Quoting VAR Business
Open-source linux may have received its largest shot in the arm to date and it came from an unlikely benefactor--Microsoft.
The ramifications of this month's pact between the software giant and its longtime rival, Novell, may take some time to play out, and the proof, of course, is always in the deliverables. But for partners and customers alike, make no mistake--this improbable partnership could have key implications for anyone running Windows and Linux. In the enterprise world, that amounts to just about everyone. And there are many midsize organizations who want to take the plunge but remain on the fence.
"It's a pretty big deal," says Gartner analyst John Enck. That's because Microsoft hasn't only agreed to cooperate with Novell to provide interoperability, but the deal also eliminates the fear that Microsoft might sue developers for intellectual property infringement when producing applications that link Windows and Novell SuSE servers.
"It removes a gray area in the stack," Enck says.
The deal also gives Novell solution providers, many of whom are also Microsoft partners, key ammunition against a common enemy: Red Hat. Since acquiring SuSE nearly three years ago, Novell has struggled to keep pace with Red Hat. Partners should not view Oracle's recent announcement that it would offer cut-rate service for Red Hat shops as a parting of the ways between the two vendors. Since Novell's SuSE Linux will now favor SQL Server, Oracle, whose database platform is still the foundation of its business, will need Red Hat that much more, Enck points out.
Red Hat has a deeper ISV ecosystem than Novell to date. Microsoft's blessing of SuSE Linux will help bridge Windows ISVs into the Linux world because of the promise of interoperability.
Customers purchasing SuSE Linux will get service and support from Novell and patent protection from Microsoft.
"Novell is ensuring our patent rights are respected in an appropriate way," said Microsoft's general council Brad Smith during an event that announced the partnership.
Technically, the pact addresses three key areas: virtualization, management and document-format compatibility. That means interoperability of Microsoft's Virtual Server environment with virtualization tools from the likes of VMware; better Web-services management support, including links between Active Directory and E-Directory; and an open-document framework with connectors between Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.
So what should solution providers do? Certainly, trying to convince Red Hat shops to switch to SuSE would be an uphill battle and probably not one worth undertaking. Most Red Hat customers likely aren't concerned enough about being sued by Microsoft to make such a shift in their infrastructures, Gartner's Enck says.
Read and comment on the original, here.