OS Roundup: What does an enterprise server OS look like in your perfect world? Find out how some real-world options -- from Linux to Unix to Windows to Mac OS X -- might stack up in a dream universe.

OS Roundup: A New York hedge fund has made an offer to buy Novell. Is it paying $2 billion just for the Linux OS, or is there more to it? And, more importantly, will the offer bring other players to the fore? Perhaps Microsoft will end up the white knight in this strange tale.

OS Roundup: So says the International Intellectual Property Alliance, a group of trade bodies that includes the MPAA and the RIAA. In its eyes, countries that encourage the use of open-source software are in the same league as those with rampant copyright piracy.

Red Hat is laying the groundwork to beef up its virtual machine management software so it can compete with VMware on more equal footing in the future.

OS Roundup: When it comes to Linux server management, if your Red Hat Enterprise Linux distro isn't supported by Red Hat, is it still Red Hat Linux, or is it 'Frankenstein Linux'?

OS Round Up: Despite the strength of backers Intel and Nokia, Meego has already fallen prey to a common open-source software pitfall -- a moronic name. Can it overcome its nomenclature handicap and help make Linux the OS of choice for mobile computing?

OS Roundup: The UNIX server market is steadily shrinking, yet the three top heavyweights are about to launch new products. It's a dog-eat-dog market, and IBM has already nibbled at Solaris. Is HP-UX the next course for this seemingly large and aggressive mutt?

OS Roundup: Supersizing is out of style in the restaurant world, but Apple's iPad announcement last week and Microsoft's commercial launch of its cloud platform Azure yesterday prove it is very much alive in the tech industry.

"Private cloud" is a term heard a lot these days. What does it actually mean?

OS Roundup: The contrast couldn't be any starker: On Wednesday, Oracle will tell the world why it means business, and Apple will likely show off some new playthings.

OS Roundup: Chinese hackers used a vulnerability in Microsoft's Internet Explorer to attack Google. PR disaster? Far from it. Both companies are now poised to benefit from the whole affair.

OS Roundup: Google might paint itself as benevolent market leader, but make no mistake, it's following the playbook written in Redmond. And Microsoft's not about to give up so easily. With the hype for Chrome OS growing, expect things to get ugly -- fast.

OS Roundup: Cut prices enough and customers will eventually bite is a common tactic for those selling commodity goods -- not high-end mainframes. Yet IBM recently did just that when when it marked down and bundled System z. Is this a sign the mainframe has lost its luster, or will the move unlock new markets?

Is your Exchange Server driving you around the bend? Fear not, from hosted Exchange services to cloud-based Outlook-compatible email services, options abound.