11/08: Microsoft and Novell Celebrate One Year; Expand Agreement
Posted by Patrick
Microsoft releasing a press release yesterday in celebration of it's now one year old collaboration with Novell. Here are some key excerpts:
Meanwhile, Mary Jo Foley highlights some of the less than positive Microsoft/Novell moments during the span.
One year after signing a landmark agreement to build a bridge between open source and proprietary software, Novell Inc. and Microsoft Corp. today unveiled continued strong momentum behind the agreement.
Having exceeded their original business targets, the companies continue to see strong demand for interoperability and intellectual property (IP) peace of mind. In addition, Novell and Microsoft announced an expansion of their technical collaboration to create a cross-platform accessibility model that links together the existing Windows and Linux frameworks used to build assistive technology products that enable people with disabilities to interact with computers. ...
One-Year Momentum and Results
Today Novell and Microsoft announced that 30 new customers, including Costco Wholesale Corp., Southwest Airlines Co. and the City of Los Angeles, will receive from Microsoft certificates for three-year priority support subscriptions for SUSE® Linux Enterprise Server from Novell®. These organizations join the ranks of all other Microsoft and Novell customers that are benefiting from the collaboration between the two companies to enable IT interoperability and IP peace of mind in mixed-source environments.
The new customers announced today are global and local, private and public, and represent a wide range of geographies and industries that include the financial, healthcare, retail and technology sectors. Examples are Zabka Polska S.A., one of the largest retail chains in Poland, marking the first agreement in that country, and CHRISTUS Health, a large U.S.-based healthcare provider.
The full list is as follows: Abraxas Informatik AG; ADIF; AFG IT Consulting; Arsys Internet S.L.; Baker Hughes; BATS Trading Inc.; State of California Department of Technology Services; Cash Converters International Ltd.; CHRISTUS Health; The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; City of Los Angeles; CompuCom Systems Inc.; Conductor Tecnologia S.A.; Costco Wholesale Corp.; Flagstar Bank; iLoop Mobile Inc.; Leicester City Council; Kent County, Mich.; Mercury Insurance; Pioneer Corp.; Riverside County, Calif.; South Carolina Department of Probation, Pardon and Parole Services; Southwest Airlines Co.; Swiss Post; Synovus Financial Corp.; TDC Hosting; T-Systems Enterprise Services GmbH; Washington State Department of Information Services; Westmont College; and Zabka Polska S.A. ...
Beyond this customer momentum, the two companies continue their technical collaboration on solutions to help customers work more efficiently in the areas of virtualization, standards-based management, directory and identity federation, and document format compatibility. Indeed, Microsoft and Novell engineers are now working closely in the Microsoft and Novell Interoperability Lab in Cambridge, Mass., running automated tests to ensure the interoperability of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 with Windows Server virtualization and Windows Server 2008 with Xen. The combined team is working with developers in Redmond, Wash.; Provo, Utah; and Nuremberg, Germany; to ensure seamless interoperability between the two operating systems.
New Collaboration to Improve Computer Access for People With Disabilities
Building on the success of this collaboration, Novell and Microsoft today announced they will work together to make it easier for all software companies and developers to create and deliver accessible products for Windows and Linux* platforms, providing better computer access for people with disabilities, especially those who are blind, in today’s increasingly digital world.
Microsoft will make available its User Interface Automation (UIA) specification, an advanced accessibility framework that simplifies the development of assistive technology products for people with one or more disabilities, and pledge not to assert any Microsoft patents necessary to implement the specification against anyone, regardless of platform, in the open source and proprietary software communities. In concert, to promote interoperability between leading accessibility frameworks in the market, Novell will develop and deliver an adapter that allows the UIA framework to work well with existing Linux accessibility projects and complement the investments made by IBM Corp. and others. Novell’s work will be open source and will make the UIA framework cross-platform while enabling UIA to interoperate with the Linux Accessibility Toolkit (ATK), which ships with SUSE Linux Enterprise, Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Ubuntu Linux. The UIA solution will ensure interoperability of nonvisual access to the next generation of software applications.
Having exceeded their original business targets, the companies continue to see strong demand for interoperability and intellectual property (IP) peace of mind. In addition, Novell and Microsoft announced an expansion of their technical collaboration to create a cross-platform accessibility model that links together the existing Windows and Linux frameworks used to build assistive technology products that enable people with disabilities to interact with computers. ...
One-Year Momentum and Results
Today Novell and Microsoft announced that 30 new customers, including Costco Wholesale Corp., Southwest Airlines Co. and the City of Los Angeles, will receive from Microsoft certificates for three-year priority support subscriptions for SUSE® Linux Enterprise Server from Novell®. These organizations join the ranks of all other Microsoft and Novell customers that are benefiting from the collaboration between the two companies to enable IT interoperability and IP peace of mind in mixed-source environments.
The new customers announced today are global and local, private and public, and represent a wide range of geographies and industries that include the financial, healthcare, retail and technology sectors. Examples are Zabka Polska S.A., one of the largest retail chains in Poland, marking the first agreement in that country, and CHRISTUS Health, a large U.S.-based healthcare provider.
The full list is as follows: Abraxas Informatik AG; ADIF; AFG IT Consulting; Arsys Internet S.L.; Baker Hughes; BATS Trading Inc.; State of California Department of Technology Services; Cash Converters International Ltd.; CHRISTUS Health; The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; City of Los Angeles; CompuCom Systems Inc.; Conductor Tecnologia S.A.; Costco Wholesale Corp.; Flagstar Bank; iLoop Mobile Inc.; Leicester City Council; Kent County, Mich.; Mercury Insurance; Pioneer Corp.; Riverside County, Calif.; South Carolina Department of Probation, Pardon and Parole Services; Southwest Airlines Co.; Swiss Post; Synovus Financial Corp.; TDC Hosting; T-Systems Enterprise Services GmbH; Washington State Department of Information Services; Westmont College; and Zabka Polska S.A. ...
Beyond this customer momentum, the two companies continue their technical collaboration on solutions to help customers work more efficiently in the areas of virtualization, standards-based management, directory and identity federation, and document format compatibility. Indeed, Microsoft and Novell engineers are now working closely in the Microsoft and Novell Interoperability Lab in Cambridge, Mass., running automated tests to ensure the interoperability of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 with Windows Server virtualization and Windows Server 2008 with Xen. The combined team is working with developers in Redmond, Wash.; Provo, Utah; and Nuremberg, Germany; to ensure seamless interoperability between the two operating systems.
New Collaboration to Improve Computer Access for People With Disabilities
Building on the success of this collaboration, Novell and Microsoft today announced they will work together to make it easier for all software companies and developers to create and deliver accessible products for Windows and Linux* platforms, providing better computer access for people with disabilities, especially those who are blind, in today’s increasingly digital world.
Microsoft will make available its User Interface Automation (UIA) specification, an advanced accessibility framework that simplifies the development of assistive technology products for people with one or more disabilities, and pledge not to assert any Microsoft patents necessary to implement the specification against anyone, regardless of platform, in the open source and proprietary software communities. In concert, to promote interoperability between leading accessibility frameworks in the market, Novell will develop and deliver an adapter that allows the UIA framework to work well with existing Linux accessibility projects and complement the investments made by IBM Corp. and others. Novell’s work will be open source and will make the UIA framework cross-platform while enabling UIA to interoperate with the Linux Accessibility Toolkit (ATK), which ships with SUSE Linux Enterprise, Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Ubuntu Linux. The UIA solution will ensure interoperability of nonvisual access to the next generation of software applications.
Meanwhile, Mary Jo Foley highlights some of the less than positive Microsoft/Novell moments during the span.
