cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/37281970
Believe it or not, an unexpected conflict has arisen in the openSUSE community with its long-time supporter and namesake, the SUSE company.
At the heart of this tension lies a quiet request that has stirred not-so-quiet ripples across the open source landscape: SUSE has formally asked openSUSE to discontinue using its brand name.
Richard Brown, a key figure within the openSUSE project, shared insights into the discussions that have unfolded behind closed doors.
Despite SUSE’s request’s calm and respectful tone, the implications of not meeting it could be far-reaching, threatening the symbiotic relationship that has benefited both entities over the years.
Oh wow. SUSE family of distribution is relatively small footprint. Whole story sounds like “splitting the hair”. The only reasonable explanation is that SUSE hired some self-glorified marketer from big corp. omg…
No, there are good reasons for it. A lot of people get confused between SUSE and openSUSE offerings. Often SUSE customers show up in openSUSE places, because they believe that it’s a place they can get official support. And I’m sure a lot of potential customers might get confused in the same way too.
On the flip side there are also a lot of openSUSE (adjacent) users who think SUSE is (secretly or not) making openSUSE development decisions or think they can dand SUSE to do that and that.So there are some good reasons to consider a rebranding, but also some speaking against it, like the less of recognition it might entail.
And you really think, people who are willing and able to buy enterprise support for their Linux distro get confused by the naming? Sure, there’s that one confused dude, but you also have people asking Facebook where they left their keys.
OpenSuse is essentially free marketing for SUSE, nobody would know them otherwise. Why would you give that away?
Suse is not a huge company, it has neither a large enterprise backer nor any killer features, and its market share is relatively small compared to Red Hat or Canonical. Throwing away free marketing while alienating a relatively passionate community is a kind of brainrot only MBA can come up with.
And you really think, people who are willing and able to buy enterprise support for their Linux distro get confused by the naming?
No, I don’t think that. I *know* that because I’m active in the community.
OpenSuse is essentially free marketing for SUSE, nobody would know them otherwise.
That is absolute nonsense. SUSE mostly serves large enterprise customers. That’s an entirely different demographic from people who care about Desktop Linux or setting up a home server.
Edit:
its market share is relatively small compared to Red Hat or Canonical.
I’m pretty sure SUSE is bigger than Canonical.
Editedit: According to wikipedia SUSE’s revenue is about twice as high as Canonical’s
That is absolute nonsense. SUSE mostly serves large enterprise customers.
And where do you think the people deciding what to buy get their information? Mind share is important.
I’m pretty sure SUSE is bigger than Canonical.
That’s actually surprising to me, but I’d argue that Suse offers more products, it seems like Rancher, Longhorn, etc. have no canonical equivalent.
And where do you think the people deciding what to buy get their information?
Advertisements at large airports
OMG. This is so hilariously true.
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as did CentOS before it
Fedora is older than CentOS?
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And where do you think the people deciding what to buy get their information? Mind share is important.
Most certainly not in Linux distro community spaces, because those are completely irrelevant for them and their needs.
Almost everybody that chooses SUSE ( SLE ) does so because of SAP.
I’m surprised and happy that SUSE is still doing well. I have fond memories of using SUSE in the enterprise especially around their “perfect guest” campaign for using it in virtualized environments. I thought they had very well-baked integration with large Windows networks—things just worked out of the box that didn’t with RHEL. I’m sure a lot has changed in the last decade but I appreciated their cooperative stance in the enterprise.
OpenSuse is essentially free marketing for SUSE, nobody would know them otherwise
I’ve been working for big enterprises for many years, SUSE is used in enterprise environment to run SAP systems because it’s recommended by SAP, OpenSuse has nothing to do with that.
And relying on marketing by someone you don’t control is not good decision even if losing some mind share.
I am in the linux world 20+ years. Used SUSE for short amout of time back than and never really cared much about it, just glad it still exist.
This is the first time I am hearing openSUSE is not part od SUSE.
Having different name should be good for all. I think openSUSE people should have done it long time ago. But sounds like name is not the only problem.
OpenSueUs
Holy shit that was so good lol
LibreSUSE 😎
I’d love them to replace SUSE with SUS. Distrowatch click rate +500%
amongSUSE
SamongUSE
I would that too
Just rename it jeSUSE, because nobody fucks with the jeSUSE.
Eight years of long term support, dude.
We already have JeOS
Fuck jususe, and fuck Jesus. Also fuck OpenJeSUSE.
There’s enough fucks to go around, for sure.
I also enjoy a good edge
Rename it to openSUS
New name suggestion:
“The Distro Formerly Known As openSUSE”
openDISTROFORMALLYASKEDBYSUSETOREBRAND
I do hope that’s an acronym, too. 🙃
TDFKOS
Careful, Germans take it seriously.
same energy (and impact) as “X formerly known as Twitter”
It’s a play on “The Artist Formerly Known As Prince”
Which is the same energy as Prince has with this, sweet summer child.
Yes, this is actually where I was going with it
Doesn’t SUSE actively benefit from openSUSE development? I thought Tumbleweed and SLES had a similar relationship as Fedora and RHEL.
