Novell to Make Linux Robust and Reliable 380
An anonymous coward writes: "It seems the folks over at Novell have the answer to making the "immature" Linux OS more "robust, reliable and scaleable" according to this Computer Weekly article. We have a lot more problems to use and keep running our NetWare 5 and 6 servers at our University than we've ever had with any of our Linux servers. I can't wait for Novell to help us out here."
Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:5, Insightful)
robust, reliable and scalable. We think we can bring that to the
Linux kernel."
I guess IBM, HP and the like are peanuts compared to Novell.
While his comments are certainly brash, and probably overly
self-important, Netware really did make a good system.
Ultimately they just got crushed under the Microsoft marketing
machine. I've run both Microsoft and Novell networks and I
definitely thought Netware was by far the superior product. As
we've consistently seen in the IT world though, a good product
isn't the only thing you need.
In a sense he has a point about Linux being an immature
operating system, although that point seems a bit overstated.
Personally though, I'd love to see Novell contributing to Linux.
The beauty of Open Source and in this case the GPL, is that
Novell can contribute to the development of Linux, but they
can't hijack it. Having more good companies contribute to
making it reliable and scalable is a good thing. I can't see a
downside to having them make contributions to the project.
Ultimately the point is that Linux is catching on. Even
companies like Sun and Novell that have their own operating
systems are seeing the value and are beginning to support it.
With broad industry support, Linux could supplant Microsoft as
the dominant OS.
no surprise here (Score:4, Insightful)
In other words...."we want to slap our brand name all over it." Last time I checked, Novell was already pretty much in a niche, so this is probably their attempt at jumping on a bandwagon.
Experience (Score:5, Insightful)
LDAP Support (Score:5, Insightful)
NDS eDirectory, being a massive LDAP system, already runs on linux. Actually, you can authenticate Winblows users using the Novell client to a linux server running eDirectory. The big thing I can see them adding though would be share access with ACL support on the linux box, along with some of the SSL and PAM options.
Novell has always had some of the best software for file sharing with regards to reliability and ease of administration. Linux has samba and NFS, but not a really good Windows authentication and file sharing service that's easily configured and run from a windows station. i.e. the ConsoleOne config tool, and the Novell client, which can replace the built-in windows authentication schemes. It would be really really nice if the server aspect could be run off of a Linux system instead of Novell's server OS.
Work on desktop usability instead (Score:4, Insightful)
I still use linux on my servers, but that's why I switched back to windows after having linux on my desktop for over 2 years. I can install something in 10 minutes and then be enjoying using it for the next few day. The one time I couldn't get a piece of hardware to work in windows, I just had to call up the hardware vendor and they solved the problem in under an hour. If I were trying to get it to work in Linux, there's nobody to call.
Jason
ProfQuotes [profquotes.com]
Re:Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that if you look at the 2.5 kernel from a OS theory standpoint, you see the most mature OS available. The scheduling improvements alone are really quite amazing, and IMO will catapult Linux far ahead of the competition.
Buzzwords (Score:3, Insightful)
A. Using buzzwords like "robust" "reliable" and "scalable" - the things Novell customers are concerned about,
B. Using the hottest buzzword in computers today "Linux" - The platform Novell probably the most worried about losing it's customers to.
Methinks Novell's focus is trying to keep it's customer base, not linux philanthropy.
Nikkos
Re:Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:2, Insightful)
Let me guess, you've never used anything but Linux and Windows...
Other OSes available today smoother than Linux: FreeBSD!!!, Solaris, Tru64, OpenVMS, pretty much any commercial Unix today is far better than Linux in many ways. Granted, they all have their own flaws (excluding FreeBSD) but Linux couldn't hope to replace any one of them.
Re:Novell linux networks? (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux and Netware are totally two different markets. Linux/Unix can not handle roaming profiles, support for any directory service, and do not get me started on printer support, nor does it come with the great administration tools from Netware.
Netware is lightyears ahead of active directory and it can work under slow networks where active directory would choke. Many fortune500 companies still use Novell because their whole lan needs to be ripped out to handle ADS.
Netware really adds services to your network and is not an application server like Unix/Linux is designed to be.
W2k is now just catching up and is still behind in many area's. IT managers are switching to Microsoft only because its from Microsoft and for discounts for EULA's from other MS products.
Can you browse the network neighborhood on a Windows desktop, select a printer, and have the drivers automatically be downloaded and installed from a Unix/Linux server? How about printer administration? How about setting up a directory service so you can administer any desktop in the company?
