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Microsoft and Novell make summertime news...

It has been a pretty slow summer for open-source news, but Microsoft and Novell have been in the news recently and what they are doing does affect the open-source community.

First, let's consider Microsoft, which handed a $100K check to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) to become a Platinum sponsor.  Now $100K is chump change to Microsoft, so what does this latest "make nice" with the open-source community mean?  It could mean that Microsoft understands that open-source software is now established as a model for software development and they need to show some respect.  After all, the Apache Software Foundation is well-known and respected in the open-source community, so it would pay for Microsoft to be on speaking terms with the ASF.

Those with more suspicious minds and longer memories see Microsoft inserting its tentacles into the ASF in order to promote their own self-serving interests, which many still believe revolve around derailing or co-opting the open-source movement.  Less suspicious minds see Microsoft as needing friends in the open-source community and willing to pay money to get them.  Well, money is what Microsoft has tons of, but what it doesn't have is much good will or trust in the open-source community.  And as the Beatles told us back in the 60s, "money can't buy me love".

Second, let's consider Microsoft's recent announcement to invest another $100M in Novell to support their November 2006 agreement to cooperate on technical, licensing and marketing matters relating to improved interoperability between Microsoft Windows and Novell SUSE Linux.  Now $100M is not exactly chump change for Microsoft, so what benefits are flowing from this nearly two-year old agreement that warrants a second cash infusion by Microsoft?

Well, Novell has gotten a tidy sum of cash from Microsoft since the initial agreement was signed.  Mutual customers of Microsoft and Novell have received assurances that they are both cooperating to improve the interoperability of their products.  The open-source community, however, split on the value and meaning of the agreement.  The fanatics denounced it and swore never to use Novell SUSE Linux.  Jeremy Allison, Samba project director, bailed out of Novell in protest and landed at Google.  Novell channel partners generally thought it was a good thing because it diffused a lot of the Novell is good and Microsoft is bad attitudes that have been festering over the years.  Ray Noorda probably rolled over in his grave given his dislike for Gates and Ballmer, but then again, Ray was also a proponent of cooperating with your competition.

On the nuts and bolts side, their agreement has had some tangible results.  Microsoft and Novell collaboration on server virtualization has shown results just as Microsoft launched its Hyper-V virtualization hypervisor.  This should give Microsoft and Novell a leg up in the management of each vendor's virtual server environments.  Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 SP2 with Xen can run Microsoft Windows Server 2008 as a virtual machine.

The International Standards Organization's (ISO) recent and controversial approval of Microsoft's OOXML as a standard document format coupled with Novell's release of a ODF - OOXML document translator in March 2007, was another good thing coming out of their agreement.   But some industry pundits want to see Microsoft do more in this  area.  Their preferred state is complete, transparent and fully functional document exchange, including macros, between Microsoft Office and OpenOffice documents.  This doesn't seem to be an unreasonable request and if Microsoft has half an interest in protecting its Office franchise they need to step up and make this happen because Novell cannot do it alone.  Translators are one thing, but full document exchange interoperability is something else.

And in September 2007, Microsoft and Novell opened their interoperability lab in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  The lab is staffed by Microsoft and Novell engineers and is a physical manifestation of their agreement to cooperate in technical areas related to virtualization management and better Active Directory - eDirectory integration.

The $100M in new money Microsoft is pledging to their agreement will be used to buy SUSE Linux Enterprise Server support subscriptions from Novell.  Novell has stated that the existing agreement has significantly improved the uptake of SUSE Linux in Microsoft Windows accounts.  Their agreement makes Novell SUSE Linux the safe Linux server play for Microsoft Windows shops that need or want to deploy Linux servers.  Any interoperability problems encountered will get the attention of both Microsoft and Novell.

So what is left out?  Some people would prefer that Microsoft work more closely with the Mono project.  Mono is an open-source project sponsored by Novell that runs Microsoft .NET applications on Linux.  This should be a no-brainer for Microsoft as it would promote the broader use of .NET applications and give .NET developers a cross-platform audience for their code development efforts.  And best of all, both Microsoft and Novell would support it.

In the end, the success of the Microsoft - Novell agreement will be based on their mutual willingness to do what needs to be done to improve the use of each others products in mixed network environments.  Microsoft and Novell customers need to let their reps know that it is important to continue to deliver the interoperability goods.  Their November 2006 agreement runs through 2011, so let's hope for continued progress.

Oh, if you want to know more about Microsoft - Novell interoperability you should visit the site at http://www.moreinterop.com.

