the Mass TLC event, I made my comments about how well the partnership is working immediately after I had spent five minutes detailing our technical collaboration with Microsoft. There really is factual basis for comment that SUSE Linux Enterprise works better with Microsoft Windows. We've got Novell engineers working with Microsoft engineers on areas like bidirectional virtualization -- the ability to host SUSE as a first-class guest on Microsoft Viridian and the ability to host Windows Server 2008 as a first-class guest on SLES/Xen -- and on areas like directory interoperability, which is the ability to drive Windows Servers using authentication and permissions from eDirectory hosted on SUSE Linux Enterprise. These sorts of technical collaborations do matter to customers, and they are things that other Linux distributions just can't offer. You'll notice in the podcast that I spent very little time talking about the IP components on the relationship, because from the Novell perspective, customers are picking SUSE Linux Enterprise because it does work better with Windows.

Justin Steinman
Director of Marketing, Linux & Open Platforms
Novell

[xenomentat]

Oh Come On...

Pam hates Novell, she loves Novell, she hates Novell, rinse and repeat.

As a VAR, I find that people who have experienced RH's pitiful attempts to provide Windows interoperability are very happy to see progress and committment from Novell/SUSE on this front.

And next week Ubuntu will include some more proprietary code and it'll all be "Whither the GPL" and off to thwack Canonical's conkers, or whatever else happens to get the punditry's attention.

Lighten up, Francis.