I believe Novell is flirting with the idea of trashing their proprietary api's and kernels and replacing them with Linux or FreeBSD ones. Which would be good.
Lack of any directory service is whats keeping Linux out and Windows in.
An operating system != operating system (Score:5, Insightful)
Most of what Novell does is rather mature on that level. Much more so then Linux, but probably not as much as he thinks. It has great directory, authentication and network file systems. A good AFS, LDAP, Kerberos run Linux domain is perhaps less of a polished product then Novell, but it is not far behind.
But thats only a part of what a NOS does. Consider Groupwise, ZenWorks and other products inherent to a Novell network and you'll quickly realize that there is nothing near as mature on Linux right now. (note: Ximian just recently put out Enterprise Red Carpet, which I haven't evaluated.)
So while I may agree that I wouldn't have chosen his terms, its still important to understand his use of them before critisizing them
Re:Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:5, Insightful)
I got Novell certification so I do speak from experience even though it not never my primary product that I supported.
Netware was incredibly stable but when it came to setup and configuration it was overly complicated. Windows took over the market not because it was a better product, but because it was more accessible. They concentrated too much on things people, who were casually trying to get involved with it, did not want to learn. MS basically proved that you don't need to be a genuis to set-up file and print sharing which is what Netware was geared for.
In many area's they were ahead of their time(Directory Services in 1994 is a great example), but if they had paid a little more attention to how people would like to work with computers instead of making it act like a mainframe they would not have been whipped so thoroughly in the market.
Novell had a lot of things going for it (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree, but realize Novell had a lot of things going for it:
Please. (Score:3, Insightful)
Novell can try. Their systems aren't bad, but they horriblely overpriced. Maybe their MetaDirectory is worth it if you need it, but the core eDirectory I suspect can be skipped by lots of shops very easily.
I had the priviledge to work on an LDAP based authentication system for 2 years. Most packages in this area use exactly 2 well documented microsoft API to sync or authenticate windows. The unix side is never a problem, they authenticate against raw LDAP. These vendors, including Novell, then turn around and charge $40/user for the resulting product.
To many people, a console is not worth $40/user plus the pain of accounting for these user.
If you're interested in open source Unix/Windows LDAP authentication checkout.
But, I'm sure some would rather use eDirectory. We ended up uses the open source alternatives and have never been happier.
Re:An operating system != operating system (Score:2, Insightful)
"Less polished" has to be the understatment of the year. A bunch of tarballs and FAQs/HOWTOs floating around the internet isn't even in the dimension as Novell or MS's directory services stuff.
In a lot of ways, Linus isn't really a NOS (in the 80s sense) -- it's more Internet server platform. Or at least that's how it's packaged and marketed -- the closest thing to NOS features out-of-box is almost NT4.0-comaptible networking, and legacy crapola like NFS/NIS.
I'd love to see "RedHat Enterprise Network Linux" with all of the directory, file/print, and management goodies. But I don't see it happening for a long time.
NDS (Score:5, Insightful)
Of all the network directory services, I FAR prefer dealing with Novell NDS than I do Active Directory (a poor MS clone of NDS hacked onto NT 4's way of doing things that debuted with Win 2K server). An open source implimentaion of NDS on Linux would make Linux THE file server of choice...
The underlying Netware OS is horribly obsolete, still a DOS relic of the 1980's, but Novell Directory Services is the REAL gem Novell has left.
Re:Novell linux networks? (Score:4, Insightful)
Printers - iPrint offers a browser as printer distribution mechanism. Go to a web page, click a link, get a printer (drivers and all). Novell even offer a handy (simple) mapping tool - drop in an image of yuor floorplan, locate the printers on that image, and your staff don't have to know (or understand) your naming convention.
Directory is really talking about ZENworks for Desktops. Once again, does anyone else offer browser integration for installing applications on the local workstation? Not to mention built-in inventory controls, licensing and SOE deployment.
In terms of reliability, I had some problems with NetWare 5.0, but I've used every version from 3 to 6 and found it one of the most stable.
Novell are not trading on their ability as a file serving platform - really, this can be resolved in about five minutes on their web site. All their new technologies are web-enabled... and speaking of file storage, iFolder is unmatched by anything by a major vendor on the market. Oh, and it runs (like eDirectory) on GNU/Linux as well as Solaris and Windows servers, as well as NetWare.
My environment is GNU/Linux and NetWare. Each have their uses, but Novell certainly are not standing still.
