06.28.08
Posted in GNU/Linux, SLES/SLED, Debian, Servers, HP, Mail, xandros at 6:15 am by Roy Schestowitz
In what could be seen characterised as a battle between Microsoft partners, there’s this comparison between the ASUS Eee (with Xandros) and SLED on the HP Mini-Note.
The biggest complaints I hear about the Eee PC are that the keyboard is too small and there’s not enough screen real estate. Even the new 8.9 inch only offers 1024×600 screen res. Some people also complain that the Eee PC runs a knobbled version of Xandros Linux. A Mini-Note running SuSE Linux Enterprise should address these issues.
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06.04.08
Posted in Microsoft, Office Suites, Standard, OpenDocument, Open XML, IBM, Mail at 1:28 am by Roy Schestowitz
…responding with lobbying, aka “Legalised Bribery”
The pressure is up for Microsoft Office to cope with. Yesterday we wrote about the press release from IBM, which covered the latest swing at Microsoft Office and Exchange. Now comes this article which sheds some more light on these moves from Big Blue.
Dubbed the IBM Lotus Foundations Start, this is a turnkey solution running on Linux that can get a business’s infrastructure up and running within 30 minutes, according to the company.
This comes at an interesting time and probably not by coincidence. IBM’s Lotus Symphony has just hit the important 1.0 milestone.
Open Document Format (ODF) comes of age today as IBM announces the commercial-grade, general availability of Lotus Symphony, a suite of free, ODF-based software tools for creating and sharing documents, spreadsheets and presentations.
Microsoft has two principal perils to face at the moment:
- Technical barrier. This relates to the ability to compete with cheaper counterparts based on merits or vendor lock-in
- Legal barrier. Microsoft’s sheer abuse is well documented, unlike Microsoft’s formats. In months to come, it’s likely to be hit by heavy fines for this despicable behaviour.
How will Microsoft respond to that latter problem? Play dirty, of course. That’s what the company knows best. The following new appointment is very telling. [via Groklaw]
Microsoft Taps Legal Czar Amid EU, OOXML Woes
Microsoft announced Monday it has hired a former European diplomat to lead its dealings with the European Union (EU). The company’s aim is to help the company face down legal and regulatory threats, among which are investigations regarding its controversial document interchange formats.
Meanwhile, a fourth nation has appealed the recent ratification of those formats as an International Organization for Standardization (ISO) standard.
Slated to start July 1, former General Electric executive John Vassallo will be Microsoft’s vice president of EU affairs as well as associate general counsel. At GE, he was senior counsel and director of European affairs. He has also previously served as Malta’s ambassador to the EU, NATO and Belgium.
Make no mistake. This is far from the first time that Microsoft plays ‘politics’ in order to escape punishment and game the system. Here is just one set of prior examples where Microsoft is gaming Europe using diplomats and well-paid lobbyists.
About that newly-appointed Top Gun again, Groklaw did some searching and pulled this one [PDF] from 2007. Pamela Jones then said: “So he’s been a lobbyist. I believe this may give us a hint as to what the angle may be with the EU Commission.” The OOXML saga will most likely continue to be chaos riddled with brute manipulation. █
From the Campaign for Document Freedom
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05.30.08
Posted in Microsoft, FOSS, Mail at 1:09 am by Roy Schestowitz
Two days ago Microsoft issued a press release heralding its plans to take over universities with its Windows-oriented, Live-branded offerings, which typically lock down students and bind them to Microsoft while they still are young. For background about this, see this older post.
We were contacted by a reader who urged us to respond. “With many of Microsoft’s minions surreptitiously pulling the plug on IMAP this summer while people are out it might be good to line up shots for the inevitable backlash,” he writes. “Or, in the best case, for use in preventative action,” he continues, “we should prepare lists.” He is pointing to this new success story of a commercial, closed source option.
He recommends that we start framing Free software alternatives, where applicable, as “the list of products Microsoft is trying to dethrone through feeble imitation and nasty intrithogue.” We were criticised by this reader before, especially for warning about Microsoft’s shots at FOSS without bothering to mention or to link to projects that Microsoft tries to fight, in which case the positive contribution to them is mere.
