SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED), introduced as
Novell Linux Desktop (NLD), targeted at the business market, it is developed from a common codebase with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) and other SUSE Linux Enterprise (SLE) products. SLED includes the
GNOME Shell,
LibreOffice,
Evolution and many other popular
open source packages such as
Dia,
TigerVNC, and
lftp. Like SLES, SLED is based on openSUSE Tumbleweed and shares a common codebase with openSUSE Leap. SLED since version 12 has included a modified version of the
GNOME Classic Shell to include a layout with one panel on the bottom of the screen, traditional application menus, and desktop icons for traditional desktop users. It also includes
LibreOffice, Mozilla
Firefox, and
Evolution along with many standard GNOME utilities, such as GNOME Documents and
GNOME Files. As well, the
YaST Control Center allows end users to make advanced changes to the system from the command line.
HP offers business notebooks with SLED 11 preinstalled, under both its own brand and the Compaq brand.
Micro-Star International offered
MSI Wind Netbooks with SLED 10 preinstalled.
Sun Microsystems previously licensed SLED as the basis of the Linux version of
Java Desktop System. In March 2018, SUSE Product Manager Jay Kruemcke wrote in SUSE blog that SUSE Linux Enterprise developers have ported it to
Raspberry Pi. Costs online in 2025, June: support standard 1 year subscription 139,23€; support priority 1 year subscription 254,66€
History SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop has been developed while SUSE was under the ownership of several different parent companies. SUSE was owned by and conducted business as
Novell from SLED's first release as Novell Linux Desktop in 2004 until 2011 when
The Attachmate Group purchased Novell and created SUSE as an autonomous subsidiary.
Micro Focus in turn purchased The Attachmate Group in 2014 and made SUSE an autonomous business unit, before selling it to
EQT AB in 2019. EQT AB is a private equity group that develops new companies before divesting them as independent companies. ;Novell Linux Desktop 9 Novell Linux Desktop (NLD) 9 was originally released on 8 November 2004, less than a year after Novell's acquisition of SUSE. There were a number of Service Packs (SP's) released for NLD 9. SP1 was released on 11 February 2005 and contained many updates. After that, SP2 was released on 9 August 2005, containing all the released updates and
bugfixes since August 2004. SP3 was released on 22 December 2005. NLD 9 was based on SUSE Linux 9.1 and offered a more conservative offering of desktop applications for businesses. Its desktop included common end user applications like Mozilla Firefox, OpenOffice.org. NLD also included software developed by Novell and its 2003 acquisition
Ximian, such as the Red Carpet software management tool from Ximian and Novell's system management tool
ZenWorks. ;SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 With SLED 10,
Novell increased the focus on features for a broader range of corporate users by focusing on meeting the needs for basic office workers, positioning SLED as a competitor to
Microsoft Windows. Basic office workers were defined in this context as users who need basic desktop functionality, including an
office suite, a
collaboration client, a
web browser, and
instant messaging. Novell attempts to meet these needs by concentrating on making these components very compatible with existing enterprise infrastructure, such as Microsoft Office data files, Microsoft
Active Directory, and
Microsoft Exchange Server or
Novell GroupWise collaboration systems. It also included the Beagle desktop search tool, similar to
Spotlight in Mac OS X v10.4. The Xgl+
Compiz support enables a variety of advanced graphical effects in the user interface, such as "application tiling" (similar to
Exposé). Other features include making it easier for Linux beginners to connect digital cameras to the computer and play audio files such as
MP3s using Helix Banshee. The version of GNOME included this release was highly customized, and debuted the
slab application menu on a one panel layout. SLED 10 was originally released on 17 June 2006. The last service pack for SLED 10 was Service Pack 4, released on 15 April 2011. ;SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 11 SLED 11, based on openSUSE 11.1, was released on 24 March 2009. It included an upgrade to GNOME and was the first release to ship
KDE 4, with version 4.1.3. Several improvements were made to improve Microsoft Active Directory and Microsoft Exchange Server integration, and the Novell OpenOffice.org version was upgraded to version 3.0. SLED continued to include some proprietary components such as Adobe Flash, as well as open-source implementations of closed sourced plugins and runtimes such as
Moonlight and
Mono. Four service packs were released for SLED 11, with Service Pack 2 notably bringing
Btrfs commercial support to the enterprise Linux market and including the snapper tool to manage Btrfs snapshots. The most current service pack, SP 4, was released on 17 July 2015. ;SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 12 On 28 October 2014, SUSE (now an independent business unit) released SLED 12 built on openSUSE 13.1. SLED 12 introduced several new technological upgrades, including
systemd, GNOME 3, GRUB 2,
plymouth, and the in-house built wicked wireless network manager. SLED 12 also included further stability and integration with BtrFS. With the transition to GNOME 3, the GNOME Classic Shell, the vanilla GNOME Shell, and a SLE Classic Shell with a design that more closely mimics the slab layout were included. KDE, the default desktop environment in openSUSE, and support for 32-bit x86 processors were dropped from the enterprise distribution. SLE 12 Service Pack 1 was the first to be the basis for openSUSE's more conservative Leap series, with openSUSE Leap 42.1 sharing its codebase with SLE 12 SP1. Leap 42.2 and 42.3 were built from the same codebase as SLE 12 SP2 and SLE SP3 respectively. SLED 12's underlying base, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12, was the first version of SLE to be offered on the Microsoft Store to be run on the
Windows Subsystem for Linux. ;SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 15 SLE skipped over versions 13 and 14, realigning the versions of openSUSE Leap and SLE at version 15. SLE 15 was released on 25 June 2018 with the same codebase as openSUSE Leap 15.0. SLED 15 included major upgrades to GNOME 3.26, LibreOffice 6.0, GCC 7 and LTS kernel version 4.12. Version 15 also made the
Wayland implementation of GNOME the default. SLES and SLED can now also be installed from the same media. SLED 15 offers the same GNOME Desktop options as SLED 12. SLE 15 SP1 shares a common codebase with openSUSE Leap 15.1. SLE 15 SP 1 includes improvements to the ability to migrate from openSUSE Leap to SLE, increased 64-bit Arm System on a Chip (SoC) supported processor options, transactional updates, and various other features. SLE 15 SP3 features a unified repository with same source code and binary packages with openSUSE Leap 15.3.
People Novell's effort on SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 was led by
Nat Friedman, one of the two founders of
Ximian. Nat was aided by a host of former Ximian and
SUSE developers, with product manager
Guy Lunardi and engineering manager
Kelli Frame.
Derivatives Through SUSE Studio Express, users can create custom appliances based on SUSE Linux Distributions including SLED. Options for SLE allow for the creation of derivative distributions as custom Kiwi and docker containers with customized package choices and configuration parameters. ==Administrative tools==