The Big Three of Linux: Looking ahead to 2008

What are Red Hat, Novell and Canonical going to have to do in 2008 to in order to dominate the desktop and server Linux market?

Let’s take a moment and assess the situation. Red Hat is the dominant force in Linux right now. They own the enterprise market. SUSE is also supported by many IHVs as a ready-to-install operating system (OS), but does not have nearly the market share as flouted by the fedora. Ubuntu is the little Linux OS that could and, in the last three years, it has gripped the desktop Linux market with a stranglehold and will not let go.

It seems that each distribution has found a niche: Red Hat and Ubuntu are the leaders in their markets, and SUSE is a comfortable runner-up. However, history has shown us that businesses are not content to stay still too long or play second fiddle. So, what will Red Hat, SUSE, and Ubuntu have to do in the new year to gain new ground?

Red Hat

I’ve been using Red Hat Linux since the mid-90s. They are arguably the most successful proprietors of Linux ever. Red Hat figured out what many companies are just now figuring out about virtualization: it’s not always about the core technology, it is about how you support and manage that technology. Red Hat provides a better support and management structure for their products than any other Linux vendor. It is no wonder they dominate the enterprise market.

On the flip side of the coin, Red Hat has long since been usurped as leaders on desktops. There was Slackware, then Gentoo and now Ubuntu. Sure, Red Hat sponsors the Fedora Core project, but it does not have the market share to be considered in the same game as Red Hat. In the coming year, Red Hat needs to get rid of the Fedora Core moniker and reel its desktop community back in under the auspices of the Red Hat name. Red Hat is associated with stability and the enterprise: they need to create a desktop product that also has these associations. True, Red Hat offers its Enterprise Linux Desktop product, but it lacks the bleeding-edge features of Fedora Core that make the latter so appealing to the desktop crowds. Red Hat must figure out how to transition the passion of the Fedora Core audience back into the house that the Fedora built. Once Red Hat is able to recapture those users, then it can finally offer a datacenter-to-desktop computing solution that can dominate servers and workstations everywhere.

Novell SUSE

Novell has been one of the most prolific innovators in the IT industry for over the past two decades. Unfortunately, the company that should be a global IT leader today has suffered one bad management and marketing decision after another. Case in point: all this nifty, gee-whiz technology called Compiz for desktops originated with Novell. Do most people know that? I doubt it. They’re probably more familiar with the rift between Beryl and the original Compiz developers (and subsequent kiss-and-make up).

The reason that Novell barely gets credit for its work is that its marketing team never leads with anything remotely innovative. If they played it any safer they’d be asleep! Remember iFolder? Unless you’re a fan of information synchronization software you probably do not. iFolder was a Novell project that offered unparalleled functionality in the arena of client compatibility and server features. What happened to it? Novell did not know what to do with it and open sourced the code in order to wash their hands of the project.

In the next 52 weeks Novell needs to do what they do best: innovate. Then they need to do well the thing they do worst: they need to lead with their innovation. They need to create a mass marketing campaign around SUSE Linux and its new innovative features that will leave the other vendors in the dust. Novell needs to stop playing the shrinking violet and give a new generation of Linux users a reason to hold Novell SUSE Linux high above the other distributions.

Canonical Ubuntu

Ubuntu has become the desktop user’s Linux of choice in the past three years and shows no signs of slowing down. Canonical understands what Novell does not, and that is marketing. The marketing machine behind Ubuntu has been working non-stop. Additionally, it does not hurt that Mark Shuttleworth, Canonical’s founder and CEO, is as charismatic as Steve Jobs and is forming deals with independent hardware vendors that results in Ubuntu being offered by the likes of Dell on their laptops and desktops.

Canonical is correct in that their next move should be to penetrate the server market. From their server and JeOS versions of Ubuntu to their alliances with IHVs in hopes of getting Ubuntu officially supported on server hardware, they are doing everything correct. However, they could be doing more. Canonical is in the unique position of having herds of passionate users behind them. (Actually Apple is in the same position, but they seem to have forgotten that they are a computer company.) They have a loyalty base not seen on this side of OS X. Canonical needs to leverage this loyalty and create a vertical initiative that will provide even more features to its desktop users as long as the servers said users are connecting to run the Ubuntu OS. Think Bonjour for Ubuntu. There is no reason that Canonical cannot achieve this with Open Source projects either. From integrating Beagle with ZeroConf to collaborative TomBoy notes-sharing technology. It is all possible.

The ultimate achievement would be when Canonical finally creates an Active Directory-like system to integrate its server OS and desktop OS into a single, manageable environment.

A three-way see-saw

The Linux market is currently a three-way see-saw. Any of the big three vendors could change the balance of things. Do you have a different outlook? I’d love to hear it!

