Free Software Linux

With all the smaller players in the Virtualization game suddenly feeling like extras on the set of a badly-animated Godzilla movie, VMWare has fired it’s visionary CEO and looks to lose one of it’s most valuable engineers (her husband) all at a time when Microsoft is spooling up it’s Hyperbole-V engine to take on VMWare directly. Best article about this so far is from the Register: EMC CEO’s Ego Has Cost Investors Billions, where the situation is laid out along withe resulting consequences for VMWare.  Basically it looks like VMWare’s CEO was axed by EMC’s CEO over personality differences, with Paul Maritz (Yes, THAT Paul Maritz so recently of Microsoft) taking the helm.

As a service to our readers whose first language is other than English, I’ve added the Yahoo Translate function to the site, it’s in the sidebar right below the Categories. All you have to do is select your preferred language and it will translate the entire page, including all current posts on that page. Enjoy, RossB

In many organizations, the first round of virtualization choice has been made.  But as the technology progresses and improves with time (and what a difference 12 months makes), viable alternatives to that initial choice begin to become more apparent. Should you stay the course or make a change?  Hedge your bets and choose two? I won’t debate that here, but just know there are choices… VMware has the marketshare and name recognition…  Xen has the performance and power of freedom… Hyper-V is for the Microsoft faithful…  What’s your cup of virtualization-tea??

There are some who prefer to use (or are more familiar with) Microsoft management tools.  There are some who prefer to use Novell ZENworks management tools.  Then there are others who want to use standards-based tools.  Your choices in the marketplace are going to be improving…

You be the judge, but I think this article makes a compelling argument that the combination of Hyper-V and Xen support (aka Microsoft and Novell) can put at least a small-to-medium dent in VMWare’s market dominance. From the article: If Hyper-V doesn’t convert the VMware faithful as soon as Microsoft makes its hypervisor generally available later this year, it may get a little help from its friends: Xen-based virtualization platforms. Some like IT consultant Ardalan Dlawar believe that Microsoft will leverage support for Xen-based platforms to increase competition with VMware. “And Xen will have more third-party support and fewer compatibility issues,” according to Dlawar.

Excellent video from Novell about the Notes 8 Client OCCS architecture and programs running on SLED 10. Link

From the article: Linux software vendor Novell Inc. of Waltham is expanding its alliance with Microsoft Corp. into China, in a bid to encourage Chinese companies to start paying for the software they use to run their businesses. Three Chinese firms - People’s Insurance Company of China, The Dairy Farm Co., and Dawning Information Industry Co. - will purchase from Microsoft three-year licenses for Novell’s SUSE Linux Enterprise Server software. “Both Novell and Microsoft are committed to furthering this partnership, and we couldn’t be happier with the results to date,” said Novell chief executive Ron Hovsepian. Read More.

Yesterday I attended the 2008 Linux on Wall Street event in New York. At the booth, we were primarily discussing SUSE Linux Enterprise Real Time (SLERT) and customers who stopped by seemed very interested in learning more.  While this was my first Linux on Wall Street, and it seemed like a nice event (although the exhibit hall area was a little too warm). It was also nice to see the Novell/SUSE booth getting swamped at times with customers interested in learning more about what we’re doing, and to see cool demos of Wombat and Sun Java Real Time benefiting from SLERT performance.  I’m glad we had several Novell employees on hand for this one.

Yesterday I attended the 2008 Linux on Wall Street event in New York. At the booth, we were primarily discussing SUSE Linux Enterprise Real Time (SLERT) and customers who stopped by seemed very interested in learning more.  While this was my first Linux on Wall Street, and it seemed like a nice event (although the exhibit hall area was a little too warm). It was also nice to see the Novell/SUSE booth getting swamped at times with customers interested in learning more about what we’re doing, and to see cool demos of Wombat and Sun Java Real Time benefiting from SLERT performance.  I’m glad we had several Novell employees on hand for this one.

Yesterday I attended the 2008 Linux on Wall Street event in New York. At the booth, we were primarily discussing SUSE Linux Enterprise Real Time (SLERT) and customers who stopped by seemed very interested in learning more.  While this was my first Linux on Wall Street, and it seemed like a nice event (although the exhibit hall area was a little too warm). It was also nice to see the Novell/SUSE booth getting swamped at times with customers interested in learning more about what we’re doing, and to see cool demos of Wombat and Sun Java Real Time benefiting from SLERT performance.  I’m glad we had several Novell employees on hand for this one.

Have you been wondering how PlateSpin’s technologies might fit into the Novell and the data center automation solutions?  Here’s a glimpse… Together, Novell and PlateSpin offer the only heterogeneous data center automation solutions on the market that provide customers the flexibility to manage mixed IT environments. This is another key step as Novell builds out its strategy as a leading infrastructure software company that can make interoperability a reality. Customers can now fully manage the lifecycle of their data center. First, analyzing which workloads to virtualize with PlateSpin PowerRecon*. Next, converting the workloads from physical to virtual machines, as well as virtual back to physical, with PlateSpin PowerConvert*. Finally, converted workloads can be inventoried, categorized and provisioned with Novell ZENworks® Orchestrator. This comprehensive approach continually monitors the data center and responds to demands automatically, ensuring the most effective and efficient IT infrastructure, while maintaining service level objectives.