Novell, which contrary to public opinion took a serious hit the other day when a federal appeals court threw its ownership of Unix - and its ability to silence SCO - back to a jury to decide, earned five cents a share or $16.7 million on revenues down 12% to $216.1 million in the July quarter.

Thanks to cost cuts its earning picture, as expected, improved over last year when the company lost $15 million, or four cents a share, but its revenue performance was another matter. Wall Street expected it to do $216.6 million.

Red Hat, Novell's competition, has maintained that the recession is good for open source companies. Obviously it hasn't exactly been a tonic for Novell. CEO Ron Hovsepian said, "revenue performance was similar to many companies in the software industry."

The company saw $40 million in product revenue from Open Platform Solutions, $38 million of which came from Linux, up 22% year-over-year, the brightest part of its business.

Product revenue from Identity and Security Management was $30 million, with Identity, Access and Compliance Management representing $28 million, down 16%. Product revenue from Systems and Resource Management was $40 million, down 15%. Workgroup product revenue of $81 million dropped 12%.

The company continues to chase long-term revenue growth.

It has $921 million in the bank, down from $1 billion after retiring outstanding convertible debentures. Total deferred revenue was $674 million at the end of July, down from $726 million last year.

Cash flow was a perkier $35 million than last year's $29 million.