Ximian, Inc. (previously called Helix Code and originally named International Gnome Support) was an American company that developed, sold and supported

application software Application software is any computer program that is intended for end-user use not operating, administering or programming the computer. An application (app, application program, software application) is any program that can be categorized as ...

for

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

and

Unix Unix (, ; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multi-user computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, a ...

based on the

GNOME A gnome () is a mythological creature and diminutive spirit in Renaissance magic and alchemy, introduced by Paracelsus in the 16th century and widely adopted by authors, including those of modern fantasy literature. They are typically depict ...

platform. It was founded by

Miguel de Icaza Miguel de Icaza (born November 23, 1972) is a Mexican-American programmer and activist, best known for starting the GNOME, Mono, and Xamarin projects. Biography Early years De Icaza was born in Mexico City and studied Mathematics at the Nation ...

and

Nat Friedman Nathaniel Dourif Friedman (born 6 August 1977) is an American technology executive and investor. He was the chief executive officer (CEO) of GitHub and former chairman of the GNOME Foundation. Friedman is currently a board member at the Arc Instit ...

in 1999 and was bought by

Novell Novell, Inc. () was an American software and services company headquartered in Provo, Utah, that existed from 1980 until 2014. Its most significant product was the multi-platform network operating system known as NetWare. Novell technolog ...

in 2003. Novell continued to develop Ximian's original products, while adding support for its own

GroupWise GroupWise is a messaging and collaboration platform from OpenText that supports email, calendaring, personal information management, instant messaging, and document management. The GroupWise platform consists of desktop client software, which is ...

and

ZENworks ZENworks, a suite of software products developed and maintained by OpenText for computer systems management, aims to manage the entire life cycle of servers, of desktop PCs (Windows, Linux or Mac), of laptops, and of handheld devices such as ...

software.

History

Miguel de Icaza had a job interview at

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

in 1997 shortly before he started the GNOME project. At Microsoft he met Nat Friedman, who worked there as an intern. Afterwards they became good friends. In April 1999 Friedman came up with the idea to create a company to work on GNOME. The company was founded on 19 October 1999 as International GNOME Support, but its name was changed to Helix Code later. Because that name could not be trademarked the name was changed to Ximian on 10 January 2001. Nat Friedman was the

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...

of Ximian from its founding to 2001 when Ximian brought in David Patrick as CEO and President. Friedman became Vice President of Product Management. The company's business model was based on providing a mix of

free Free may refer to: Concept * Freedom, the ability to act or change without constraint or restriction * Emancipate, attaining civil and political rights or equality * Free (''gratis''), free of charge * Gratis versus libre, the difference betw ...

and

proprietary software Proprietary software is computer software, software that grants its creator, publisher, or other rightsholder or rightsholder partner a legal monopoly by modern copyright and intellectual property law to exclude the recipient from freely sharing t ...

, solutions and services. Ximian was a founding member of the

GNOME Foundation GNOME Foundation is a non-profit organization based in Orinda, California, United States, which works to coordinate the efforts in the GNOME project. Purpose The GNOME Foundation works to further the goal of the GNOME project: to create a co ...

and the Desktop Linux Consortium. Ximian was acquired by Novell on 4 August 2003 to improve its offerings of Linux for the enterprise. Novell was in turn acquired by

The Attachmate Group The Attachmate Group, Inc. was a privately held software holding company based in Houston, Texas in the United States. The major companies held by the group were Attachmate, NetIQ, Novell, and SUSE. Attachmate was owned by Wizard Parent LL ...

on 27 April 2011. In May 2011 The Attachmate Group laid off all its US staff working on

Mono Mono may refer to: Biology * Infectious mononucleosis, "the kissing disease" * Monocyte, a type of leukocyte (white blood cell) * Monodactylidae, members of which are referred to as monos Technology and computing * Mono (audio), single-c ...

, which included De Icaza. He and Friedman then founded

Xamarin Xamarin is a Microsoft-owned San Francisco-based software company founded in May 2011 by the engineers that created Mono (software), Mono, Mono (software)#Xamarin.Android, Xamarin.Android (formerly Mono for Android) and Mono (software)#Xamarin.i ...

on 16 May 2011, a new company to continue the development of Mono. On 24 February 2016, Microsoft announced that they had signed an agreement to acquire Xamarin.

Products

Ximian both developed new products and "polished" existing free software projects to provide more consistent operation. These projects were packaged into its

Ximian Desktop Ximian, Inc. (previously called Helix Code and originally named International Gnome Support) was an American company that developed, sold and supported application software for Linux and Unix based on the GNOME platform. It was founded by Miguel ...

product — a range of integrated applications intended to provide all the tools a typical business user might require. So-called "Ximianized" versions of

OpenOffice.org OpenOffice.org (OOo), commonly known as OpenOffice, is a discontinued open-source office suite. Active successor projects include LibreOffice (the most actively developed) and Collabora Online, with Apache OpenOffice being considered mostly d ...

, and

Gaim Pidgin (formerly named Gaim) is a free and open-source multi-platform instant messaging client, based on a library named libpurple that has support for many instant messaging protocols, allowing the user to simultaneously log in to various s ...

were released, along with the following completely new products: * Ximian Evolution * Ximian Connector * Red Carpet * Bonobo *

References

External links

Copy of official website on the Internet Archive
{{GNOME American companies established in 1999 GNOME companies Linux companies

History

Products

Further reading

References

External links