Re:Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:4, Insightful)
Kernels - Windows, Unix, Linux and NetWare - may have become commoditised, said Messman, but services were the key to the future. "Linux doesn't have the services and support that we can bring to the table," he said.
Novell has a Directory Services that is far more mature and superior to its competitors, and NDS is integrated very nicely with LDAP. 'eDirectory' on Linux has been a reality for some time now. Novell has been shifting toward Java and open standards since the time that Eric Schmidt took over. Their latest push seems to be toward web services; In NetWare 6 the servers and services can be almost competely managed through a browser and they purchased a minor but highly regarded J2EE application server, Silverstream [silverstream.com]. Linux was never designed to be a fileserver and doesn't even have ACL's yet in the filesystem, something that MS had from the start in NT 3.1. But even NT's file rights assignment is laughable compared to the fine grained control that exists in NetWare. Similarly, SMB is not at the same level that NCP is.
Novell is now aiming to help put Linux on the desktop. Just today they announced a Groupwise client for Linux [novell.com] which was a big roadblock for companies who want to migrate from Windows to a more secure, stable, and economical alternative. I think if Novell wants to bring their technologies to the Linux platform (and vice versa [novell.com]) then it will strengthen both. That's synergy.
With broad industry support, Linux could supplant Microsoft as the dominant OS.
'Will' not 'could'. It is already beginning.
Re:An operating system != operating system (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, but Linux isn't even in the same league when it comes to network services. NetWare has its warts, but so far as NOS capabilities they are in a class of one. (Although Banyan was interesting, are they still around?)
The fine granularity of file permissions in NetWare is an absolute dream, and matches and supports real-world needs *far* better than those of Windows, or especially Unix-derived servers. (I've been dealing with the brain-dead Unix file permissions for 18 years now, and the whole system is a major dog's breakfast.)
ACLs have been grafted onto various network filesystems in myriad incompatible, incomprehensible, and unmanageable ways, but that's really no substitute for a just having a reasonable set of permissions capabilities in the first place.
Further, NDS is far and away the best directory service available today - it's really a shame it hasn't taken hold in the Unix/Linux world, as we need it badly if there is ever to be any hope of holding AD at bay. (Those that don't do serious enterprise work fail to comprehend that it's AD that makes it virtually impossible to pull Windows out of an organization - this is the *real* Kool-Aid, and if your organization has drunk a long draft of it, you're poisoned, bucko... Raw LDAP is not really an option in most environments, as the staffing required to manage it that way exceeds the available talented labor pool in most places...)
You're right that all the apps built on these network services have no real equivalent at all in the Unix/Linux world, and only shabby imitators in the Windows world, but even at the server-only level, NetWare in unequalled. I hate the way you administer it, (it's intentionally obtuse to encourage CNE certification), and it has some weaknesses as an application server, but it works and works well.
It's well-engineered, too: As a protocol jock, I say that with real knowledge - compare the rock-solid reliability, wide area bandwidth efficiency, and latency insensitivity, not to mention advanced features and security of NCP to *anything* else, and I think it will come out *way* ahead. I've built worldwide remote site networks that have to have transparent file access back to civilization via a satellite telephone, (the worst latency environment within three planetary diameters) and only NetWare and NCP are capable of operating in such an environment. Nothing else is - not NFS, not SMB, not whatever, just NCP.
Gee, this sounds like a Novell ad - It's not, I haven't even touched the product in two years, but what they do, they do well.
Re:no surprise here (Score:3, Insightful)
However, the competent administrator revels in being able to tame linux into being the unseen force that makes the network environment "richer". You just have to know what you're doing... the same with all things.
I guess my point is: Netware is deep and robust by design, while Linux needs someone to make sure it so. I am comfortable with the second option. I suppose because I believe there will come a time when that effort is no longer necessary, and I will feel somehow connected to the process of getting it there. ^_^
And in that case, let Novell bring its ideas to Linux! We can learn from them (even if the marketing department is a bit brash... then so are we). Let us be the OS pioneers taking the "knowledge of the ancients" [Netware] and implementing it well.
Have you even tried it? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Translation (Score:3, Insightful)
Well as the head web-techie-dude I decided to take matters into my own hands and installed our lone, unused copy of NT4 server* on that little old machine to run our web site. It was probably the best move I made, and it's still going to this day (a few years now). It averaged an uptime of a hundred days or so---it never needed any of those imminent IIS security patches as I set the server up with those extensions/unused "features" disabled. A little P/150, still humming along just fine, and it actually, believe it or not, serves web pages faster than Novell's beast on the p/500, which still crashed. (Ah, the joys of running that fucking VREPAIR program... ugh. I also got a kick out of how when NetWare refused to boot it stumped even the brightest Novell engineers that visited us.)
