“Despite studied nonchalance on the part of company execs at its
iForum event in Florida last week, it now seems inevitable that
Citrix is poised on the brink of a major break from dependence on
Microsoft. The execs still talk happily about the importance of
“adding value to NT terminal server,” but under the covers Citrix
is working feverishly on Unix and Linux ports of MetaFrame server,
and strengthening links with Redmond enemies such as Novell and
Sun.“
“It’ll be a good trick if Citrix can pull it off, seeing its
initial commercial USP was making NT applications available to thin
clients, but all of the components for the Microsoft-free version
of Citrix are starting to click into place, and some of them are
going to cause its old ‘ally’ severe discomfort.”
“Citrix’s ‘technology demonstrations’ provided some useful
signposts, as did the appearance of Novell CEO Eric Schmidt, and
the unveiling of a new ‘pay as you go’ licensing strategy. The use
of Solaris as the server software for some of the demos…might
have been talked down by Citrix VP Dave Weiss as something that
would only go commercial if customer demand existed, but privately
Citrix staff conceded that Unix and Linux ports were going
ahead.”