The Waltham, Massachusetts-based software and services vendor’s new Linux desktop solution is currently in closed beta testing and will be launched along with a roadmap for Novell’s business desktop strategy this summer.
The new solution will bring together Novell’s own desktop collaboration and productivity tools with Ximian’s desktop expertise and SuSE’s enterprise focused Linux Desktop product, although Novell is looking to maintain customer choice rather than package the ingredients together in a single bundle.
We don’t want to muddy the waters, Brian Green, Novell’s director of Linux solutions EMEA, told ComputerWire. We want to go for choice and we want to ensure there are no inhibitors to that choice.
While that means businesses will be able to select from Novell’s range of Linux desktop technologies as well as other open source and third-party applications, the company is still working to ensure interoperability between the various components it has at its disposal.
These include its own GroupWise collaboration and productivity applications and the Evolution collaboration application it acquired with Ximian. There will also be enhanced integration with the Red Carpet Enterprise and ZENworks management software for enhanced identity- and policy-based desktop management.
Meanwhile, Evolution 2 is being lined up for release in the third quarter and will feature enhanced interconnection with GroupWise as well as Microsoft Corp’s Exchange messaging server. The company last released the Evolution Connector for Microsoft Exchange under the open source GPL license to encourage its development.
Interoperability with Microsoft, which holds 95% of the desktop operating system market according to International Data Corp, will be key to the success of Novell’s Linux desktop strategy, according to Green. The company is also making contributions to the OpenOffice.org open source productivity application suite to improve file format and font interoperability with Windows.
We have to make sure we can interact with the file formats available today, said Green. Ease of use is also important. Novell is well aware that the easier it is for end users to get started on desktop Linux, the easier it will be to sell it to businesses and IT departments. The company will not be completely copying its more established rival, however.
It’s not our intention to make the Linux desktop look like the Windows desktop, but it is our intention to make it intuitive and easy to use, said Green. If you try to make it look and feel 100% the same, it’s not really achievable and users may not actually want that.
While Novell is looking to convert Windows users to its Linux desktop strategy, it is well aware that no company will take desktop migration lightly and is encouraging those expressing interest to think about which areas of their business are most appropriate for Linux.
To begin with that probably means limited function or web-based applications in areas such as government and financial services, said Green. He admitted that general knowledge workers are unlikely to move to Linux in the near future but maintained that there is a large amount of interest in the potential cost and flexibility advantages.
One of the things about Novell’s experience on the desktop is that we do get a lot of people wanting to talk to us about it, he said. Mainly it’s about understanding. The conversations then go on to talk about where Linux is relevant. We talk about where it starts, which is segmenting the user base.
Green also admitted that there are situations where a specific document, such as a financial planning spreadsheet originally formatted in Microsoft Office, will make it very difficult for a Linux user to view documents in Linux applications.
For that the company proposes three choices: porting the application to OpenOffice.org macro language, which might work fine internally but cause problems when exchanging documents outside the company; using virtualization or server-based computing technologies; and using open source Wine project technologies that enable Microsoft applications to run on the Linux and Unix operating systems. We’re looking at providing customers with direction-setting and migrations paths for all those three, said Green.
