Red Hat adopts Novell e-mail software

Red Hat, the top seller of the Linux operating system, has adopted an e-mail enhancement that its rival Novell recently released as open-source software.

In May, Linux convert Novell shared the source code of the previously proprietary Exchange Connector, a program that lets Linux e-mail software connect to Microsoft Exchange servers. And on Wednesday, Red Hat said it included the software in a test version of the third update to Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

The move illustrates the advantages and drawbacks of the open-source software in the business realm. On the one hand, it enables companies to cooperate, challenging common foes such as Microsoft or improving technology so the overall market grows faster. But on the other hand, it can make it harder for one company to maintain a competitive advantage over another.

The final version of the Enterprise Linux update is due in September, spokeswoman Leigh Day said Thursday.

Also coming with the new version is support for IBM's new Power5 servers and new security features.

One security change is support for the no-execute (NX) feature of new Intel and Advanced Micro Devices processors, which labels patches of computer memory so that it's harder for attack programs to inject executable programs.

Other security features include Execshield, another mechanism to prevent parts of memory from storing executable information, and Position Independent Executable (PIE), which makes a computer store information in random memory locations so it's harder for attackers to build attacks that expect more predictable patterns.