openSUSE
Until November 2, 2006, Novell SLED/SELS would have been on our recommended list but the announcement of a Novell-Microsoft joint venture hass somewhat tainted our opinions regarding any Novell product. Considerable speculation on the outcome of this joint venture can be found on the Internet. We believe that nothing good will come of this project. Here are few selected quotes/opinions on this subject:
- "Hell called: They want their ice back."
- "Ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?"
- "First reaction? Crap! And I was so looking forward to SUSE 10.2 :-(
- This might, might be a very wise move by Novell. I have kept an eye on the prospects of M$ imminent Vista release. It is almost certain to be a security nightmare for the first gen adopters. Their "iPod" killer Zune will launch without video support and doesn't look promising. M$ now has a fallback (sic) position if Vista is the bust I think it will be, and this will give Novell quite a leg up in the market. The golden years of M$ dominance are coming to a close and they know it. So does Novell. I guess we'll have to wait and see what happens next."
- "Microsoft is obviously desperate to undermine confidence in OpenOffice, Mono, and Samba."
Background/History
openSUSE started life as S.u.S.E., "Software- und System-Entwicklung" ("Software and system development"). S.u.S.E. was based on Slackware Linux and later integrated with the Jurix distribution to create their first truly unique S.u.S.E in version 4.2, c. 1996. Novell finalized the acquisition of SuSE in January 2004 and renamed it SUSE Linux. openSUSE is a community project, sponsored by Novell, to develop and maintain SUSE Linux components. Novell also offers commercial/enterprise versions of SUSE for both the desktop SLED (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop) and for the server SLES (SUSE Linux Enterprise Server).
Key Features
- SLED 10.x has new Start menu with its integrated desktop search (Beagle), Recently Used applications, and Favourite Applications is both reminiscent of and more functional than the Windows XP Start menu.
- XGL enhanced graphic desktop. In our opinion XGL out Eye-Candies XP!
- AppArmor easy to use security application to configure limits on what any application can do.
Target Audience
Enterprise Desktop and Server and individual users (openSUSE)
Strength/Weakness
- A number of key software packages are missing from the installation and not available as add-ons, notably Thunderbird e-mail.
- Three versions to suit your individual requirements
- openSUSE a free (gratis), community version
- SLED Enterprise Desktop
- SLES Enterprise Server
- Excellent documentation ships with SLED
- openSUSE support available as an paid add-on
Web site
www.novell.com/linux
openSUSE