On the other hand we still had an old NetWare 3.11 server that had lodged 413 days of uptime till we had to hit the power switch when we retired it. Just goes to show that if something ain't broke don't fix it... and I think Novell unfortunately did that when they decided to come out with their 5.x series... NOW WITH MORE JAVA!
The only thing that kept Novell going was their NDS directory services, and I think MS gave them the golden boot up the ass when they came out with Active Directory, which is more moderately priced. We were paying out the ass for our NetWare licenses, and we were a school, mind you-- schools get Novell at a pretty good discount.
The only good I can see coming out of this is if Novell gave Linux a decent ACL system (which is what gives NT the upper hand right now) -- and no, I'm not talking about "BUT LINUX ALREADY HAS ACLs!!! -- you just need to compile so and so module and reiserFS and so and so and blah blah blah." I'm talking about ACLs that integrate into your user management software that works right out of the box. If they can pull this off they will give Linux a new boost.
Frankly I can see Novell abandoning their Netware line and coming out with like and add on to Redhat or something... like a Linux Plus! pack as so to speak... which would give it full ACL support, directory integration out of the box, etc.
*Originally I attempted to put Linux on it (at the time I think it was Caldera) but the install puked. I think it didn't like the SCSI card and I didn't have time to fiddle with that.
Re:Buzzwords (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know if this is necessarily the case. I've been working on developing a solution for a problem that I've been having - distributed logons - with Linux, and have so far come away delightfully unimpressed.
First, we installed Samba, and got that working as a PDC with our W2K machines. Then, we got it working together with roaming profiles. Ok, fine, but then we went to Samba-TNG so we could use an LDAP directory backend. That'd be great, if there were any decent LDAP HOWTOs for Linux. The ones that there are are horrid, and you have to assemble them all in your head to make any sense of it. Once that was done (with the poor LDAP browsers available), we tried to move other services to it, which is a nightmare. Most of the LDAP-authenticating software we have (proftpd-ldap, etc.) just plain breaks, or doesn't work, or 'works' but doesn't (fails silently), or a myriad of other things. Figuring out how to do any of this stuff in the first place was a nightmare, and then trying to figure out what's wrong without having to source-dive is just a waste of my time. Once I finally got PAM working with LDAP, we have the problem of it asks for passwords twice, instead of automatically falling back. PITA. Then, if we wanted other systems to authenticate, we'd have a whole new bag of worms.
People say Novell is a bitch to configure. They say it's hard to learn. Yeah, but you know what? There's ways to learn. There's documentation. There's manuals. There's courses. There's books. When it comes down to it, there's $150/hr freelance CNEs or the consultants that installed your network in the first place. When customers move to Linux and try to do anything that's great about Linux (i.e. assembling their own solution) they quickly find that it may be cheaper, and it may give you more of a sense of satisfaction, but when you have to manage an entire corporate network, you don't have time to migrate everyone to Linux just because 'it's cheaper'. It's not. For the price of my time as a Linux admin, setting all this up, testing it, re-testing it, making damn sure it's not going to blow up in my face, I would suggest a Novell solution, because I know that if I set it up properly, it's going to freaking work, and if it doesn't, I don't have to worry about my boss bringing the hounds of hell down on me, because there's a support contract.
Linux is only a challenger in small business, and Novell's offering their small business starter pack for free [novell.com] (contact your local CNS for details). Larger business will go for solutions that they don't have to worry about. You pay for some staff to get their certification, keep them up to date, and that's it. With Linux, you only have their word that they know what they're doing, and when things explode or you have to find someone else, they have to figure out what's going on, and when the system's a melange of PHP sites calling perl scripts to manage LDAP databases of user data for the patched daemons running on colocated servers, better men than I have threw in the towel on the first day. Businesses are finding this important point out: anyone can learn 'Linux' - you can train a kitten to play with the keyboard and administer a Linux system - but when it comes down to the crunch and you need to build your own system, unless you keep excellent, centralized, readable, updated documentation, you can't just hire some Linux admin off the street - you need the guy that worked there before, and hopefully he left on good terms.