Here is the list of suggestions, as-is, which he passes on to us (making this a static page would seem too much like advertising). We omit only Scalix because it’s Xandros, which we boycott:
Server Applications
Kolab
Project homepage
Kolab is an open source, standards-based groupware server. It is a product of a series of contracts for the federal office for Security in the Information Technology in the German Government. Support contracts are available from several sources including ones in Sweden. It is maintained by the Kolab consortium.
Citadel
Project homepage
Citadel is fully open source with end-to-end GPLv3. It has been production grade for several years.
Bongo
Project homepage
Descendant of the Hula project.
Zimbra
Project homepage
Zimbra is owned by Yahoo! as of 2007. Though the recent bid against Yahoo! by Zimbra’s main competitor puts the product at risk. If the deal goes through, given the competitor’s history it is likely to be sidelined like FoxPro or broken like HotMail, to name just two examples.
Open-Xchange
Project homepage
Open-Xchange is available under dual license GPL + proprietary.
Client Applications
Sunbird
Project homepage
Sunbird is very easy to use, open source calendar client. It can handle both stand-alone calendars and shared calendars using SQLlite, CalDAV and the standard iCalendar. Shared calendars can be accessed via the net or via the file system. The interface is written in XUL, JavaScript, and CSS
Thunderbird
Project homepage
Thunderbird is a very easy to use, open source mail client. It can handle IMAP and POP, with options like encryption. It is readily extensible and many plug-ins exist to provide essentials like culling duplicate messages or PKI encryption.
Kontact
Project homepage
Kontact is very easy to use, open source calendar client from. It can handle both stand-alone calendars and shared calendars using SQLlite, CalDAV and the standard iCalendar. Shared calendars can be accessed via the net or via the file system. The interface is written in XUL, JavaScript, and CSS. [correction: the client interface/program is implemented with Qt and C++]
Google Calendar
Project homepage
Google is easy to use and supports data standards, but it is server-based and the server is located on the other side of the Atlantic. KPlato
KPlato
Project homepage
KPlato is a standalone project management and planning tool. It has many useful functions including Gantt charts, task lists with resource allocations per task, task allocations per resource, cost planning with configurable cut-off date and periodicity, and more. █
On Microsoft’s dumping technique to ensure lock-in in schools:
- Bill Gates' Retirement Merely a Political Lock-in Crusade
- Microsoft 'Buys' Dubai Away from GNU/Linux, Calls it “Charity”; Paris Also?
- OOXML Sins and “Charity” Against GNU/Linux
- It's Not Dumping Because They Call it “Charity”
- Boosting Windows Vista Sales Using AIDS
- “Let Them Eat Vista...”
- Mysterious New Moves in the Gates Foundation
- Microsoft Carries on Dumping to Make Its Products a 'Standard'
- The Takeaways from the Giveaways
- Microsoft Must Be Absolutely Terrified
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05.24.08
Posted in Microsoft, Novell, America, FOSS, Mail at 4:21 am by Roy Schestowitz
Much like buybacks (Novell recently resorted to them [1, 2]), changing of heads in a company is a great sign of weakness. This continues to happen at Novell.
Some weeks ago we noted that some head-changing moves in Novell Canada ought to at least be mentioned. There is now some clearer proof of this. This one is the latest:
Former Novell Canada president Katie McAuliff is looking at ways to improve channel partner profitability in her new role as Novell Americas channel chief.
More here about the new leadership:
I am very happy for Chevalier for a couple of reasons. First he has paid his dues and deserves a shot at running the Canadian operation. Secondly, he is a channel advocate and will try his best to create a win-win culture for Novell and its ever growing partner base.
Chevalier replaces Katie McAuliff, who is going off to run the
Americas channel. I do not want to be overly critical of McAuliff because she made a lot of time for CDN during her tenure as Novell
Canada president and I do appreciate that.
The fact that McAuliff spent time here and learned the way this market works will only help Novell
Canada partners since she is running that channel.
Related to this but not quite the same, Novell is losing customers to Microsoft. Yet again. We mentioned more examples just an hour ago.
Computer Service Partners, a Raleigh-based IT Integrator was recently selected by CommunityONE Bank, N.A. to migrate 550 employees in 49 different locations from Novell to Microsoft E-mail and Domain Controller solutions, and concurrently consolidate operations at the bank’s corporate data center in Asheboro. CSP will also deploy Cisco IP phone systems initially in seven community offices, and over time implement Cisco Unified Communications solutions organization wide at CommunityONE.