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A Declining Economy Creates Opportunities for Open-Source

In his recently published book titled Reinventing Collapse, author Dmitry Orlov compares and contrasts the collapse of the former Soviet Union with the observable signs of a declining United States.  Orlov's wide-ranging analysis touches on the information technology business where he makes several insightful comments.

Orlov states that the United States initially dominated the information technology arena during the free-wheeling era of the 1970s and 1980s that produced a number of significant random and accidental successes.  These storied successes included:  Apple, 3Com, Compaq, Microsoft, Novell, Lotus, Sun, WordPerfect, Borland, Ashton-Tate and Cisco.  But along the way the United States engaged in a strategy to "kill the golden goose" by enforcing intellectual property laws, allowing patents on software and perpetrating a fraud called "enterprise software."

In the Internet age of the 1990s it was no longer possible to enforce intellectual property laws governing information in the form of computer code or movies, since it could easily be copied and distributed.  Orlov argues the the only people still paying to rent this information are Americans who are afraid of being prosecuted.  And with the dubious extension of patents to software, the United States has now limited the type of speech software developers are free to engage in unless they are employed by large corporations who have amassed a war chest of software patents, which they threaten to use against potential lawsuits by competitors or anyone they feel threatened by. 

Orlov criticizes bureaucratized corporate software development, which has placed multiple layers of project managers, systems architects, marketing flacks, sales weasels and corporate management on top of software developers who must cobble together pieces of purchased and licensed code that takes an army of software consultants to get working, if it ever works at all.  The end result is a "solution" that is expensive to license and implement and not open to inspection and modification by the people who have to use it. Bugs are fixed on the vendor's time-table and are frequently late in coming or not adequately addressed.

Under such a system Orlov claims it is no wonder that the best developers now create their software outside of this system as open-source projects.  And unless software patents are done away with, the commercial software business in the United States is in danger of disappearing as open-source garners a larger and more receptive audience.

It is easy to see how open-source software will improve and thrive in a declining economy. Businesses are under immediate and long-term pressure to reduce IT costs, which they can do by replacing expensive proprietary software with open-source alternatives.

Ditto for federal, state and local governments whose storage of public documents in vendor-controlled proprietary formats will be challenged because these formats make public documents more expensive to access when they require the use of a vendor's proprietary applications. 

Public K-12 educational institutions face serious budgetary constraints in a declining economy.  Taxpayers will demand that public schools use free and open-source software alternatives to more expensive proprietary software that completely stifles the educational benefit of being able to take software apart, learn how it works, modify it and give copies of it to your friends.

The good news in this scenario is the demand for people capable of supporting and modifying open-source software will be on the rise.  So the sooner the K-12 public education establishment gets going with open-source software adoption, the sooner their graduates will have opportunities to enter gainful employment creating and supporting open-source software.  A side benefit could be increased student interest in attending higher education programs in computer science.

Open-source software will be increasingly valuable in a declining economy.  That said, can there be any doubt that the only software development model that will thrive in a declining economy will be one based on open-source software?

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Is Microsoft Windows still Relevant?

There has been a lot of talk recently about whether or not Microsoft Windows has a future.  Some of the conversation turns on the perceived lack of value in Windows Vista.   Others contend that a  "heavy" operating system, like Windows, is not needed by most corporate computer users.  And industry pundits have criticized Microsoft for not having re-designed Windows Vista using a modular architecture.

So just how valuable is it to have a Windows operating system in order to take advantage of today's network-based Web applications and services?  The answer is, not very.  The size and complexity of Windows is working against it.  And the ability of Microsoft to keep schlepping its legacy application baggage along has reached the breaking point. Windows Vista offers the corporate Windows user no compelling reasons to go through the expense and pain of upgrading from Windows XP.  And in these tougher economic times, the prospect of deploying a Windows Vista upgrade is a non-starter when Linux and open source software alternatives can do the job for less.

Microsoft XP will be 7 years old this fall.  Seven years is a long time for any Windows operating system to maintain its currency.  Windows 95 and 98 were current for shorter times.  Ditto for Windows 2000 and Windows 2003.  Only Windows NT maintained its currency for the same reason Windows XP has survived.  Both of them managed to find a sweet spot in corporate computing environments where it seemed just right.

But even if Windows XP was just right, it is showing its age and faces a questionable future after Microsoft discontinues its availability on new PCs after June.  Emerging desktop virtualization technologies may give Windows XP a reprieve from retirement, but just how long are those Windows applications running on Windows XP going to be needed?  Maybe longer than most people think, but then again, maybe not.

