the company I work for is so mind set on Novell that they feel no other server operating system will ever be intergrated with there precious Novell 6.0 sometimes I feel like I'm spinning my wheels learning Linux & Samba and should dump it all for Novell training Ive learned so much from Linux that I'm at a turning point, does Novell stand a chance down the road
so many forums have Linux vs NT but none i've seen on Novell vs Linux
any thoughts or opinions

I'm in the excact same boat you are. I just started like 6 months ago as the only admin (or tech. at all) with a company who loves novell, even though i don't know anything about it. Over the past month or 2 I've been trying to talk my boss into linux which he hadn't even heard of until i mentioned it to him for the 3rd time (he ignored me about it the first 2 times). Well, luckily he told me when i started that he wanted to bring our web server in-house eventually so, when code red was going around i proposed apache on a linux box (he was thinking about IIS before), so that was pretty easy to talk him into. Then a couple weeks ago our sonicwall firewall broke, so I talked him into letting me put together a linux firewall on one of our old workstations. Well, as for your actual question of where novell is on the market, from what i can tell its slowly fading. In all logical purposes I don't see any advantage that novell has to any other network is in large enviroments like hospitals and schools where, its centralized NDS system can really shine.

Also i've actually been asking some people the same question lately, but the only answer i ever get is that its good for a File Server which i don't really understand how it has any better qualities than anything else. Only thing i can think of is a file server would be that it runs safer and more secure than NT and yet is set up nearly as easy as NT, whereas with linux it may be just as secure, but more difficult to set up?

My opinion is that novell won't have a WHOLE lot of a future shortly. I live int the same town as them (Provo, UT) and it's sad. They are still above water, but with the advent of NW 6, I don't see a lot of room for them to grow as a company. They are on the downhill, IMHO.
As for Linux vs. Netware - it's a nobrainer. Not as much as M$ vs. Linux however. Novell is a very stable NOS; security-wise, it may be close (some would argue that netware is more secure due to less popular exploits and public exposure). Capabilities-wise however, Linux takes the cake. You can do far more with your linux box than you can with your novell application server. NDS is the one area where NW rules however; even MS's precious active directory falls far short. Given 5 years to mature and build on it, I believe the OSS community will bring open-ldap into the forefront of Directory services and then will come the end of Netware as we know it.
As a prediction; 10 years from now, Netware will be spoken of as OS/2 is today, and Linux will still be carrying the torch for NOSes around the world.

I wouldn't say it's black or white. Every NOS has it's strong sides and it's weaker sides.
I think that we will see more complex networks where there are more than one NOS, each taking care of it's specialties.
Linux is fast and reliably as a web server for instance while Novell is good at user handling and file right due to NDS and it's extensive rights. Using object oriented user handling also give you more control of users and administrative task delegated to others.