Novell is a frail company. It still relies heavily on its legacy, which is being devoured by competitors, however gradually.
This may be another reason for you or your business not to adopt Novell’s ’solutions’ (that’s how Novell and Microsoft perceive Free software). █
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Posted in Microsoft, SCO, Novell, Security, Asia, Courtroom, HP, Virtualization, Mail, Identity Management at 3:17 am by Roy Schestowitz
We are still waiting for a decision on Novell-SCO to be made — a decision which the public knows nothing about. For background on the latest, see [1, 2].
In the mean time, here are a few of the latest developments at Novell, to the exclusion of GNU/Linux news which earlier posts covered [1, 2].
Windows/Novell
Novell gets sort of snubbed in Indian banks. Novell ought to get used to it if it relies on Microsoft for marketing.
Deepak Maheshwari, Director, Corporate Affairs, Microsoft India, shares his thoughts with Neeraj Gandhi, on the recently introduced Microsoft Platform Security and Audit Handbook 2008.
[…]
What about Linux keeping in mind Microsoft’s tie-up with Novell?
Presently we are focusing on these three Microsoft platforms only.
Microsoft is likely to continue phasing Novell out while Novell’s strategy is to rely on Microsoft. Not smart.
The school system currently uses Novell, which is an aging operating system. Novell also isn’t compatible with the Microsoft operating system that county government uses.
That’s interoperability? Well, we digress.
Groupwise
The Gwava-Groupwise affair is not on the rocks, but mind the following:
Rather than creating direct integration with specific packages, Gwava puts all of its data into an SQL Server format that can be integrated by a supplier or enterprise as part of a custom solution. Unlike its other products, however, which interact directly with Novell GroupWise, Gwava’s Retain for BES does not require GroupWise. ”
On the other hand, GroupWise gets a lift from Messaging Architects.
M+Extranet 3.5 is an efficient and cost-effective solution for collaborating with non-GroupWise users, and instantly publishing GroupWise content on a company intranet site, client extranet site, or student portal. Content can be published as an HTML page, RSS feed, blog or podcast without the need for expensive web authoring tools or content duplication.
Mentioned last week was the following news, which Beta News gets to at the end. It seems like Beta News has found new affinity for Novell, especially because of Jacqueline Emigh. Bear in mind that Beta News is very Microsoft-oriented. It’s worth keeping track of which publications give positive/negative publicly to whom. It explains favouritism and prejudice.
Despite its well known interoperability deal with Microsoft, Novell still sees Redmond as the big competitor to catch in the groupware, collaboration, and messaging arenas, where the SuSE Linux distributor has just released the new, multiplatform Novell Open Workgroup Suite (NOWS) with Novell Teaming.
Virtualisation
Not from a source that we like citing, but mind Novell’s presence in SYS-CON’s Virtualization Conference & Expo.
Novell’s Stephen Pollack to Present at SYS-CON’s Virtualization Conference & Expo, June 23-24, in New York City
We wrote about virtualisation at Novell some hours ago. Novell is with Microsoft and its affiliates. Even SYS-CON, especially with the presence of Maureen O’Gara, is not friend of FOSS. She’s describing ODF as “Microsoft-hostile” at the moment, revealing her bias immediately. Her recent attacks on Stallman are not to be forgotten and they make SYS-CON seem like a tabloid, not just an annoying publication that floods Google New using spamming techniques.
Identity and Security Management
Forbes passed on the news about Hewlett-Packard’s collaboration with Novell on identity and security management.
Hewlett-Packard Co. and Novell Inc. said Friday they will jointly offer migration services as part of an deal to migrate Hewlett-Packard identity center customers to Novell identity and security management products.
The press release is here.
As part of an agreement between the companies, HP and Novell will jointly offer migration services, HP will resell Novell identity and security management solutions and Novell will license HP Identity Center technology.
More from the British press appeared almost a week later.
HP has exited the world of identity management and handed over its Identity Center customers to Novell as part of an exclusive alliance.
Remember what we wrote earlier on about the H-P relationship with Microsoft (and with Novell). Like Novell, H-P is another Microsoft pawn that promotes OOXML. It’s part of the cycle of nepotism and ‘protection’.
