Interview: OSDL chief seeks business Linux takers

IT Week: Has the SCO legal pursuit deterred business Linux uptake?

Stuart Cohen: I think it's the best thing that ever happened to Linux. It's got us on every front page for months. In the spring there was a lot of due diligence and internal counsel going on but by July and August [buyers knew] there was nothing there. The code is either OK or it will be surgically removed so [users are] covered. We set up an indemnification fund... but I don't know anybody who's holding off.

OSDL has some similarities with UnitedLinux, which perhaps failed in part because it was perceived as an anti-Red Hat venture. Could you revisit the idea of a single, global Linux?

I don't think it was a get-Red Hat thing. Customers want to run one application in any country they want. The idea is still very viable. The [enterprise hardware] vendors [have] lost a lot of money investing in an OS. They all knew they didn't want to get in the OS business but they don't want a single vendor to control the OS. We can help to do a lot of these things. ISV porting is the biggest issue in the marketplace. I'm a huge fan of the Linux Standard Base but it could do a lot more.

Have you talked to the biggest distributors about another attempt at a single Linux and if so have they been worried about losing differentiation?

Every day I talk to them about [the single Linux idea]. If you're differentiating at the OS level you're going down.

What is still missing from Linux?

I'm not sure there's anything missing, considering where it is in its evolution. It's the fastest growing server OS in the world. On the desktop there's a lot of interest. Linux gives you the opportunity to do thin-client better than anything in the past. In a typical organisation you could have a third of your people using Linux today for single-function users with a browser and email functionality. The next third are the office workers who look at DB2 and SAP, give presentations and use Excel. The last group is the mobile professionals who sychronise, replicate, use PDAs and smartphones. They may be the last to convert.

What steps are you taking to reassure blue-chips wary of investing in Linux?

We've spent some time talking about roadmaps with Linus Torvalds and Andrew Morton. Think of it as a sort of 12-month rolling roadmap. I think it's a level of commercialisation that we need. Linux has gone mainstream and one of the things that means is quarterly roadmaps and updates. We can do a better communicating job. We published a process chart a few months ago because we wanted to explain how maintainers and peer review worked. There were people thinking that 4,000 people submit changes to one person.

How did you get involved with the OSDL?

They wanted a CEO that was market focused, spending more time with the governments and organisations. If you ask someone in the development community about Linux he thinks about the kernel. The CIO thinks wider: about hardware, software and solutions.

Do you need to keep a balance between appealing to business and keeping developers happy?

I combat that by making sure of the centre of gravity for Linux and keeping a balance between the developer community and users. We don't submit as much as Red Hat, Intel or Suse or IBM but we do our fair share of code. Every time we do an announcement I send it to 15 people to say, 'How will this play out on Slashdot?' If there's less than 100 complaints on Slashdot I think it's pretty good [laughs].

Do you make requests to Linus Torvalds and Andrew Morton about what you'd like in the next kernel?

It tends to be more about what we hear at customer advisory councils. If they ever felt I was putting undue pressure on them they would quit.

Some people call Red Hat the Microsoft of Linux. Does its leadership worry you?

I think it's great but I wish it was even broader. Linux is growing very quickly in China, Asia, Japan. Red Hat is not number one in any of these markets. It would be nice if [Red Hat] were stronger around the world. It's also great that Novell bought Suse because it gives them brand and financial stability

ABOUT STUART COHEN

Stuart Cohen is chief executive of the Open Source Development Labs.

Cohen worked at IBM for 17 years, including stints in the PC and networking groups.

He most recently served as vice-president at embedded systems maker RadiSys.

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