g
PATENT FROM PAGE 9 issue more directly now, and providing
effect on the council members,” he specific patent numbers and areas of
said. infringement, in response to contin-
UPDATES TO RECENT STORIES
go.eweek.com/updates
Dell to create formal
channel program
DELL WILL UNVEIL A FORMAL CHANNEL
partner program, complete with
deal registration, by the end of
2007 (eWEEK, May 14, Page 22).
The OEM has given the go-ahead
for partners to describe themselves
as “Dell-authorized partners” and is
letting partners in its public-sector
sales group register deals, but more
formal programs are on the way, said
Chris Bates, director of Dell’s Solution
Provider Direct program—the company’s previously less-than-visible
channel program, in Round Rock,
Texas. A financing program for partners is also in the works, he said.
Dell is no stranger to the channel as it sells some $4 billion
worth of products a year through
U.S. partners, Bates said. However,
the operation had been all but
clandestine. —Jessica Davis
Novell and SAP
partner up
Gasparro said he canvassed some of ued industry questions and concern
the council members at its last meet- over the GPL v3’s adoption, he said.
ing—before Microsoft made its latest “Unfortunately, for customers, the
patent violation claims—and they were Free Soft ware Foundation’s efforts
all cautiously optimistic about what with GPL v3, while not harming exist-
they could achieve around interoper- ing contracts, can harm the desired
ability in the long term. interoperability and open exchange
The patent matter probably will be that we have increasingly seen between
brought up at the next council meet- proprietary and open source over the
ing, he said, and he also suggested that past several years,” the spokesperson
Microsoft use the council as a sound- said.
ing board for some of these issues. The third draft of GPL v3 includes
For its part, Microsoft is not yet new patent requirements that pre-
saying what it plans to do about the vent distributors from colluding with
alleged violations. “The company’s patent holders to provide discrimina-
longstanding preference is to license tory protection from patents, such
rather than litigate, and Microsoft’s as that covered in the controversial
work over the past three years to build
a bridge with open source is a result of that commitment,” a Microsoft spokes- Violations
person told e Week. “The November Microsoft’s claims of patent infringe-
agreement with Novell addresses the ments by open-source software include:
IP issues in open source while meet- ing both the distributor’s needs and, 42 Violations by the Linux kernel
more importantly, the needs of the customer.” 65 Infringements by Linux GUIs
But Novell, of Waltham, Mass., dis- agrees with Microsoft on the topic of 45 Violations by OpenOffice
Linux and patents. 15 Infringements by e-mail “Our agreement with Microsoft is programs
in no way an acknowledgment that
Linux infringes upon any Microsoft 68 Violations by other free and intellectual property. When we entered open software
Source: Microsoft
the patent cooperation agreement with
SAP AND NOVELL ARE EXTENDING
their relationship to offer a new
joint-support solution for customers who run SAP applications on
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server.
These customers now have a
single-support entry point for the
entire software stack (eweek.
com, March 19).
The offering, rolled out May 15
and named “SUSE Linux Enterprise
Server Priority Support for SAP
applications,” is a Novell maintenance and support package that
will be integrated into the SAP global support backbone for managing
the entire life cycle of SAP applications. —Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
Microsoft, Novell did not agree or
admit that Linux or any other Novell Microsoft-Novell deal.
offering violates Microsoft patents,” Customers want their interoperabil-said Novell spokesperson Bruce Lowry, ity issues addressed by both proprietary
in San Francisco. “The patent agree- andopen-sourcevendors, the Microsoft
ment simply takes the patent issue off spokesperson said, referring to a survey
the table for those customers who are that found that some 90 percent of cus-concerned about it.” tomers support the Novell agreement
But what is clear is that Microsoft as addressing this need for vendor
has the third, and latest, draft of GPL interoperability and cooperation.
3 (General Public License, Version “Microsoft has also made other
3) in its sights, with the Microsoft effortstoadvanceopen-sourceinterop-spokesperson accusing the draft erability and encourage pragmatic
license of trying to “tear down the open-source development with our
bridge between proprietary and open- intellectual property. These include the
source technology that Microsoft has covenant not to sue open-source hob-worked to build with the industry and byist developers as part of the Novell
customers.” agreement, and the Open Specifica-
