03.29.08
Do-No-Evil Saturday - Part I: OpenSUSE and SLED 11
Here is a roundup of news and reviews from the past week. As done every Saturday, we show the gentler side of Novell so that people like Francis complain a little less.
OpenSUSE
The newsletter is here, courtesy of Francis and others.
A new tutorial is available from from pendrivelinux.com, which turns its attention to SUSE this time around.
The following tutorial covers the process of installing SUSE Linux to an external USB Hard Drive using the OpenSUSE Live CD. The process is made possible due to a custom Portable SUSE script created by James Rhodes. The user basically boots from the Live OpenSUSE CD and performs the installation via the included YaST2 Install script to install SUSE to a USB Hard drive. Then the user reboots from the Portable SUSE installation and launches the custom script to convert some files in the running SUSE system for portable compatibility.
Also in focus this week, OpenSUSE had Masim Sugianto from Indonesia as a feature article.
Today’s ‘People of openSUSE’ interviews Masim ‘Vavai’ Sugianto - founder of the Indonesian openSUSE community helping users, and spreading out openSUSE to be widely used in his country!
The latest alpha of the latest OpenSUSE was put to the test as well.
Well looks like we are in for some new prizes with the new openSUSE alpha (Yay, Operating system development time!)
* NEW YAST THEME! With QT4, programs are themeable!
* Package manager updates!
* KDE/Gnome updatesPretty fancy (shots after the break)
Here are some raves about the stability of OpenSUSE. It actually speaks more about stability in KDE. The KDE4 family is not yet completely ripe for widespread adoption.
In my pervious experiment with OpenSUSE 10.3, I found the default KDE 3.X desktop to be ultra stable and functional.
KDE 4 version is not that functional and lacks the polish of KDE 3.X version but is definitely much better than KDE 4 implementation of other distributions.
Here is a general expression of satisfaction with OpenSUSE as whole.
Overall, I am very impressed with OpenSUSE and as a result it has climbed its’ way to the top of my “favourite linux distro’s” list. Unfortunately, it hasn’t amassed the strength to reef me from the clutches of cupertino - though vista’s smooth skin and easy smile has stolen my stair once or twice in recent times. Perhaps Ubuntu’s “Hardy Heron” (due out in April) will be not just a credible opponent for the Green Chameleon, but a worthy platform for even this most fussy of power-users - we shall soon see.
SLE[D|S] 11
As usual, Timothy Prickett Morgan brings the news a week or two after everybody else. This time it’s about SUSE Linux Enterprise 11, which was talked about quite a lot at BrainShare.
Novell hosted its annual BrainShare event last week in Salt Lake City, Utah, and probably the key announcement that the company made to the 5,500 attendees at the event and the untold numbers who participated secondarily through the Internet was the preview of some of the features and development plans (in the absence of features) in the upcoming SUSE Linux Enterprise 11 operating system. But don’t hold your breath waiting for SUSE Linux 11, since it is not coming to market any time soon, apparently.
A press release from last week had the following article (with pictures) composed and published: UMPCs gain Novell SLED compatibility
Fujitsu Computer Systems announced that four of its ultra-light notebooks have passed compatibility tests with Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED). The LifeBook U810, LifeBook T2010, and LifeBook P1620 ultra-mini PCs (UMPCs), and the LifeBook S6510 notebook have been “YES Certified” by Novell, says Fujitsu.
This was initially announced almost 2 weeks ago, but the pictures put it all in perspective. █
Highlight: Novell was the first to acknowledge that Microsoft FUD tactics had substance. Novell then used anti-Linux FUD to market itself. 
Highlight: Xandros let Microsoft make patent claims and brag about (paid-for) OOXML support. 
Highlight: Linspire's CEO not only fell into Microsoft arms, but he also assisted the company's attack on GNU/Linux. 
Highlight: Microsoft craves pseudo (proprietary) standards and gets its way using proxies and influence which it buys. 
Highlight: The invasion into the open source world is intended to leave Linux companies neglected, due to financial incentives from Microsoft. 
Analysis: Xen, an open source hypervisor, possibly fell victim to Microsoft's aggressive (and stealthy) acquisition-by-proxy strategy.