Joe Wagner (of Novell) published an article that covers security.
Joe Wagner, senior vice president and general manager of Systems and Resource Management at Novell, explains the security implications of all those popular portable storage devices.
Looking at his mailbox, a reader of ours found this in the Global Novell Newsletter of May 2008:
“Security Threats Straight Ahead!
“Jim Ebzery, Sr. […] discusses the realities of online security dangers and […] addresses compliance issues, insider threats, identity theft, and privacy violations. Read the entire article online now”
He then added: “I thought security was about making Operating Systems that were secure from clicking on an URL or opening an email attachment.”
Partnership with Genovate in India
Here is another new partnership for Novell. It’s the first of its kind in this nation.
Genovate, a leading high-end technology company, has today announced that they have become Novell’s first platinum partner in India.
Genovate provides Business applications, software solutions and consulting as well as the best-of-breed value-added educational programs and quality training services in the Asia-Pacific region.
8 new centres are being created by Genovate, which met with Novell.
Genovate has also entered into a tie-up with infrastructure software and services company Novell to provide training in India. Genovate, with the partnership, would target both individuals and universities, he added.
Novell’s Past People
Ray Noorda, a fierce enemy of Microsoft and one who could not trust Bill Gates or Steve Ballmer, is mentioned in this article about a donation/fund.
The largest limited partner in Canopy Ventures II is the family of legendary entrepreneur Ray Noorda, who founded Novell Inc. and was chief executive officer of the software company for 12 years until 1995.
More details here.
The early-stage venture fund, which is backed by the Noorda family of Novell fame, is investing in life sciences for the first time, and also expanding its investment along the Wasatch Front.
“There are plenty of good opportunities in medical devices and pharmaceuticals, and there’s so much good technology and so many talented scientists affiliated with the University of Utah and BYU. Utah County was our backyard from the Novell days, but we’re now looking forward to branching out to northern Utah,” said Brandon Tidwell, another general partner with Canopy.
Since its establishment in 1995, Canopy has invested around $100 million in 13 technology companies in Utah, 10 of which are in Utah County. Canopy was founded by the late Ray Noorda, Novell’s founder and former CEO.
Here is the story of one who departed from Novell’s technologies on the face of it.
While I was working at Air New Zealand I assisted setting up a Novell network. I started thinking it was the way I wanted to go in terms of my career, so I bought my first computer and went from there. My first foray into IT was working in field sales in LA for a distributor of electronics called Hallmark Electronics. I started working with Kingston back then as they were one of the brands we had.
That’s all for this week, as far as good or innocent news are concerned. █
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05.16.08
Posted in GNU/Linux, Novell, Deals, Debian, GPL, Ubuntu, Mail, xandros, Linspire at 10:54 pm by Roy Schestowitz
Linspire
To be very clear and probably a little blunt, Linspire’s main distinguisher is CNR. At some stage last year, Matt Hartly even advised the company the have the entire business just centrered around CNR and rely on others, as it typically has (Debian or Ubuntu), to produce the GNU/Linux distribution. Linspire adds customisation, proprietary bits and CNR to make what we know as Linspire (or Freespire, which isn’t as free as the same implies). It’s pretty much the same with Xandros.
It’s unsurprising to find that Linspire’s presence is pretty much tied to CNR. Those two are now inseparable. Over at Linux.com you’ll find this article about Linspire using its ‘bread and butter’, CNR which is now free software, to approach Mint and Ubuntu. They all share the same codebase, but only Linspire will have great trouble with the GPLv3, due to its foolish deal with Microsoft.
Linspire, the San Diego, Calif.-based Linux distributor, is continuing to build up its CNR (Click-N-Run) software installation system with partnerships with Ubuntu parent Canonical and the Ubuntu-based Linux Mint distribution. Linspire recently announced that its beta CNR service now supports the Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron release and Linux Mint versions 4.0 and 5.
Here is a new review of CNR.
CNR or Click and Run is a free one-click software delivery service designed to standardize the process and eliminate the complexity of finding, installing and managing Linux software for the most popular desktop Linux distributions according to the Linspire folks.
