| Novell showcases SuSE Linux Pro 9.3 at its annual tradeshow |
Mar. 21, 2005
Salt Lake City -- At its annual BrainShare tradeshow Monday, Novell showed off the next edition of its enthusiast Linux desktop, SuSE Linux Professional 9.3, to a few partners here. The SuSE Linux Professional desktop will ship in April. It comes with all the usual updates one would expect from a modern, full-featured Linux desktop: the Firefox 1.01 Web browser, the Novell Evolution 2.0 groupware client, the 2.6.11 Linux kernel, and your choice of a KDE 3.4 or GNOME 2.10 interface.
But there's more. In addition, this distribution will ship with OpenOffice.org 2.0, the latest version of the popular desktop application suite; VOIP (voice over IP) Linphone; and iPod compatibility.
SuSE Linux Professional, though, will not just be a collection of cutting-edge Linux and open-source technologies. SuSE is adding its own new contributions to the Linux desktop.
This distribution is also the forerunner for Novell's next enterprise Linux desktop: NLD (Novell Linux Desktop) 2.
In fact, Nat Friedman, vice president of Linux desktop engineering at Novell Inc. said, "We are getting ahead of Windows for the first time."
While the new Professional hasn't been shown to the public yet, those bedazzled attendees who have managed to see it think Friedman may be right.
The most exciting development, according to several observers, was Beagle. This is a new integrated desktop metadata search program that indexes a user's hard drive content in a way that's similar to Google Desktop 2 or Apple's Spotlight. One observer commented, "Beagle is like Desktop on steroids."
Beagle, which uses the Mozilla Gecko rendering engine for its display, is more than just an attractive, interactive search tool. It can also be used in Mono-based C+ programs, as Friedman demonstrated during an interview.
A demonstration of some Beagle's features is available online.
Friedman also said that with Beagle in place, it would finally be possible to create a program he calls "Dashboard."
Dashboard's goal is to automatically show a user useful files based on his or her current activities. For example, if you were writing an email about your plans for the coming weekend, Dashboard would automatically display your schedule for that weekend.
While Dashboard won't make it into 9.3, Friedman has hopes that it will make it into the next version of Professional, and possibly into NLD 2.
The new Professional also comes with another program that's reminiscent of a Google software offering. In this case, it's Google's free photo-editing, organizing and Web publishing program Picasa 2. Novell's answer to this Windows-only program is the F-Spot photo-management tool.
Both these innovative Novell-sponsored programs are licensed under the GPL. Beyond the feature set, Professional will also include Xen 2.05 virtualization software. This will enable users to run multiple instances of Linux simultaneously.
While this may seem more like a parlor trick than something useful on a desktop machine, Chris Schlaeger, Novell's vice president of engineering for Linux, said, "It will work on Professional, but we're not going to say it's ready for enterprise use, because it's not."
Looking ahead, though, Schlaeger said, "Once Xen has been mastered on the Professional platform, its virtualization capabilities will become part of our data-center offering, where the processor virtualization is extremely important."
And looking ahead for Professional, Ed Anderson, Novell's vice president of Linux and platform services, hinted that Novell may be thinking about opening up its development path. "We've been mulling over creating a community-based Linux like Red Hat's Fedora. There are many things we like about the Fedora Project, but there are some we don't."
If you found this eWEEK.com article by Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols informative, be sure to check out eWEEK.com's Linux & Open Source Center for the latest open-source news, reviews, and analysis.
Related Stories:
(Click here for further information)
|
|
|
Approaching the Linux Desktop
The purpose of this paper is to help organizations evaluate the Linux desktop against their own enterprise needs and discover what benefits the Linux desktop might bring to their organizations.
Migrating To Linux: Application Challenges and Solutions
Several solutions exist to help organizations migrate in an orderly fashion from Windows to Linux desktops. This paper establishes the characteristics of an ideal cross-platform solution and reviews these alternatives in light of this ideal standard. The paper takes a closer look at the pros and cons of various solutions and outlines the business benefits that can be achieved.
Linux Advantages: Publicly Available Information on Linux Software
This paper offers a brief summary of readily-available Linux information to help businesses sort out this widely misunderstood operating system.
Top 5 Strategies for Managing Linux
Despite continuous evolution in the manageability of Linux, a 2006 survey cited manageability concerns as a top reason why organizations are hesitating to adopt Linux. Levanta believes Linux can be as manageable, if not more so, than other operating systems by following key strategies. These strategic recommendations were developed from experiences in numerous customer environments, both large and small.
Why Choose Novell for Linux?
This paper outlines the benefits of switching to the Linux platform and choosing Novell as a high-performance, enterprise solution.
Enterprise Linux Selection Guide
Considering moving your enterprise to the Linux operating system? Since there are so many similar versions, choosing the right one can be tough. This paper offers a clear process to help you make an informed decision and get the features, support, and cost that are right for your business and technical needs.
Overcoming Challenges in Managing Linux
Levanta has created a new administration model with innovative technology that breaks down the barriers to making the most of Linux systems. This paper will provide an in-depth look at the workings of Levanta’s product, the first Linux appliance of its kind.
SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 for Retail Businesses
Discover why major retailers have switched to SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop in the back office. SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 is a low-cost desktop that offers a complete set of productivity applications and interoperates seamlessly with the other Windows, Macintosh and UNIX desktops in your store.
Moving to a Linux Desktop
Migrating from Windows to Linux on the desktop can be a substantial undertaking because it has the potential for touching -- and perhaps disrupting -- every user in your organization. Unlike a data center (server and infrastructure) migration that is largely transparent to users, the cultural and administrative transitions and environment readiness required to support a Linux desktop migration are extensive.
Seven Good Reasons to Exchange Exchange
This paper describes seven compelling reasons why you should switch from Exchange to Scalix.
|
|
|
|
|
news feed