Today, the environment for delivering applications and data has shifted to the network and its servers and away from the desktop.  In modern computing environments a Windows desktop becomes just another delivery appendage to a network's ability to present users with access to applications and data.   Windows terminal servers and Windows desktop virtualization can extend the usefulness of Windows a bit longer because these technologies also reduce the management costs of Windows and allow organizations to contain their Windows and Windows application licensing expenses.

In the world of network computing, the future belongs to Linux and open source software.  Linux can be stripped down and embedded into just about any electronic device.  Novell just released SUSE Linux JeOS (Just enough Operating System) to developers who want to embed their applications in a minimal Linux environment.  Red Hat is also working along similar lines. 

For its part, Microsoft produced several embedded Windows versions over the years, but they missed the boat on the current movement of embedding just enough of the operating system with an application.  Microsoft appears to have been too conservative and too focused on its "heavy" operating systems to take notice of what was happening around them.  Score another win for the flexible Linux OS and the open source community.

For over 25 years Microsoft has been a successful marketer of expensive proprietary software.  And over that time we know that nothing can fail like success.  Another thing we know is Microsoft Windows has past the peak of its power and influence.  We have reached "peak Windows" as more adaptable Linux-based open source technologies along with the Apple Mac begin to erode Microsoft's Windows empire.

The irrelevance of Windows is on the horizon, but it isn't here yet. A lot may depend on what Microsoft does or doesn't do with Windows 7.  Those who don't care or can't afford to wait to find out are deploying Linux and open source software alternatives now.

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Open Source Moves Uptown

Linux was born in the early 1990s but the term "open source" wasn't coined until 1998.  And over the past ten years the open source development model has steadily gained momentum. Today, many commercial sponsors of open source project have seen the value of their projects rise in the marketplace.

Acquisitions of companies based on open source projects include:  JBoss, which was acquired by Red Hat ($350M).  SiteScape, which was acquired by Novell (undisclosed).  Scalix, which was acquired by Xandros (undisclosed).  Zimbra, which was acquired by Yahoo! ($350M).  Xensource, which was acquired by Citrix ($500M).  MySQL, which was acquired by Sun ($1B).  The fact that large sums of money are being spent to acquire the commercial sponsors of open source projects is proof that software development momentum is shifting to open source and away from proprietary software development.

A movement as powerful as open source was destined to reach high levels of value and interest.  The open source model is world-wide and brings together the talents of many developers who work on a project not because they want to get rich, but because they want to do it.  In other words, they have found an "itch" that they want to scratch.   Open source software by its very nature can be fixed or modified by anyone with the skill to do it.  See something wrong...fix it.  Want to add some feature to a project...submit it.  Want to take a project in another direction...fork it.  Open source is about the freedom to freely use software that is valuable to you. 

Closed source or proprietary software development typically serves corporate interests, which are usually motivated by profit.  Closed source software is about  keeping the source code secret and making you pay for a license to use it.  You cannot take it apart.  You cannot fix it.  You cannot copy it and you cannot give it away to someone else.

So far the acquisition of commercial sponsors of open source projects  has been made by companies committed to open source software development.  But the big bucks exchanged for some of these high profile project sponsors has generated concern among the purists.  Should we be worried that this is happening?  Probably not too much because even if the commercial project sponsor ceases business operations, the maintainers and contributors of the project can organize themselves to continue the project on their own or fork it if they decide to take a different direction.

Open source projects cannot be "orphaned" unless everyone involved with the project stops working on it.  With over 130,000 open source projects registered on SourceForge.net you can bet there are a lot of projects that have received very little attention for years, but there they are waiting for someone who wants to continue scratching the "itch" that got the project going in the first place.  You can't say the same thing about proprietary software where products can be abandoned leaving users with no legal access to the program source code.

When it comes to selecting software for your organization, it is now important to weigh the value of choosing open source software.  After all, which software development model offers you more freedom and security?  The correct answer is open source.

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Super NOS Redux...now that SCO is dead will Novell open UnixWare code to Linux?

Back in 1993 you may recall that after Novell acquired Unix Systems Labs from AT&T there was a lot of speculation about whether Novell would create a "Super NOS" by engineering a NetWare-Unix hybrid OS.  Well, it didn't happen.  Instead of doing that, Novell turned out an excellent Unix implementation on Intel processors called UnixWare.  Novell wound up with both NetWare and UnixWare to offer its customers.  Ironically, Novell wound up in a similar situation in 2004 after acquiring SUSE Linux.  This time the plan was to replace NetWare with Linux due to NetWare's declining fortunes in the OS marketplace.

