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For many early Linux users, Slackware was their introduction. One user told me her first Linux install was Slackware—and she had to use a hex editor to fix the partition tables so that Slackware would install. Support for her hardware was added in a later release. Another got his start building the data center that would power one of the first internet-enabled real estate sites. In the mid-1990s, Slackware was one of the easiest distributions to get and didn't require a lot of effort to get IP masquerading to work correctly. A third person mentioned going to sleep while...

Mint KDE 17 is finally released!

Today is the last day that Novell (NASDAQ:NOVL) will exist as a publicly traded company. Trading in Novell's stock will cease at the close of business, as the company is taken private. Novell is being acquired by privately held Attachmate in a deal that closes today. The $2.2 billion acquisition was first announced in November of 2010. Attachmate is paying $6.10 per Novell share and will keep Novell as a wholly owned subsidiary. Novell shareholders approved the deal back in February. The final step that was required for the deal to move forward was the completion of a patent deal....

Now, let's look at Novell's history for a minute, shall we? Didn't Novell smack SCO up side the head with its claim that SCO owes it the money the Unix company has been using for its never-ending lawsuits? Didn't Novell hit SCO where it lived with its claim that SCO never actually bought Unix's IP(intellectual property)? Wasn't Novell one of the companies that founded the OIN (Open Invention Network) with the goal of sharing Linux patents without charging for royalties? The answers are yes, yes, and yes.

Microsoft has announced a partnership with Novell and will help promote Linux. This is stunning. This is like Red Sox fans announcing they're going to root for the Yankees. Microsoft has spent ten years bashing the free-of-charge open-source Linux operating system and trying to kill it. Now Microsoft is making nice.

Excerpt - Microsoft Corp. is entering into an unusual partnership with Novell Inc. that gives a boost to the Linux operating system, a rival to the software giant's Windows software, according to people familiar with the companies. ~ snip ~

Novell plans an October launch for its Suse Linux Enterprise Real-Time product, an operating system geared for Wall Street traders and others who watch every microsecond of the clock. Real-time operating systems can respond to external events within a guaranteed time frame, a feature that mainstream business computing doesn't generally require but that's necessary for some areas, such as aircraft radar. But in a move that indicates the flexibility of Linux, Novell plans to begin selling the real-time variant of the open-source operating system next month. High Impact What's new: Novell plans an October launch for its Suse Linux Enterprise...

On August 4th, we found out that Lenovo Group, the company that has taken over IBM's Personal Computing Division, had made a deal with Novell Inc. to preload SLED 10 (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop) on its ThinkPad T60p mobile workstation. For the first time, a major OEM (original equipment manufacturer) has committed to preloading a Linux desktop.

SUSE Enterprise Linux Server 10 finally cuts Windows Server's ease-of-installation advantage out of the picture. ******************************************* You no longer have to be an uber-geek to run a Linux server. With the release of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10, Novell has at last put out a product that's as easy to install, administer and use as a Windows server--in some cases, even easier. And if you're looking for more reasons to make the move, consider the OS' wide range of free development tools, applications for everything from mail to office software, a wide choice of distributions and source code that's...

I have a fried CD-RW. I don't know how it got that way (died all of a sudden). So, in the meantime, I'm borrowing an external Yamaha and have it hooked up--as I can't afford to replace the CD-drive. Question 1: I'm running Suse 10.0 Eval, first updated KDE to 3.5.1 and then updated the kernel to 2.6.16-default. Since the kernel upgrade, I cannot get any USB devices to start. I've tried editing /etc/fstab as recommended, but the devices won't mount--and if they do, nothing shows up in Konqueror. I did however, and only once, did Question 2: How can...

 Opinion: New Linux study suggests fundamental Microsoft credibility problems Nov. 17, 2005 Another day, another lame attempt by Microsoft to show that Windows is better than Linux. This time around, Microsoft commissioned a study to show that Windows does a better job of serving e-commerce applications than Linux. Of course, in the study, they didn't use the same e-commerce or back-engine DBMSs. OK, right there, without saying another word, anyone who really knows anything about benchmarking knows that the study is fundamentally flawed. You're not comparing apples to apples; you're comparing apples and oranges. It would be a different story,...

