SuSE Teams With VA Linux Systems' SourceForge to Improve Developer and End-User Access to SuSE Linux

Business Wire, March 13, 2000

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

NUREMBERG, Germany--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 13, 2000

SourceForge Designated as Primary Mirror for SuSE Linux;

SuSE Offered as a SourceForge CompileFarm Platform

SuSE Linux today announced that it has designated VA Linux Systems' (Nasdaq:LNUX) SourceForge(TM), the world's largest Open Source development center, as a primary mirror for ftp.suse.com, to help improve the availability of SuSE Linux via download.

SuSE Linux is available for download at ftp://download.sourceforge.net/pub/suse/, which carries the full FTP version of SuSE Linux, as well as ISO images of the evaluation version, updates and fixes.

"We are very pleased to have SourceForge as our primary mirror site," said Dirk Hohndel, chief technical officer for SuSE Linux. "This enables our customers to have faster access to our download area and helps us spread the word about SuSE's superior quality."

Further, SuSE Linux is now offered as a platform on the SourceForge CompileFarm, a unique service that gives Open Source developers a convenient way to build and test applications on multiple versions of the Linux and BSD operating systems over the Internet.

The SourceForge CompileFarm enables Open Source developers to automatically create packages that can be installed on SuSE Linux using SuSE's YaST installation tool, without having to compile the programs manually.

"The designation of SourceForge as the primary mirror of a highly regarded Linux distribution such as SuSE demonstrates the growing importance of SourceForge within the Open Source community," said Dr. Larry M. Augustin, president and CEO of VA Linux Systems. "Incorporating SuSE on SourceForge's CompileFarm makes it easy for Open Source developers to build and tune applications for a broader user base."

About VA Linux Systems

Since 1993, VA Linux Systems has been a recognized leader in advancing Linux and Open Source solutions. VA Linux provides a single point of contact for Linux systems, Open Source software, and world-class professional services and support. VA Linux Systems owns and operates SourceForge, the world's largest Open Source development center, as well as Linux.com and Themes.org. Headquartered in Sunnyvale, VA Linux is located on the Web at http://www.valinux.com/.

About SuSE

Headquartered in Germany with a workforce of over 300 people worldwide, SuSE (www.suse.com) is the leading international Linux company. SuSE is used by more than 50,000 business customers worldwide due to its stability and high quality. With offices in the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, the United States and Italy, SuSE contributes extensively to Linux development projects such as the Linux kernel, glibc, Xfree86(TM), KDE, ISDN4Linux, ALSA and USB. The company name is pronounced "SUE-zuh." The web site is http://www.suse.com.

Note to Editors: VA Linux Systems and SourceForge are trademarks of VA Linux Systems, Inc. Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.