Justin, for all those people who aren’t Linux users/fanatics and have only heard about the whole thing from the sidelines, what does the Novell / Microsoft deal represent, what does it mean?

It means interoperability between Windows and SuSe Linux. You take one step back from that – Novel and MS both believe in 5 years that there will be two dominant operating systems in the enterprise – Windows and Linux – and as much as Novell wants to see 100% data centre – that’s not going to happen. How do I differentiate from Red Hat? We work with Windows.

One thing we’re doing with MS is bidirectional virtualization. Windows Longhorn on top of SuSe Linux Enterprise with Xen. And the reverse – SLES on Longhorn with WSV. We’re building adapters with MS to address the performance issues. We’re making it so that you can get support. If you’re running virtualized windows on top of SuSe – MS will help you. They’ll even call Novell and have a three-way conference if you need to.

If you’re using Red Hat – they’ll say please re-create the problem in a non-virtualized environment.

There’s more than just the virtualization stuff – we are also doing directory interoperability. Most companies using a different version of Linux and whichever version Windows have their own solution to share info between directories. E-directory on Linux from Novell and Active Directory from Microsoft – up ‘til now companies have had to custom build a solution. Every time Novell and Microsoft made changes, customers had to change their solution. Now with the MS and Novell deal is in place, federating directories is done automatically.

Another piece that we are doing with MS is that we are working with systems management standards with them. We are going to compete with MS on systems management, they are pushing their Systems Center, we are pushing Xen Works. But we are agreeing on only one way of getting core information from the OS. The WS Management Framework  - which basically means one way to learn about cpu consumptions, processes, memory etc – you can use a Windows manageemt tool to manage Windows and Linux, or a Novell management tool to manage Windows and Linux.

What we tried to do is to provide customers a compelling reason to choose SuSe over Red Hat.

How long has it been since the Novell / Microsoft deal?

November 2nd 2006.

Wow, only around 6 months. What are the sales figures now, six months after the deal for Microsoft and Novell to work together?

Also, before you answer, a snippet of info I found online in an article said that "July 14, 2006: Novell still has less than half of Red Hat's Linux sales. Red Hat's share of overall Linux operating system revenue decreased from 66 percent in 2004 to 61 percent in 2005, while Novell's increased from 21 percent to 29 percent over the same period, IDC analyst Al Gillen said".

Since signing the deal with MS – Novell recorded revenue in the 1st quarter – November 1 to January 31. So, with the deal signed on November 2nd – we sold $91m of Linux in Q1. Which is a whopping 659% year-on-year growth. It’s our best quarter ever – by far. Q1 from an invoicing point of view – we invoiced more in one quarter than we’ve ever invoiced in a whole year!

Of that $91m – roughly $70m came through the MS channel. New business. Microsoft selling SuSe Linux – new business for us. Brand name customers like Wal-mart – AIG, Detuse Bank, Credit Suisse – significant customers. Through MS!

Also HSBC – we co-sell with MS on this. These are customers with significant windows implementations who are looking to bring Linux into their companies.

Isn’t this bad for Windows and Microsoft?

Certain apps run better on Windows, certain run better on Linux. Customers don’t care about the OS, they care about the App. I want to run apps on Linux if I get the performance. Web serving runs better on Linux from a technical perspective. A lot of Unix apps run better on Linux than Windows.

If I want to move to x86 architecture – and away from Sparc and other Unix architectures – it’s better to do it on Linux than Windows.

READ ONTO PAGE 2 for more questions, including one from Stan Beer, three from iTWire's Linux Guru Sam Varghese, and some questions that I found on the 'Boycott Novell' site that I thought I may as well as Steinman to see what his reponse would be. Go to page 2 now!