Novell Releases First Commercial Linux Featuring 2.6 Kernel
SuSE Linux, now part of Novell Inc., on Thursday will announce that its SuSE Linux 9.1 personal and professional editions will be available in early May. The company says these are also the first complete commercial Linux distributions to support the recently released Linux 2.6 kernel.
The update is also the first Linux distribution from the company since SuSE Linux AG and Ximian Inc. were acquired by Novell last year.
This update is technically a point release, which are usually fairly minor upgrades. However, Charlie Ungershick, director of product management for the SuSE Linux business unit in Waltham, Mass., told eWEEK that this update is far more significant than a customary point release.
"We are pretty excited about it because there are many significant things in it. We also believe this will be the first really portable retail Linux box that supports the Linux 2.6 kernel, which we have been testing and back porting for a long time," he said.
"We have had no issues with the 2.6 kernel, which has been incredibly stable. In fact, SuSE Linux 9.0 even came with a test version of the 2.6 kernel," he told eWEEK in an interview.