Openswan 2.4.11 and xl2tpd 1.1.12 packages for Ubuntu x86_64 (Feisty+)

The Ubuntu repositories are lagging when it comes to keeping up with Openswan development. Currently, the latest package in the Feisty pool is 2.4.6 and 2.4.11 was just released (with several bug fixes — one that allows newer OS X clients to connect). The l2tpd package that provides an l2tp daemon is also old due to the fact that development on the l2tpd projects seems to have stalled. The maintainers of Openswan, xelerance have forked l2tpd, creating x2tpd.

Both pieces of software have already be Debianized, it is just a matter of running dpkg-buildpackage to create the binary package files. I have updated the changelogs for both Openswan and xl2tpd and created deb packages out of the latest source code:

Openswan 2.4.11

kernel-patch-openswan_2.4.11+dfsg.2-1.1_all.deb

openswan-modules-source_2.4.11+dfsg.2-1.1_all.deb

openswan_2.4.11+dfsg.2-1.1.dsc

openswan_2.4.11+dfsg.2-1.1.tar.gz

openswan_2.4.11+dfsg.2-1.1_amd64.changes

openswan_2.4.11+dfsg.2-1.1_amd64.deb

xl2tpd 1.1.12

l2tpd_1.1.12_all.deb

xl2tpd_1.1.12.dsc

xl2tpd_1.1.12.tar.gz

xl2tpd_1.1.12_amd64.changes

xl2tpd_1.1.12_amd64.deb

I will be writing an article on how to configure Ubuntu with Openswan and xl2tpd. Stay tuned!

Hope this helps!

It’s 10 o’clock. Did you remember to turn packet forwarding on?

So I am on a VPN kick lately; I wonder if it shows? I spent the last week setting up and tweaking Openswan on an Ubuntu box in order to allow me to connect to my home network with my MacBook Pro. I finally got it working — you can see some of the fun gotchas you might run into when using Leopard to connect to Openswan at my own blog — but I could not actually see anything on my home network. Well, it turns out I seem to be a special case. (My wife is insisting that I had a prefix “head” to case). My VPN box was never previously a part of my home network topology. It was a DNS and DHCP server, but it played no role in packet switching or forwarding. I guess most people install VPN software on a Linux box that is already a router of some sort. Thus the Kernel did not have packet forwarding turned on and the VPN server was not forwarding packets to the rest of the network.

To turn packet forwarding on simply issue this command:

echo "1" > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward

After you do this the packets will flow! Of course, I would have known about this a lot sooner if I had used the “ipsec verify” command. This command will check your system to see if it is properly configured to run Openswan and tell what you need to do in order to get it into a ready state.

Hope this helps!

Mono: Does anybody want it?

When you think mono, you think tired. You think sleepy. You think shut-yourself-up-in-your-bedroom-for-two-weeks-and-snooze-like-Rip-Van-Winkle. You get the idea.

But that is not how it should be. Mono isn’t boring. Mono should excite people! I am speaking, of course, of the open source implementation of the Microsoft .NET Framework. It should make them stand up and say, “Wow! Here is one of the most interesting projects I’ve seen in a long time in the wonderful world of Linux.” And yet, this is not the case. People are taking their prescription sleep aids, turning off their cell-phones and settling down for a long winter’s nap. So why is it that one of the most ambitious projects that I have ever laid eyes on is not garnering more enthusiasm?

Misconceptions about Mono

No matter what you know or how smart you are (or think you are), it can be near impossible to change people’s perceptions. This is especially true in the software world (see Apple). And unfortunately for Mono, there are a couple misconceptions that keep it from gaining ground.

1. People think Mono is simply a derivative of the Microsoft .NET Framework.

Even though the Mono FAQ (http://www.mono-project.com/FAQ:_General) points out that this is not the case, the common perception keeps many people from using Mono to build their projects.

2. People assume that Mono is not ready for the enterprise.

One of the reasons for this is because not many enterprise projects are being built with it (I’ll get to that later.) Instead, Mono is primarily being used to construct desktop software.

The second reason for this misconception is the Mono project’s inability to stay in step with Microsoft .NET. Currently, Mono is somewhere between .NET version 1.1 and 2.0 while .NET 3.5 was just released. This is not the Mono team’s fault. Microsoft does not collaborate with them, so everything the Mono team accomplishes is through their own blood, sweat and tears. Nevertheless, this version discrepancy creates the perception that Mono is just a .NET wannabe.

How Mono can improve

I have a few ideas on how Mono can realize its potential:

Software With the exception of iFolder, Mono is not being used to develop any truly useful enterprise applications. Great desktop applications are being created, like Tomboy and Beagle, but no one has created the next great server application using Mono. Until this happens, IT administrators won’t see Mono as an equal to the other common framework, Java. My suggestion is that more effort be put behind iFolder, as it is already a very useful application. With some work, iFolder could compete with Xythos Webspace and be a poster-child for Mono in the Enterprise.

Ubiquity I cannot tell you how many IT administrators have been hesitant to use software I have written in C# for the sole purpose of being cross-OS compatible via Mono because Mono was not installed on their servers. Java is installed by default on many Linux distributions, making it an easy development choice. The Mono team needs to work more closely with Linux distributions to ensure that Mono is pre-installed, making it an easy choice to use.

