High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Ximian was a company that provided free software desktop applications for Linux and Unix based on the GNOME platform. Ximian (previously called Helix Code, and originally announced as International Gnome Support) was founded by Miguel de Icaza and Nat Friedman in October, 1999, and was bought by Novell on August 4, 2003. Novell intended to continue and extend development of Ximian`s original projects, while adding support for its own GroupWise and ZENworks software.