| Good-bye NetWare, hello OES 2 |
Mar. 19, 2007
Salt Lake City -- Novell announced the next generation of its OES (Open Enterprise Server) operating system, at its annual BrainShare tradeshow today. OES 2 adds 64-bit Xen-based virtualization, dynamic storage support, and Windows domain support, and marks the final transition from Novell NetWare to SLES (SUSE Linux Enterprise Server).
The new OES is built on top of the just released SLES 10 SP1. This operating system supports Intel and AMD 64-bit dual-core and multi-core processors. In addition, many of OES' main services -- Novell Storage Services, Novell Cluster Services, and others -- have been updated to 64-bit code. Other services are 32-bit with 64-bit libraries where needed.
Using Xen virtualization, OES now enables users to run NetWare 6.5 as a paravirtualized guest operating system on top of SLES. In order to achieve optimal performance on the latest hardware in this paravirtualized mode of use, NetWare has been enhanced to recognize that it's running as a virtual machine, according to Novell.
Novell's director of product marketing Justin Steinman said NetWare on OES opens up some very profitable server consolidation possibilities. "On today's high-end hardware, NetWare rarely comes close to reaching full CPU utilization. When Novell Open Enterprise Server 2 comes out, you'll be able to take advantage of under-utilized hardware by having a single machine host two, three, or more NetWare servers without affecting performance. This can deliver significant savings on hardware costs, rack space, cooling requirements, and power requirements."
In OES 2, Novell is also introducing "dynamic storage technology." This new functionality enables administrators to create policies that dictate what data is considered active or inactive. According to Novell, these policies allow inactive data to be relocated to lower-cost storage solutions and backed up less frequently. Active data then resides on highest-performing storage environments, is backed up more frequently and is first to be restored in the event of a disaster. Novell says end users should see no change in the way they access their information.
The new Domain Services for Windows employs server-side authorization and authentication that allows Windows users to access a Novell server using native Windows protocols. It also provides seamless cross-authentication between Active Directory and Novell eDirectory. In other words, Novell claims that users can work in a pure Windows desktop environment and still take advantage of all the Novell back-end services and technology, without the need for a Novell Client on the desktop. This technology also enables Linux servers to behave as if they were Active Directory servers.
To manage this, administrators can use either Novell iManager or Microsoft Management Console. Administers can also use this functionality to centrally manage Samba shares.
This release of OES also spells the end of NetWare as a separate operating system. While you will be able to run NetWare as a virtual machine on OES for NetWare specific legacy applications, OES 2 completes the transition of NetWare services to Linux.
So, for example, administrators can now transition existing DNS (Domain Name Server), DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol), and DFS (Distributed File System for Windows) infrastructures from NetWare to Linux, as well as centrally administer them in the same way they are administered on NetWare.
The new OES also has several additional minor updates. These are said to include: - Multiple domains in a system
- Server-side trash can for recovering deleted files
- On-disk file encryption
- Macintosh client
- Archive and Versioning server now supported on Linux
- Novell Client for Windows Vista
- Improvements to installation and migration tools
OES 2 will be available to customers in this quarter, Novell says.
-- Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
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