Unfortunately, UnixWare met with only modest commercial success.  Even though Novell now owned Unix, it was not regarded as a Unix company like Sun.  So in a moment of questionable decision making, Novell sold the marketing* rights for Unix and UnixWare to the Santa Cruz Operation (SCO).  At the time, SCO was regarded as the "Rodney Dangerfield" (I don't get no respect!) of Unix on Intel processors.  At least SCO had a reputation for doing Unix on Intel processors, which was more than Novell had at the time.  This decision, however, would come back to haunt Novell in 2003.

By the mid-1990s the open-source Linux OS was emerging as a challenger to both Unix and Windows for a share of the server OS market.  Former Novell CEO Ray Noorda funded Caldera, which created its own Linux distribution aimed at the business customer using a reseller channel distribution model.  Along the way, Caldera eventually acquired SCO and renamed itself The SCO Group after abruptly dropping out of the Linux distribution business.  New management then decided to branch out into the intellectual property licensing business.  Next thing you know it is 2003 and The SCO Group files a lawsuit against IBM for $5 billion claiming IBM allowed Unix code from their AIX implementation to be "donated" to Linux.  There was wide-spread suspicion that Microsoft had arranged the financial backing SCO would need to litigate this lawsuit, which turned out to be true.

Novell responded to The SCO Group v IBM lawsuit by claiming it still owned the Unix and UnixWare copyrights because it never sold them to SCO...just the marketing* rights.  The SCO Group then sued Novell for defamation.  Novell said we'll see you in court.  Fast forward to August 2007 when a Federal District Court judge in Utah ruled that Novell, not The SCO Group, owns the copyrights to Unix and UnixWare.  The SCO Group filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection one month later.  End of story?  Not yet.

By way of Shickshinny (a town in northeastern Pennsylvania) we finally get around to what Novell should have done with UnixWare back in the mid-1990s.  Novell should have opened up the UnixWare code base to Linux kernel developers.  Why?  Because Novell was going nowhere fast with UnixWare, NetWare was beginning to lose out to Windows NT, and Linux was just reaching  take-off velocity in the OS  market.   For  a company looking for the "next big thing" in OS software, this should have been a clue about what to do.  But nothing fails like success and Novell management was still enamored with the success of NetWare despite the growing competition from Microsoft.  Too bad that Novell had lost Ray Noorda's insight into the importance of Linux.

Today, there should be no reason why Novell, which is also the distributor of SUSE Linux, would not want Linux to take advantage of technical advances "locked away" in UnixWare.  Rather than "fork" Linux development by keeping it just for SUSE, Novell should open-source UnixWare to Linux kernel developers and see if we can't finally get the "Super NOS" that was rumored about many years ago.

As an addendum to this post, Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols (Linux-Watch, January 4, 2008) has been thinking along a similar line when he writes:  "What will Novell do with Unix?  I don't know, but what I'd like them to do is to open-source as much of the code as they can.  There's still some goodness left in Unix that hasn't been duplicated in Linux."  He goes on to say that when Ransome Love, former CEO of Caldera and one-time Novell executive, wanted to open-source Unix he discovered that the Unix code contained copyrighted code from other companies.  Steven concludes by writing:  "Since Novell is a Linux company, it make perfect sense to me if they were to cherry-pick Unix for its best code and release it to the public".  I assume by "release it to the public" he means under the GPL.  You can read the full Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols article at http://www.linux-watch.com/news/NS6243163353.html

Well, there you have it.  We both agree that Novell could make a valuable contribution to Linux kernel development by releasing some of the Unix/UnixWare code to the open-source community.  And as soon as the wooden stake is pounded into SCO's heart, maybe that is just what Novell will do.  Let's hope so.

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March of the Penguins...Stylish open source releases now available!

There are a flock of new Linux and open source releases out this fall, here are some of the most notable.

Just a few weeks ago the Novell-sponsored openSUSE.org project released openSUSE 10.3. This release features a much faster Linux startup time...under 20 seconds. It also includes Virtual Box, KVM and Xen for your virtualization pleasure. Graphics enthusiasts will be happy to see that Compiz and Beryl have re-united their efforts in Compiz Fusion, which is nicely on display in openSUSE 10.3. I don't know if I could take that level of "eye candy" on a daily basis, and it is cool to see a Linux distro do things graphically that don't exist in Windows Vista.

