TurboLinux to ‘Enlighten’ Users

Enlighten Software Solutions, Inc. announced this week that its multi-platform administration software product will now be included with the expanding line of open-source operating system (OS) solutions offered by TurboLinux.

According to Enlighten — a provider of workgroup administration management solutions — its EnlightenDSM 3.4 will be bundled in all future versions of TurboLinux’s workstations. The product will enable TurboLinux customers to monitor and manage their Linux, UNIX and Windows environments from a single console. EnlightenDSM 3.4 will also be available as a download from the TurboLinux Web site.

“The addition of EnlightenDSM to TurboLinux makes TurboLinux by far the most enterprise-ready Linux on the market,” commented TurboLinux CEO Cliff Miller.

Workstations by TurboLinux

TurboLinux released its Workstation 3.6 product this past summer, commencing its official debut in the U.S. Lonn Johnston, Vice President of North American Operations for TurboLinux, told theE-Commerce Times that the “target market for Workstation is the Linux user who wants to concentrate on desktop work,” including “education, developers and office workers.”

According to Cliff Miller, President and CEO of TurboLinux, his company “is best known as the Linux leader in the Pacific Rim through (their) Japanese and Chinese language products.” The company formerly known as Pacific HiTech transformed itself into TurboLinux earlier this year, taking on the designation of its flagship product. The name change was to coincide with the company’s entrance into the North American market.

TurboLinux has made significant advances on the Japanese and Asian/Pacific market. The company’s workstation product outsold Microsoft Windows 98 and other Linux operating system packages in its first week of retail sales, as announced by market research firm Business Computer News in July. TurboLinux products, available in Chinese and Japanese, are additionally being developed in Korean language editions.

About Enlighten Software Solutions

“Clearly, with such strong market acceptance, adding support for TurboLinux greatly enhances EnlightenDSM customers’ capabilities to centrally manage their diverse IT infrastructure,” stated Bill Bradley, president of Enlighten. In addition, our TurboLinux partnership both expands and compliments Enlighten’s existing bundling arrangements with Access Graphics, IBM and SGI.”

The Penguin Gets Thinner

In other Linux news, National Semiconductor Corp. announced this week that INFOMATEC AG / IGEL Technology Labs will develop Linux-based firmware to port to its set-top box and thin-client platforms. The Santa Clara, California-based chip titan has already built strategic partnerships with Windows CE system integrators CCL and ITE.

“To optimize performance and market value of these new devices, it is vital that our Geode solutions run on as many operating systems as possible,” said Ozy Wong, National’s information appliance market director for Asia Pacific. In July, National Semiconductor introduced its Geode SC1400 that, according to the company, “integrates an interactive set-top box onto a single piece of silicon — including full PC functionality.” INFOMATEC develops e-commerce solutions for the bank, insurance and trading industries.