SuSE CEO's Two-Distro World 401
FrankoBoy writes "CRN has an interview with SuSE CEO Richard Seibt in which he claims such things as 'Linux means two companies: Red Hat and SuSE, and nobody else.' Another example of this kind of corporatespeak can be found in another interview he did with ZDNet last week. DistroWatch has an article about all this in its current weekly newsletter."
You know, it's funny (Score:5, Interesting)
Oh well. To me, Linux still means "Debian and Gentoo, and maybe someday I'll consider trying SUSE, but probably not." Redhat and Mandrake are dead to me. ^_^
Huh? (Score:2, Interesting)
and Slackware has as strong of a following as ever.
hell, I find slackware to be the only choice for embedded system prototyping or dedicated things like a freevo box or other things you need to be able to strip out the crud to get a fast small system.
The whole quote isn't nearly as bad (Score:5, Interesting)
All he's saying is that in the corporate market most of the support is related to these two companies.
Personally I think he's wrong, but he's not trying to deny the existance of other distros or anything.
A bit inflammatory, no? (Score:5, Interesting)
C'mon -- the guy is a non-native English speaker and the context makes it perfectly clear what he's saying. He said that from the perspective of commercial Unix vendors, there are two Linux distributions they actively consider.
I'm a Gentoo and Yellow Dog user, but the shrieking in just the first 10 comments is completely misplaced.
Re:makes me think twice... (Score:5, Interesting)
And with appointments of ex suse people... (Score:5, Interesting)
And that McBride comes from being a VP at Novell...
The SCO Group Announces Appointment of Gregory Blepp [yahoo.com]
I thought it was (Score:5, Interesting)
But then I realized he was referring to "companies". Linux is the way it is because it was made by people who care, and the same can be said (possibly to a lesser extent) about other unices(Linux walks, talks, and quacks like UNIX. So does BSD/QNX/etc.)
Don't get me wrong, I like nearly all Linux distros for the guts beneath them. I just prefer Debian over Redhat/Suse because of the complete lack of commercialization; I can get ALL of the available software in the same interface, with nothing held back "for paying customers".
The phrase in context (Score:2, Interesting)
This kind of polarization is usual behaviour when you have several smaller opponents, as a example: political parties in "non-bipartidist" systems use it frequently.
yep, Suse is cool. (Score:5, Interesting)
The funny thing is that I actually did try Suse the other day. I downloaded and burned their "Live CD" as part of a lecture [hillnotes.org]. I was very impressed at how well it worked. It really was a no fuss deal. Like you I'll put up with a little meglomania for that. What harm can he really do to free softare? Who really needs large IT vendors? The future is free.
He also says lots of good stuff too. He slams SCO and easily dances around all their FUD. He's creating value and sees himself as a big institutional player. Good for him. No free softare based system can be as ugly or as abusive as Microsoft was.
Re:it's disgusting (Score:2, Interesting)
SuSE's strong points (Score:3, Interesting)
Admittedly, this guy is leaning out of the window here. However, the industry -- in this case meaning not computer vendors but IT companies wanting to use computers for administrating/performing their work, is so far used to Windows, and may not always be forgiving when it comes to quirks that geek distros like Debian, Gentoo and Slackware tend to have. While in the hands of a dedicated power user, these may be far superior to SuSE and RedHat, in the hands of even a computer-experienced, intelligent linux-newbie, they bomb.
Having appeased the geeks (I like Debian a great deal, trust me), what does SuSE(my current OS) have to offer? Easy, smooth installation, flawless autodetection -- as far as I know -- and an acceptable configuration tool in the form of YaST. On first boot, you get a good KDE install, with the important stuff, like OpenOffice and such integrated, good menu structure and MIME type settings. SuSE's weakest points are lack of SuSE rpms for a lot of programs, and the fact that changes to configuration files may be overwritten by SuSEconfig, which runs after every major system change. However, for someone who either wants a smoothly running system, or is proficient enough to disable SuSEconfig and compile some programs themselves, SuSE is quite a nice distro. For those reasons, it may be much more attractive for companies than tweak distros.
In that case... (Score:3, Interesting)
[OT] Why is SCO stock up so big today? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:about his answer on Novell (Score:2, Interesting)
On a different subject. Since Novell is hitching its star to Linux, maybe they can help by doing automated comparisons of the Linux code base against System V (similar to what SCO claims to have done) and reporting its findings so any problems can be cleared up and/or SCO's FUD can be countered with facts. They have access to both code bases so it should be feasible for them. IBM and Red Hat are probably doing this already, but their lawsuits with SCO may place limits on what they can do with it.