And just like clock-work, the Canonical-sponsored Ubuntu Linux project has released Ubuntu 7.10. The Ubuntu release schedule is aggressive with releases usually taking place in the spring and fall of the year. I've been running Ubuntu since the 6.06 release and have found it to be one of the easiest distros to install and maintain. No wonder it is so popular. And no wonder Dell chose Ubuntu to pre-install on certain Dell desktop and laptop models for the consumer market.

As an added bonus, users running Ubuntu 7.04 or higher can take advantage of Linspire's "Click and Run" library. The library contains over 35,000 programs...free and proprietary, including multi-media codecs. Linspire 6.0, which is self-described as the "world's easiest desktop Linux", and its community-supported Freespire 2.06 edition are both based on Ubuntu. Linspire allows Freespire and Ubuntu users to access the "Click and Run" library. I've never seen an easier way to install Linux applications. When critics complain about how "non-standard" installing Linux applications can be, they should take a look at "Click and Run" and get with the program.

The OpenOffice.org project just released OpenOffice.org 2.3. I haven't taken it for a test drive yet...just downloaded it the other night, but there are new features to delight OO.o users everywhere. Writer can now export directly to the Media Wiki format. Chart can now do 3-D pies and 3-D exploded doughnut charts in addition to a simple 3-D look. Impress now allows you to edit the animation paths of moving objects on slides. Entire slide shows can now be exported to HTML format. OO.o now supports approximately 130 languages...hey, how about a Nobel prize!

Before I turn OFF this SOAPBOX post, I would like to salute the efforts of all the people working on the openSUSE, Ubuntu, Freespire and OpenOffice.org projects. Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) keeps us free to choose and you help to create that freedom. Thanks for making it happen.

OES2 Linux Rules! NetWare Headed for Retirement...

I'm excited to let you know that Novell's recently released Open Enterprise Server 2 for Linux (OES2) is what I've been waiting to see.  All of Novell's networking services are now running on OES2 Linux.  OES2 networking services install as an "add-on product" to SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 SP1 (SLES10 SP1).  The underlying OS is straight up SLES10 SP1.  Anything that runs on SLES10 SP1 will run on OES2 Linux.

A Little background regarding this important product release...

At the end of 2003 Novell announced its intention to acquire the SUSE Linux distribution.  SUSE was one of the first commercial Linux distributions.  Today, there are really only two commercially supported Linux distributions that are "data center ready" and one of them is SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 SP1 (current release) from Novell.

Faced with a declining share of the server OS market, Novell announced plans in early 2004 to implement the networking services found in NetWare 6.5 on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9.  In early 2005 Novell shipped the first release of Open Enterprise Server (OES) on Linux.  Some, but not all of Novell's networking services ran on this release of OES Linux.

The initial OES Linux release was a good first step, but many people, myself included, were unconvinced that Novell had made the best possible case for migrating from NetWare to OES Linux.

Why OES2 Linux is important to NetWare users...

The release of OES2 signals that it is time to put the future of NetWare into perspective.  NetWare is and will always be a 32-bit OS.  OES2 Linux exists as a 32-bit and 64-bit OS kernel.  The deployment of 64-bit operating systems running on 64-bit servers is growing.  Major server vendors like Dell, HP and IBM will eventually stop certifying NetWare 6.5 on their new server hardware and stop writing driver support.  This would normally be the death knell for NetWare, but read on!

If you have a major investment in NetWare NLM based services you can still use them by running OES2 NetWare (NetWare 6.5 SP7) as a para-virtualized OS under the Xen hypervisor kernel extensions to SLES10 SP1 in OES2 Linux.   It may take a minute to grasp the meaning of this if the permutations of server virtualization are new to you.   What you should understand is this will be the preferred way to run NetWare NLMs when upgrading to new server hardware.  Why?  Because the para-virtualized OES2 NetWare kernel does not directly access the server hardware.  This will "future proof" NetWare for you until Novell ends support for it in 2015.  I'll stress that you only need to consider doing this if you have NetWare NLM based services that you absolutely need and cannot find substitutes or upgrades that run on OES2 Linux (SLES10 SP1). 

A final word about running NetWare.  OES2 NetWare will be the last version of NetWare that will install on "bare metal".  You can install OES2 NetWare on "bare metal" as long as you have driver support from the server vendor.  If not, then running OES2 NetWare as a para-virtualized OS on OES2 Linux will be the way to go.

The benefits and features of NetWare live on in OES2 Linux...