Notice that “Fedora” does not have “Redhat” its name. Maybe the request is reasonable. I don’t know how many people think that thy don’t need SLES, because there is openSUSE.
My comment was more about how SUSE benefits from openSUSE development (and vice-versa) and that Tumbleweed has a similar relationship to SLES as Fedora has to RHEL, as they are both upstream of their respective enterprise distributions.
Besides, people don’t need SLES. Enterprises do because of the support they get. And I’d assume employees responsible for that kind of thing at such enterprises would know the difference.
And the Red Hat logo is literally a fedora hat.
If it’s just a name change done well, I couldn’t care less (although openSUSE is a very recognizable name and brand recognition would have to be reestablished). I just hope that this isn’t the beginning of something worse.
Fedora/Redhat is a good example. It could be argued that the Linux distro scene was different 23 years ago, making it harder to be seen today.
The thing I’m pondering is what the openSUSE community actually is. Does it exist as a group, or is it separate projects, each doing their own thing… for who? What is the overlap between people in the various distros, overlap in technology used in packaging and QA etc? Is it meaningful to talk about openSUSE as a distinct community separate from SUSE?
SUSE provide a lot of the infrastructure for openSUSE and base their enterprise Linux from factory.
wow. I had a good opinion of suse up to this point. what a silly request after all these years.
Corporate backing is a two-edged sword, unfortunately.
From my own looking into this it looks like more of a suggestion than a request (for now at least), just a “this might be a good idea, we should look into it”.
I just don’t get what they are thinking. opensuse is basically free advertising for them.
Yea, I only know suse from opensuse and of my company ever needs Linux support, I would go to suse because I know it from openSuse…
And I would love to work for suse because I had such a good experience with openSuse
I think a name change would be pretty dump…
this is how I feel. If I am involved in work decisions I will recommend the enterprise version because the support just makes sense and is incredibly cheap vs most software. It actually took me awhile to understand the whole fedora, centos, redhat connection.
It’s a strange suggestion after very recently working closely with openSUSE to ensure Leap can use the same binaries as SLE, though
Strange is using and marketing someone else’s name without written permission.
Why do you think linux distros and free software have such strange names? To avoid stepping on someone toes without expensive trademark research.
TIL SUSE exists and wouldn’t have found out if not for OpenSUSE and this news. It’s kinda weird to open their website and see this:
SUSE is such a stupid name. Like, it is stupid to say in German.
Just rename it SUSGeckoOS
If GeckOS isn’t already taken, it could be kinda cool.
As opposed to G.E.C.K. OS.
Why Geck ?
A gecko is a lizard, so it’s in keeping with SUSE’s chameleon theme. Maybe a little too similar for corporate.
I think Komodo Linux, or KomodOS are good options too, but I can’t recall if they were already used for a distro.
Komodo (last update 2006)
I don’t know what’s stupid to say about Gesellschaft für Software und Systementwicklung mit beschränkter Haftung
They are the second largest “Linux company” by revenue after Red Hat iirc
It’s SUSSY Linux time
or Sussie
That must be annoying just after OpenSUSE went through a branding redesign process. I guess they’ll have to give up the gecko logo since SUSE also uses it?
And there’s more at stake than a rebranding it seems. This could signal SUSE withdrawing development support from OpenSUSE:
Let’s face it: SUSE has been more than just a namesake for openSUSE; it has actively provided resources and support far beyond what it would ordinarily need for its business operations.
This generosity has fostered a thriving openSUSE project that has excelled under SUSE’s goodwill and informal support, including contributions made by SUSE employees on company time.
However, the recent request for a branding separation has overshadowed this partnership. If openSUSE does not handle this request with the sensitivity and cooperation it demands, the project risks not just a reduction in support from SUSE but a potential shift in priorities away from it.
The “Factory first” policy, a cornerstone of the engineering synergy between SUSE and openSUSE, could also be scrutinized, emphasizing the gravity of the current situation.
This could signal SUSE withdrawing development support from OpenSUSE
i had a similar thought; feels like the centos/redhat episode we had a couple years ago.
Heh. “A couple of years ago.”
That quote sounds uncomfortably like a grudge on SUSE Enterprise’s part.
It’s a quote from the article, not a statement by SUSE.
Okay, that’s better.
This is a massive miss-play on Suse’s part. Essentially all the good will, and recognition I have for Suse is based on OpenSuse. It’s the reason many of the places I’ve worked at now run a Suse product instead of redhat. Seriously, when I think of OpenSuse and Suse as a whole I barely differentiate the toonunlike redhat and fedora. That’s likely the reason for the switch but I cannot see how-this does anything but benefit them.
From the article too there are some concerns. Suse is, admittedly, trying to cause opensuse to change direction ans managment to further suit it’s buisness at threat of removing support. This is sad to see.
to further suit its* business.
To fursuit it is business
OpenSusame
open sesame
The request was respectful and SUSEs support on OpenSUSE is very helping the project so I’d personally be fine with fulfilling that request
OpenGNU/SE