Other companies (Score:2, Interesting)
Mandrake is a product of MandrakeSoft [mandrakesoft.com].
UnitedLinux [unitedlinux.com] is the parent company of SUSE [suse.com], the European arm which produces SUSE Linux. There is also the Asian arm, TurboLinux [turbolinux.com], and the South American/Latin arm, Conectiva [conectiva.com]. Yep, all these major distributions fall under the same parent company. So you're pretty accurate in asserting that there's only a few big players as far as corporations go.
Re:here's what the article says (Score:5, Interesting)
It's my view that the industry has decided there is one main operating system competitor to Microsoft, and that is Linux. Linux means two companies: Red Hat and SuSE, and nobody else. There will be no third distribution that will be supported by the large IT vendors. And from that perspective, even Novell decided not to compete anymore on operating systems. They now migrate all of their applications to Linux. This is a two-horse race between Linux and Windows. [emphasis mine]
So, there! He's giving his opinion about distributions that will be supported by "large IT vendors". He is also talking about Novell bailing out of OS competition. This is a corporate environment.
What is even more out of context is
If you want more, read the question thas was asked as well, and read it carefully, not just copy and paste. The question was:
But is it Unix or Windows that's being used less because of Linux? And will there be a shift in the future toward Linux replacing one or the other? For instance, as Linux on the desktop becomes more prevalent, will it be Windows that's more at risk?
The first question is: What OS is Linux displacing more right now: Unix or Windows? The second question is: As Linux gets more popular on the desktop, what OS will it displace more in the future?
In response to these questions he mentions HP, IBM AIX, Sun Solaris, and SCO, out of which his vendor analysis comes out. It is obvious he is talking about corporate server environments supported by "larte IT vendors"!
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Interesting)
Mandrake is alive, more or less, but its still in bankrupcy for the time being. Debian isn't a company as such, but it definately warrants mentioning.
The synopsis is a troll (Score:5, Interesting)
He's right, by the way: the IT world is concentrating on SuSE and RH right now. That doesn't mean Gentoo/Debian/Mandrake/Slackware and the rest don't have a place, but none of these distros have done much to get themselves certified for government adoption. SuSE has. Power to 'em.
I like SuSE, and have put 8.2 Professional on five machines in the past few months. My friends love it. It's an easy install, and yast is a convenient manager. SuSE goes naturally with KDE.
The only computer in my life that isn't running SuSE is my iBook, which uses Yellow Dog 3.0. It's tough to beat Terrasoft's Mac hardware support.
I'm happy to buy from a company that's passionate about the platform and knows how to play hardball with Microsoft.
Re:suse and redhat alone? IDTS (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:makes me think twice... (Score:4, Interesting)
I did find Red Hat limiting for my own applications - and I prefered the way Slackware handles configurations, more 'unix - like'. Since 1994 I have used many different distros, including Turbo Linux, Gentoo, Mandrake, Linux Pro, Suse, Debian, and Knoppix. Over the years I always keep coming back to Slackware (although I use Knoppix as a recovery/utility disk at times - due to its ease of use).
If I had unlimited money and time, I would run Slackware on a standard fast motherboard/peripheral setup, that I would tune and lock down configs on, and all of the 'chrome' stuff my daughter likes (what's a "shell" Dad!?) would be tweaked out for her and my wife.
Unfortunately, I work on computers all day (configs, programming, troubleshooting, consulting on system admin issues - you name it), and have neither the time nor the energy to do it 'right' at home. So my menagerie of computers of various makes, models, ages and operating systems will have to suffice until that day I win the lottery, find out I have a rich uncle who left me his estate, or sell the great American novel...
yes, here is why... (Score:2, Interesting)
Why SuSE? A few reasons:
1. it works out of the box on every box from my an old p75 to my newest 2.4GHz with and without scsi, and raid.
2. it has the shortest install time, esp. since everything is now on one DVD or 7 CD's
3. yast2. the way suse can handle both tarballs and
4 it has a killer firewall script that is just extremely fast to edit, so i don't ahve to waste hours rewritng my firewall whenever i move a box from its role to a new one, or 10-15 minutes just to play a new online game or something.
Slackware is and was great, but i got tired of wasting all the time building from tarballs.
Redhat was just riddled with bugs and problems, even installing its own rpm's
However, I think SuSE has seen its day, too. They have gone too proprietary, and non-standard compliant, making it a pain in the rear to update these days. Needless to say 3 years of SuSE is now soon to be over on my boxes...back to slackware or maybe something new, for I shall not use RedHat due to past experience, and I will not use it simply because "its what everyone else uses"...which is why most people in the US use it, I think. Because I never found it that impressive compared to other distros.
oh, and i live in the US, also.