Business

Veritas Software has entered into an agreement to acquire KVault Software (KVS), a provider of e-mail archiving software, in an all-cash transaction valued at US$225 million. With the addition of KVS, Veritas hopes to offer customers software to store, manage and archive corporate e-mail and data. T...

Novell announced Monday that it is consolidating some of its business units in order to concentrate more fully on Linux and identity management. Four business units have now been made into two, which will also necessitate management changes at the company. "Open source offers choice in markets previ...

A recent blog posting by a Microsoft project manager spawned a blizzard of discussion on one of the Internet's major tech forums and generated speculation that Microsoft may be ready to improve its relations with the open-source community. Josh Ledgard, a program manager for Microsoft's Visual Studi...

As part of Software Freedom Day, set for August 28, OpenOffice will be translated into three African languages for the first time. After Saturday, the open-source desktop suite will be available to speakers of the South African languages of Zulu, Sepedi and Afrikaans. The new versions have been prep...

The UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has asked Microsoft to change an ad that claims Linux has been found to be over 10 times more expensive than Windows Server. The group evaluated the truthfulness of the ad after a number of public complaints were filed. In the ad, Microsoft cites figure...

Cisco Systems of San Jose, California, Monday acquired privately held P-Cube of Sunnyvale, California.

Gateway today announced that its new line of retail notebooks, desktops and monitors are now available at Micro Center's 20 stores nationwide. The Gateway products are available at Micro Center stores and on the company's Web site, microcenter.com. The agreement is the latest in a series of announce...

In court documents filed Friday, IBM has asked for dismissal of a second major component of the lawsuit filed against the company by SCO. IBM is arguing that SCO's breach of contract allegations should be removed from the lawsuit. IBM has been accused of violating its contract with SCO by improperly...

Sometime around 5,000 years ago, Chinese merchants learned to spread their cargo over several ships so that if one were lost, they would not lose their entire shipment. It was the birth of what we now call the insurance industry. Before too long, the concept spread. Phoenician ship owners on the hoo...

Munich announced that patent concerns will not affect a planned migration to Linux for 14,000 of the city's desktop computers. Although the city had unveiled a plan last year for the move, on August 4 it decided to postpone the program, nicknamed LiMux, citing legal and financial concerns over softw...

Microsoft has introduced a new version of Windows XP designed for computers sold in emerging markets -- and analysts contend that is a sign that the Redmond, Washington-based software giant is worried about threats to its leading market position by Linux as well as to its bottom line by pirates.

As Linux moves into mainstream corporate environments, Microsoft has acknowledged that open-source software is a growing threat. The software giant, however, stops short of calling Linux a serious competitor for the desktop. The company is so strongly focused on spreading its opinions about Linux be...

Thin client vendors have shown a greater presence at this week's LinuxWorld conference than in the past, with Wyse Technology, Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems all offering new products. The moves set the stage for broader deployment of the technology in the coming year. IDC analyst Bob O'Donnel...

IBM announced that it will not use its patents against Linux, and it encouraged other software companies to make the same vow. As the owner of 60 patents on which the Linux core may infringe, IBM could wreak havoc on Linux if it chose to do so. The new promise, delivered at LinuxWorld, emphasizes th...

Industry observers yesterday took differing outlooks on rumors that Sun Microsystems might buy Novell. "I don't find the speculation credible," analyst Dan Kusnetzky, vice president of operating systems at International Data Corporation, said. Kusnetzky said such a merger would face problems from po...