Novell made a series of announcements in the past week that underscore its commitment to open source, specifically SuSE Linux. Among these are collaboration and resource management software announcements.
On Friday last week, a day after announcing SuSE Linux version 9.1, Novell introduced an all-Linux version of GroupWise, its collaboration platform, and also rolled out a patch-management system for Windows. The announcements were made at CeBIT in Hannover, Germany, and the company`s annual BrainShare conference in the US.
All mail cast
The new GroupWise 6.5 will be publicly available on 15 April with support for Linux on the client and server sides. GroupWise now runs on SuSE Linux Enterprise Server as well as RedHat`s Enterprise Linux distribution, and on Windows 2000/NT and NetWare.
Novell has promised native support later this year for GroupWise 6.5 for Linux in the Ximian Evolution mail client. The company also plans to add basic GroupWise plug-in support for the open source Gaim instant messaging client, which will let Linux desktops connect directly to the GroupWise Messenger server included in GroupWise 6.5 for secure instant messaging.
Zen and the art of patch management
Novell also unveiled ZENworks, a resource-management application. Windows-running customers can use it to deploy security patches. The program assesses risks, reports on the patches necessary for each network device and automatically deploys patches. It is scheduled to ship at the end of March.
The upcoming 6.5 version will let companies manage both Linux and Windows 2003 Server, desktop, and handheld environments.
Mind sharing your brain?
Novell also introduced these and several other open source software (OSS) undertakings at its annual BrainShare conference.
The new Open Enterprise Server is a combination of NetWare 7 and SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 9, as well as networking services designed to interoperate between the systems.
Novell also announced it would contribute SuSE`s "YaST" (Yet Another Setup Tool) Linux systems-management tool and Novell`s iFolder personal storage and filing application to the OSS community.
The company`s CEO, Jack Messman, has said in international reports that Novell would be profitable this year. Keeping this promise would depend on balancing development efforts in NetWare with investments in Linux. Novell would invest profits from other areas of its business into its Linux efforts, Messman reportedly added.
Freedom of choice
With Open Enterprise Server (OES), expected to ship at year-end, Novell is supporting a mixed environment where customers can run NetWare and SuSE Linux. This combination promotes enterprises` move to open computing platforms, Messman added.
While the company remains committed to its NetWare network operating system, that product will cease to exist as a standalone offering from the end of this year. NetWare will be supported and upgraded "for a long time" as part of OES.
Messman said the kernel from the upcoming version 7.0 of NetWare would be included in the first version of OES. The SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 kernel will also be included in OES - but will also be retained as a standalone SuSE Linux product.
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