[…]
CNR achieves what it strives to be, easy installation of programs, especially for newbies. What is great about CNR is that it integrates with the distro’s package manager and thus make making life much easier unlike other projects like Autopackage. However it is not as easy and great to use like Add/Remove in Ubuntu and is not as vast as the official Ubuntu repositories and many programs are not available but is not far behind. It is still in the beta-development phase so I expect more innovations in the future. And as I said before, it is great for purchasing and installing proprietary programs.
However most users of Ubuntu do not need CNR as such but it is good to have options as well.
Another non-announcement comes from Linspire about Cedega in CNR:
Cedega enables Linux gamers to play Windows titles on their Linux OS. Triple-A video games such as Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Battlefield 2142, World of WarCraft, Madden 2007, Civilization IV and many more, can be played on Linux using Cedega. This allows an easy, out-of-the-box gaming experience.
As we pointed out last week, eWeek doesn’t miss a beat when it comes to Xandros or Linspire. Almost immediately Henry Kingman covered this non-story. Bear in mind that Desktop Linux is owned by the bankrupt Ziff Davis, which hardly publishes anything these days, especially after SJVN changed directions (he publishes in Computer World, Linux.com, CIO.com, his personal Web site and IEEE) and Rick Lehrbaum made a career change.
Anyway, from the article:
CNR can also be used to install “over 900 free and commercial software games,” Linspire claims, in genres that span from classic arcade games, to action games, adventure games, puzzles, and boardgames.
In other words, that press release could brag about hundreds of other games. So, is it an article or a commercial? It’s hard to tell. Maybe somewhere in-between. On the brighter side of things, Linspire seems to be a source of inspiration to some.
Version 2.0 of the software will offer the iPhone SDK and the App store, which is similar to Linspire’s online store CNR.com which allows you to install software directly from the web, and can be used both by iPhone and iTouch users.
Xandros
Last week we saw Xandros and Viyya Technologies getting together and this week it’s an obscure (and probably small) company from India that says it joined hands with Xandros.
IIRA Technologies pioneer in the field of open source join hands with Xandros Inc. for basic OS and mail servers. After working on varied Open Source platform for long 8(eight) years, we found Xandros is most scalable, user friendly and network savvy. Xandros is the only OS having facility to communicate with almost all of the applications irrespective of platforms whether proprietary or open source.
The only other noteworthy news from Xandros (other than Asutek’s Eee PC coverage) would be Commtouch and Scalix collaborating on E-mail security technologies.
Commtouch and Scalix Collaboration Brings Real Time Messaging Security to Linux-based E-mail Servers — New Scalix Release Incorporates Commtouch Anti-Spam and Zero-Hour Virus Outbreak Protection Technologies
Here is the press release.
Scalix, a Linux e-mail, calendaring and messaging company and Commtouch® (NASDAQ:CTCH) today announced the signing of an OEM licensing agreement to bring real time Scalix AntiSpam and Scalix ZeroHour AntiVirus protection to the Scalix messaging platform.
It would only be fair to admit that I resent Xandros and Linspire. With Novell it’s a more complicated relationship because I used to love the company and even advocated its products. Then came the deal with Microsoft. It felt like a divorce, or at least a cruel betrayal. Even Groklaw seems to maintain its love-hate relationship with Novell. █
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04.19.08
Posted in SCO, Novell, Courtroom, Virtualization, Africa, Mail at 8:54 am by Roy Schestowitz
This is where a leftover of news should fit rather well. All articles allude to Novell in one form or another. The first item speaks of hypervisors and has Novell mentioned because of its ownership of PlateSpin — the result of of a rather pricey and recent acquisition.
One company that was looking to make this a problem of the past was PlateSpin, now swallowed by Novell. PlateSpin provides virtual image management, and was bringing to market the capability to carry out on-the-fly virtual-to-virtual (V2V) conversions from one format to another. This not only makes it easier to provision the function, service or application that is required at any one moment, but also eases image management itself. For example, an application image will need patching or upgrading at intervals. Having just one image that can be provisioned to multiple virtualised environments will be far more manageable than having to patch multiple images, one for each environment.
At the moment, the jury is still out as to how Novell plans to play the PlateSpin card it now has in its hand. The majority of other players have a vested interest in keeping virtualisation proprietary, and Quocirca does not expect to see those who stand to gain a lot of their revenues through the sale of their own hypervisor, or who believe that they can take the big guys on directly, putting in great efforts to ensure full interoperability with other vendors’ systems.