Memory Leaks If you have ever used Beagle you know that it can heinously crash your system. Since it’s inception, Mono has been plagued with a random memory bug. Your system memory will go from 1% to 1000% in a matter of seconds, without warning. If the Mono developers want to make Mono more than just a desktop hobbyists language then they need to fix this bug once and for all.

Python Effect There is a huge movement in the Gnome community to make Python the standard language for Gnome development. Mono is a close second, thanks in part to the great desktop applications being written with it. However, if Python is officially adopted, there will be a backlash against Mono, or pressure on developers to adopt Python and port their once Mono applications to the official language. In order to prevent this from happening, Mono developers need to demonstrate Mono’s cross-compatibility. The Mono team needs to have Mono installed by default into Linux so that if you write an application with Mono it can run in Windows AND Linux (and even OS X).

Python is also cross-compatible, but I do not foresee Python being installed by default on Windows. Mono stands the best chance at being the first cross-compatbile language out of the box. This is Mono’s best play to fight off the Python effect.

Mono is a great framework and C# is a tremendous language. I like them both very much, but I am ready to move to Python myself if I do not see more initiative by the Mono camp to make Mono more accessible. Having a great language and product is not nearly enough. Again, Apple is a good example of this. Sure, OS X is great, but the real reason Apple resurged is because of their darn good marketing team and the iPod. From the iMac commercials to Steve’s securing of digital music distribution rights, it was a master marketing strategy. The Mono team needs to think outside the IDE and start securing Linux distribution partnerships to build some fantastic reasons to use Mono in the enterprise.

LinuxWorld 2007 decompression

So another LinuxWorld Conference and Expo has come and gone — but what’s this?! Where’s the Linux?!

Sure, it was there in sessions on interoperability between Linux and Windows; and in Novell CEO Ron Hovsepian’s “can’t we all just get along” keynote; but overall this year was one to remember for all the things that weren’t 100% Linux-related.

Take the conference that happened concurrently with LinuxWorld, for example. The Next Generation Data Center conference was a treehugging lovefest with sessions devoted to “green computing” and power and cooling. Our brothers and sisters in arms over at SearchDataCenter.com had a field day talking with users and analyst sat the show about these and many other topics, including Site Editor Matt Stansberry. Matt flew down on a puddle jumper from Oregon to cover the show alongside myself and Sr. SearchEnterpriseLinux.com site editor Jan Stafford, and I’m happy to say he was able to basically commandeer our good friend Andy Kutz’s afternoon keynote on greening the data center. SearchDataCenter also managed to corner Andy after the session and get some thoughts up on YouTube, which was an interesting venture to say the least.

Then there was virtualization; a topic that dominated LinuxWorld’s of the past, sure, but seemed to really come a boil in San Francisco last week. At InternetNews.com, writer Sean Michael Kerner described it pretty well, leading off an article with, “If this week’s Linux World were to be summed up under a single theme, it would be penguins gone virtual.“

“Gone virtual” they most certainly did, with the virtualization track getting nice traffic from attendees and from Jan, who threw together a few cool videos on virtualization, Linux and everything else in between with her trusty (and inexpensive) Flip video recorder. A side note: That thing’s pretty good for YouTube quality video. One hour point and shoot recording time for $150? Yes please! /shameless promotion.

Bernard Golden, one of our expert contributors at both SEL and SearchServerVirtualization.com, penned a nice recap of the virtualization news from LinuxWorld that addressed the debate surrounding the Xen vs. KVM camps. Is fragmentation a good thing when we’re talking about virtualization technologies? Read Golden’s column and see if it answers your questions or creates new ones.

Of course, this is but a sampling of our LinuxWorld 2007 coverage. For more, I encourage you to head over to our LinuxWorld conference page and see what SEL, SSV and SearchDatacenter.com had to offer. The page is getting new content every day as we add some post-coverage content too, so check back often.

Using VMware ESX or VI3? Better know Linux!

Question authority, yes; but, more importantly, question your vendors. This advice is critically important if you’re a Windows shop migrating to VMware ESX or VI3. said Andrew Kutz, former University of Texas systems analyst and now a Burton Group analyst. Kutz offered this advice during a session at last week’s Server Blade Summit in Anaheim.

“Although VMware sales representatives pitch the idea that IT professionals do not need to know Linux to run ESX, this is a fallacy. It would behoove any shop thinking of running VI3 to have a good understanding of ESX’s console operating system (OS), and it is Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3.0.”

Linux users have an advantage in the virtualization market, because they’re probably more familiar with using online mailing lists and forums for tech support, says Kutz. Online resources and the peer support available there will be life savers during virtualization implementations.

“It seems to be the case that the technology has out-paced the vendors’ ability to support it. There have been instances of 5-month long open support tickets that the vendor is never able to solve. Rely on forums, your own wits, but not vendors.”