Recently, Novell Inc. has been the beneficiary of generally good news. First, Microsoft gave Novell the nod to write open source extensions to its new System Center, which signals Microsoft’s move toward greater interoperability. This will benefit all open source vendors, but Novell in particular, because these extensions are built on Novell’s ZENworks management software.

Both Microsoft and Novell can be accused of harming perceptions of “Open Source”. Novell seeks justification by clarifying that it really is a mixed-source company, whereas Microsoft shoves the word “open” everywhere it deems possible.

Novell today announced Open Workgroup, a basic Linux set-up for small-to-medium businesses.

In doing this Novell also revealed Microsoft’s open source strategy.

Given the outcry in the open-source community over the coupon deal Novell struck with Microsoft, you can only begin to imagine the mother of all rumpuses that would ensue if SUSE actually ended up in the Redmond bed, but these things have a habit of dying down eventually. What happens if Microsoft doesn't buy Novell, and SUSE gets sold off to somebody else?

There is a substantive effort in open source to bring such an implementation of .Net to market, known as Mono and being driven by Novell, and one of the attributes of the agreement we made with Novell is that the intellectual property associated with that is available to Novell customers.

Mary Jo Foley notes some of the highlights of Microsoft's patent/interoperability deal with Novell, following Microsoft's own press release celebrating the deal. She says something, however, that I'm not sure I agree with

Novell is working with Microsoft to help Microsoft cooperate and contribute to open source projects under open source licenses, and sticking with the existing standards to do so. Keen observers of the tech industry might note that this is a bit of a rarity, but it’s something that I hope we’ll see more of from Microsoft.

"Not since SCO has there been a company so reviled by the open source community as Novell following its deal with Microsoft.

To many outsiders and to numerous sections of the open-source community, Novell's decision to make a deal with Microsoft in 2006 to avoid litigation around Linux was motivated by desperation.