More news about Novell in this context you will find in the following article/blog post.
Novell actually conducted a survey among 411 data center managers last year in conjunction with Lighthouse Research that found approximately 61 percent of companies either use a manual process or no process at all to track server resources. What’s more, almost 80 percent still use manual means to reallocate server workloads.
The Novell-sponsored survey found that 67 percent of data center managers are evaluating management technologies in order to save space in their data centers, while 65 percent were considered power savings. More often than not, you won’t be surprised to hear, virtualization was the mechanism by which they hoped to achieve this. Slightly less than half of the respondents already use virtualization, while more than half of the remaining respondents are evaluating server virtualization for the future.
Here is Novell calling for its channel to specialise a little. This comes from the newly-appointed Michelle Beetar, who took over the operations after a mass exodus of staff.
Novell has realigned itself from being a “pretty direct” company, to a “channel-centric” one. So says Novell SA country manager Michelle Beetar.
Here is a duel involving Domino, GroupWise and Exchange.
Novell still sells GroupWise as well, but along with the rest of the products in the company, Novell is focusing it more now to run on the Linux platform rather than NetWare. (That said, GroupWise will still run on NetWare as well as Linux and Windows.)
Groklaw still keeps an eye on the Novell-SCO court battle, which is handy for those who are patient enough to dig into documents and are sufficiently familiar with the background of this long-standing case.
Here’s Novell’s Opposition to SCO’s Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings on Novell’s Claims for Money or Claim for Declaratory Relief [PDF] as text.
Looking at the week ahead, the local press reveals that Novell will host a meeting.
The Utah Valley Entrepreneurs’ Forum, Omniture, the Open Source Technology Center at Novell, the Provo Business Development Corp., Utah Science, Technology, and Research; and the Utah Fund of Funds will host a free lecture series featuring speaker Josh Coates, who will discuss “Marketing: Press, Analysts and the Interweb.”
Novell seems almost like the centre of attention in this region. █
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03.29.08
Posted in Microsoft, Finance, GNU/Linux, Novell, SLES/SLED, Ron Hovsepian, Deception, NetWare, Mail at 3:55 am by Roy Schestowitz
The worse of both worlds
Novell will carry on ‘massaging’ its financial figures and pretend that while its legacy products fade away, its future business is flourishing. Some innocent journalists will buy this story and perpetuate the myth that Novell is seeing a rebirth (never mind the expected sacking of a great proportion of the workforce).
Novell’s dilemma is eerily similar to that of Microsoft and the stories they tell bear a resemblance as well. Both companies also send jobs overseas — cost savings being the main motive — but they don’t make as much noise about it as lame and unsubstantiated excuses.
If further evidence of this is required, here are a couple of stories from last week’s news. The first article we can present here talks about Novell’s decline in the messaging and collaboration market.
Novell’s lagging position in the messaging and collaboration market
[…]
That said, many (including me) talk about Novell’s lagging position in the messaging and collaboration market behind Microsoft and IBM, the defection of GroupWise customers to other platforms, etc. If Novell is lagging behind its competitors, why is that the case?
One might call this an old business of Novell, but Novell has attempted to evolve in this space, yet it seems to continue to fail.
Over at ComputerWorld, another article about the staffing dilemma/crisis got published. We mentioned and presented this in more negative light just over a week ago. Have a look:
It’s a difficult management challenge, and it’s one I broached during a conversation last week with Ron Hovsepian, the CEO of Novell. Hovsepian said that in the past year, he has had to replace 24% of his workers to gain the skills Novell needs.
“One thousand of our 4,000 employees are new to Novell,” he said. “Candidly, among all the good revenue stories and the profit improving, people don’t realize how much we’ve really gone in and changed our workforce to get the right skills here.”
When I asked Hovsepian why he didn’t retrain his employees instead, he said Novell “absolutely retrained the ones that we felt had the right aptitude and the right capabilities,” and he stressed that his company continues to invest in training. But the reality is that companies often don’t have the luxury of the time it takes to retrain.
Excuses pushed aside, Novell will have to show more compelling proof of success. While it has some cash reserves in the bank (attributed to ‘old Novell’), it’s hard to know how the company is really doing at the moment. The only sure thing is that the company is shrinking, evidence being the gradual layoffs (more to come soon). █
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« Previous entries ·
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.