Today we have a survey, jointly sponsored by Novell and Microsoft (nowadays that's quite common), to measure how customers feel about interoperability between vendors. That's taken to mean that the same percentage approve of the entire deal which Novell struck with Microsoft on November 2.

The questions put to the customers do not include any mention of the fallout of the patent aspect of the deal, the aspect which has raised the most questions. But then why would you raise such hairy issues? The figures would probably get skewed. Bear in mind, this is a survey of just 201 so-called IT decision makers.  There's a margin of error of nearly six percent.

Surveys are so discredited these days, especially when tech companies are involved, that few people pay attention to them anymore. It's pretty easy to obtain the results you want by asking the right questions. The glass can be half-full or half-empty, it all depends on the queries.

As expected, the survey comes out with glowing endorsement of the deal - the customers surveyed overwhemlmingly approve of the deal, believing it will "benefit IT customers and increase interoperability of IT systems." The rest of the results are here - not that they are news, they are all as expected.