If you are running NetWare in your organization today, it may have a lot do with its performance, security and reliability.  Hey, how many NetWare viruses are there anyway?  I want to let you know that you will maintain the same level of performance, security and reliability you are accustomed to by migrating from NetWare to OES2 Linux.  In fact, there are additional advantages when running OES2 Linux including:

• Full 64-bit OS support on Intel and AMD processors for the highest possible performance.
• Built-in Xen server virtualization support to help you consolidate your server bloat.
• Dynamic Storage Technology lets you do HSM without the tears.
• Novell DHCP and Novell DNS are now eDirectory integrated in OES2 Linux.
• Domain Services for Windows...a Microsoft AD clone, is coming in OES2 SP1.
• Thousands of Linux applications certified for SLES10 SP1 gives your more choices.

Expect Novell to publish offers encouraging you to migrate from NetWare to OES2 Linux.  Do not panic when your receive them.  Take a deep breath.  Realize that your are not giving up anything by migrating from NetWare to OES2 Linux.  You do not need to be a Linux guru to get going with OES2 Linux.  The same NetWare management tools you use today, like iManager and ConsoleOne, are used with OES2 Linux.  Along the way you will become that Linux guru and you don't need to start there to be successful with OES2 Linux.  Just recall that most of us were not NetWare gurus from the get-go either.

Take it from someone who has installed, upgraded and supported NetWare since 1985.  Sometimes good things come to an end.  NetWare has been a good thing. NetWare helped launch the whole networking industry and enabled countless organizations to experience the benefits of networked PCs and applications.  And now all of the enterprise class networking services in NetWare are available in OES2 Linux.  Dig in.  OES2 Linux is a good thing too.

Summer Update

Even though it was summer there was no shortage of interesting news to come across our desks and mailboxes.  Google acquired the popular Postini email scanning service.  Google...just what won't they buy?  The Xandros Linux distribution sponsor acquired Scalix, an open source groupware project.  This could help Xandros gather a lilttle more mindshare in the crowded Linux distribution marketplace.  Dell acquired Silverback Technologies, one of the premier managed service providers.  This can only mean that Dell is serious about reselling managed services to  create a “residual” revenue stream for the company.  Citrix acquired XenSource, the commercial arm of the open source Xen virtual machine hypervisor project.  At $500 million, XenSource was not cheap, but if Citrix is determined to go up against VMWare it may prove to be worthwhile.    Yahoo! acquired Zimbra, another open source groupware project.  Poor Yahoo! needed to do something...anything.  The Scalix, XenSource and Zimbra acquisitions brought a combined price of almost  $1 billion.  This should silence open source software critics who proclaim that “free software” is worth what you pay for it.

Just when you thought the SCO v. IBM lawsuit over Unix copyright infringement would never end. A U.S. Federal District Court in Utah ruled that Novell not SCO owns the copyrights to Unix and UnixWare.  And to make matters worse for SCO, the court also ruled that Novell is entitled to a share of the $30 million in license fees SCO collected from Sun and Microsoft.  A month after the court's ruling SCO filed for Chapter 11 protection.  Surprise!  It turns out you can't sue someone for copyright infringement when you don't own the copyrights!  Hopefully this is almost the last we will hear of SCO until it goes into Chapter 7 liquidation.  Good riddance.

Microsoft has just about run out of appeals to fight the European Commission's $689 million fine against the company for not opening up Windows code to competing media players.  This is another case of Microsoft having more money than sense.  Recent court judgments and out of court settlements against Microsoft have cost the company over $5 billion.  I know Microsoft has a cash horde of tens of billions but it still seems like a lot of money to fork over for bad and/or illegal behavior.  Why can't Microsoft just learn to get along?  It would certainly be a lot cheaper.

Finally, the competition against Microsoft Office is getting better organized.  Sun's StarOffice is now available for free download from Google Desktop.  The free download might  be just the Windows version of StarOffice.  It shouldn't matter to Linux users who already have OpenOffice.org, which is the open source code base for StarOffice.  And IBM has released a free beta of its OpenOffice.org based Lotus Symphony for Windows and Linux.  Those of you old enough to remember the first DOS-based Lotus Symphony program back in the mid 1980s will recall that it was pretty much a dud compared with the success of Lotus 1-2-3.  However, it was written by Ray Ozzie who turned out Lotus Notes a couple of years later.  Ray subsequently  developed Groove, which he eventually sold to Microsoft and finally made the move to the “dark side” himself by joining Microsoft.  Watch for Ray to keep moving up the Microsoft corporate food chain after Bill Gates departs the middle of 2008.   

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