Avnet Partner Solutions has created a new channel program that offers certification, sales and technical training to solution providers and ISVs selling Linux. The Enablement, Partnership, Incentives and Co-Marketing (EPIC) program is jointly funded with Novell to help solution providers craft Suse Linux-based solutions on IBM’s eServer platform. The initiative also includes marketing development and planning services and margin-based sales incentives for Novell products, according to Avnet executives. “The Linux market is big. We participate with Novell in a big way in an effort to drive more business into the Intel space with the Suse OS,” said Fred Cuen, president...

Novell plans to begin opening up development of one of its Linux products to outside programmers in a project called OpenSuse, a strategy similar to that taken by rival Red Hat, Novell is expected to announce next week. Novell is launching the project in an attempt to attract more outside developers, new users and, ultimately, market share, said Greg Mancusi-Ungaro, director of marketing for Linux and open source. Novell is the No. 2 seller of Linux after Red Hat. Novell and Red Hat each have two versions of Linux: a slow-changing, higher-priced product intended for conservative customers and a fast-changing...

Linux Loyalists LeeryDaniel Lyons, 03.31.04, 1:49 PM ETNEW YORK - Two years ago, when Rick Carey was chief technology architect at Merrill Lynch, he was crazy about Linux and especially about Red Hat, the leading Linux distributor. At the time, he was leading the charge to migrate all of the computer systems at Merrill to Linux. But these days, things have changed. Carey, who is now chief technology architect at Bank One (nyse: ONE - news - people ), says that although he still likes Linux, he's not rushing into any deployments of the open-source operating system. Chicago-based Bank One...

SCO will turn its sights on Novell once the latter has completed its $210m acquisition of SuSE, with a claim that Novell signed a non-competition clause when it sold SCO the rights to Unix in 1995. Darl McBride, chief executive of SCO, commented: "When SCO bought Unix from Novell there was clear non-compete language in the contract to prevent Novell from competing against us."When the Novell/SuSE deal is completed then we may have to enforce that non-compete agreement."Any Linux distribution marketed by Novell would put the firm in breach of the non-compete clause, which stops it from competing directly with...

Two major moves by well-known Linux companies have the open-source community worried that the consumer is being left behind. On Monday, in an expected move, Red Hat said that it would stop supporting all consumer versions of Red Hat Linux by the end of April and that it planned to support only its business version of the operating system. On Tuesday, enterprise software maker Novell surprised the high-tech world when announced an agreement to buy software maker SuSE Linux for $210 million. For the business world, the deals seemingly confirmed the corporate role for the communal operating system. However, many...

NEW YORK (AP) -- Novell Inc. stock soared Tuesday after the company said it will buy Germany's SuSE Linux AG for $210 million in cash. Novell also said IBM Corp. plans to buy $50 million of Novell's convertible preferred stock, and the two companies are in talks to extend agreements between IBM and SuSE. SuSE provides software and support for Linux, an operating system widely used on Web servers and corporate computers. Its version of Linux is supported by IBM. Shares of Novell traded Tuesday morning at $8.48, up $2.44, or 40 percent, on the Nasdaq Stock Market. The...

Comparing Server OSes: Why SCO UNIX Is A Bad Idea by Jem Matzan It's a rather difficult mission to shop for an operating system for a server. When most people think of server OSes they think of Unix, and when they think of Unix they think of SCO, the company that owns the Unix source code. But there are so many more choices out there, the least of which offers a bonanza of advantages over SCO's Unix products. Having said that, let's explore the Unix world and take a look at what it has to offer the server and workstation...

Can a frustrated Windows user dump Microsoft? Even with lots of improvements, Linux is still no cakewalk. Scott Spanbauer From the November 2002 issue of PC World magazinePosted Tuesday, October 01, 2002 You might be pretty happy with Windows XP. But Windows continues to suffer from more than its share of drawbacks: From the newer operating system's incompatibility with older software to Microsoft's well-known security problems, Windows still engenders a fair amount of user aggravation. Windows XP also subjects its users to the indignity of the Microsoft Product Activation service: You might have to ask Microsoft for a new key...