Microsoft and Novell are not out there because they're corporate whores. They're not popular because they lock people in. They're not even popular because managers have heard of them. They're popular because if I'm Novell certified in the relevant products, I can walk into any Novell business and sit down and administer the network. It's consistant. It's coherant. It's easier to just get to work, because if you know it you know it. Until Linux gets this, it won't be popular.
--Dan
Re:Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:3, Insightful)
Perhaps not the only, but a major reason. The SMB protocol was originally written so linux machines could talk to DEC machines. Later MS embraced and extended the protocol and that spurred samba into becomming what it is today. How come samba (or what it was called back then) or DEC didn't instantly become heavy hitters in the file serving world. Well Samba did need some work and now is getting acceptance due to grassroots marketing and newer features, and DEC just never marketed a product as a server fro windows machines. Sure there would have to be new code written to add some spit and polish, but lack of marketing was why it never competed with MS.
Sure DEC probally never wanted to get in the business of making file servers for windows, but nonetheless it could be done. There probally were a few people that knew it could be done and did it on there own because they had old DEC machines lying around with hard drive space to spare. The point is yes being windows NT server was made to be a file server made it the best tool for the job at the time compared to every other SMB solution. However, it was arguably not the best file serving OS in general that could somehow be made to serve files to Windows clients. However, regardless of the quality o Novell MS marketdroids created the appearance of a superior product in NT and that sold. Even while most people concede that NT was better for fileserving to Windows machines than DEC it was definatly the total lack of marketing that prevented DEC from becoming a noteable contender in Windows file serving.
Yeah, I guess it's better... (Score:5, Insightful)
Forget having modern extensions and X11R6 applications. You can't have them.
And color terminals? Add them yourself! And forget about user support! You'll pay them good money if you want support!
What about advancing the gnu tools to the current level? You want recursive grepping? Color "ls"? Tar support for bzip2 and gzip? These are only the common ones that I've noticed are subpar compared to linux - I'm sure there are many others that I don't use. Wait until the next version of Solaris and maybe it'll get added.
The hardware will be great, though - for only ten times what you pay for commodity hardware you get reliability (just ignore the fact that if you buy quality hardware for PCs that cost about twice that amount you'll get the same level of quality).
I've yet to see that Solaris is elegant. It works, but it sure ain't pretty - not even compared to Linux. What they offer is reliability that comes from good hardware.
And don't give me any stuff about not rebooting for 4 years - you can do the same with flavors of Linux designed for that. There's more to it than software stability now.
Re:Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:3, Insightful)
However, you are grossly underestimating Linux. Linux is certainly quite capable of replacing Solaris in many deployments and has been so capable for some years now. Immaturity of Intel hardware is far more likely to be a probem than the 'immaturity' Linux.
Re:Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:5, Insightful)
Or did we all just hallucinate EVMS, the port of jfs, and the work IBM have done to help better SMP scalability on large systems? Sheesh.
There are VERY few "enterprise features" that commercial UNIX's have which linux doesn't, by now. Massive SSI multiprocessor scalability still isn't competitive with Irix or Solaris. AFAIK, there is still no support for hot-swapping memory in linux, even on hardware that supports that featre. But apart from that, I really can't think of much in the OS itself. Maturity of _documentation_ on the other hand is an area where some catching up is needed.
Re:Overstated but could be beneficial to Linux (Score:2, Insightful)
There were a lot of ways Novell was behind the times too. They were very slow to support IP, and even slower to support IP server applications like proxy and web servers. None of that was stable until at least Netware 5. And BorderManager? That thing was AWFUL! It crashed constantly and was way outperformed by squid and even MS proxy.
Re:An operating system != operating system (Score:4, Insightful)
GNU/Linux ships OpenLDAP, an open implementation of the LDAP protocol implementation. It's still very rough, though.
On the other hand, Novell ships eDirectory, which is a much improved, time-tested implementation of LDAP protocol.
Believe it or not, NDS/eDirectory is much better than OpenLDAP. Work with both, for at least a year, with scores of hundreds of users... and then, you tell me.
As for what can Novell bring to GNU/Linux... well, IBM has helped improve GNU/Linux. Sun has helped improve GNU/Linux. Oracle has helped improve GNU/Linux. HP has helped improve GNU/Linux. SGI has helped improve GNU/Linux...
We cannot know for sure, that's right. But a reasonable assumption, with the knowledge in hand of what has already happened, there's a good chance that GNU/Linux will benefit from Novell.
Why some people are affraid of companies investing in Linux?