Last December we shared with you news that NetWare would become a virtual service running on top of the Linux engine in Open Enterprise Server. I've now been able to track down, with the help of Network World Senior Editor Deni Connor, the slideshow outlining the OES roadmap confirming these plans for NetWare.

The slideshow is contained in a large PDF file.

Jump through the document to page 26, "NetWare ViX", which shows the "configuration option for running NetWare para-virtualized on top of [SuSE Linux Enterprise Server's] Xen." For those not fluent in Novell marketing-speak, Xen is a "hypervisor " and "Para-virtualization" means the NetWare kernel is "optimized for performance on Xen."

(Wikipedia defines "hypervisor" as: "A scheme which allows multiple operating systems to run, unmodified, on a host computer at the same time. The term is an extension of the earlier term supervisor, which was commonly applied to operating system kernels in that era." )

Evidently, the "Para-virtualization" means you can't actually run unmodified NetWare on the hypervisor (unlike, say, VMware - see "Running NetWare 6 Under VMware Workstation for Windows"). Among the benefits touted are:

• Backward compatible NLM support.
• Preserve NetWare management tools.
• Tools for NetWare to NetWare ViX migrations.
• NLM's on new hardware.

Yes, you can run NLMs on new hardware. I'll bet that's something you've been waiting for, isn't it?

It does, though, preserve your investment in NetWare add-on products for a little longer, and for that we can be grateful.

According to slide 20 of the slideshow, the second generation version of OES (codenamed "Cypress"), the one with virtualized NetWare, will ship by year-end. Those of you at BrainShare this week may have more up to date information.

In addition to NetWare ViX, "Cypress" was also slated to have new or improved features including:

• Enterprise Distributed Management
• Workgroup File Services
• Enterprise Print Services
• Storage and High Availability
• Information WorkPlace Stack
• Workgroup Services Desktop Presence
• Enterprise Deployment Services
• Global Identity and Security Services
• x86-64 Support

Watch for it!