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Open Source Microsoft

Microsoft President: We Were 'On the Wrong Side of History' About Open Source (phoronix.com) 148

In 2001, Slashdot covered Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's description of Linux as "a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches."

This week during a chat with MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab, Microsoft's current president Brad Smith admitted that "Microsoft was on the wrong side of history when open-source exploded at the beginning of the century." "And I can say that about me personally. The good news is that, if life is long enough, you can learn...that you need to change.

"Today, Microsoft is the single largest contributor to open-source projects in the world when it comes to businesses. When we look at GitHub, we see it as the home for open-source development, and we see our responsibility as its steward to make it a secure, productive home for [developers]."

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Microsoft President: We Were 'On the Wrong Side of History' About Open Source

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  • OK (Score:5, Interesting)

    by phantomfive ( 622387 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @03:47PM (#60071180) Journal
    Time to open source Windows.
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by LifesABeach ( 234436 )
      Actually, we're past that point. Open Source File Managers can read MS files. I think we are looking at relevance now. PC Desktops are fading, fast. My phone, and tablet have the horse power to do what needs to be done. As speed increases Hierarchical Data is dominating Relational Data. I have time for the likes of those that champion obsolete technologies.
      • As speed increases Hierarchical Data is dominating Relational Data

        What

        • XML structures are rapidly gaining ground over Table structures. A quirky example are the data driven tree structures.
          • They're being used more than they previously were, but I think that just coincides with the need to pass more complex data around (particularly over the internet) and that XML is a convenient form for doing that because it's easy to interface with. However that doesn't mean that it's the correct to use in all circumstances any more than using a relational approach is. Any carpenter would tell you that trying to do everything with a single tool is folly. There's also nothing prohibiting an RDBMS itself or th
      • Re:OK (Score:5, Insightful)

        by garett_spencley ( 193892 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @04:16PM (#60071320) Journal

        Different tools for different jobs.

        While my smart phone is more powerful than the desktops I was programming on at the turn of the century, I still wouldn't want to write code on a smart phone. Even if I could connect a monitor and keyboard.

        Lots of developers use laptops these days for portability, and these days I get to do a side by side comparison since I'm working from home and have my own gear in addition to a company issued laptop. The hardware specs of both my desktop/workstation and laptop are similar but I prefer the desktop for work. Here's why:

        I can open up my desktop and continuously upgrade any component within far easier than I can my laptop. Yes, you can swap out laptop hard disks and RAM - but that's about it. With my PC I can upgrade the motherboard if I need, the power supply, I can install many more disk drives if I need to (and I do - and have).

        Cooling is also much better on my PC. My laptop fan spins up every time I compile. It's annoying.

        And since I work from home I don't need the portability that a laptop offers. I like having a dedicated home office with a nice chair and a desk that puts me in "work mode."

        Gamers also still tend to prefer PCs.

        That said - there are definitely situations where a phone or a tablet is the right tool for the job. And us "power users" are going to become the minority. That's OK. Just don't call PCs "obsolete."

        • Re:OK (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Strider- ( 39683 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @05:21PM (#60071496)

          You're definitely in the minority these days. As I've gotten older, I've realized that I really don't want to screw around with computers in my spare time. I do complex systems for work, but at home I'm down to Synology NAS, a MacBook pro, and an Asus router. This coming from someone who had a linux box that had been continuously upgraded for over 20 years. I've still got my home directory living on the NAS, but it's mostly there for the sake of nostalgia.

          Why? because the last thing I want to do when I'm at home is screw around with computers. I'd rather work on my sailboat, head to the park, read a book, or play with my niece and nephew.

          • It sounds like the degree of 'screwing around with your computer' that you did at home never involved much more than a phillips screwdriver.

            It's okay to be the software guy who knew how to screw together commodity hardware. It's also okay to be a slightly less involved version of that guy.

          • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

            by Anonymous Coward

            So hes in the minority because he wants to screw around with his computer but youre in the majority when you want to screw around with your boat? Also if you can screw around with your boat and do all the other things why cant he screw around with his computer and still do the other things you named. Seems like youre in no more of the minority/majority than he is.

        • Servers not desktops.

          A server for main work. Offloading basic things, like browsing,to tablets and laptops, and use laptops as smart terminals.

      • by Sique ( 173459 )
        The only reason why hierarchical data is feasible for many tasks is that you can keep large chunks of it in memory. Hierarchical data is only fast during storage and sequential reading with known paths. If you don't need data very often, if your database fits completely in RAM, and if it is okay to wait some time until a search without a given path is completed, hierarchical data is the way to go. For anything else, you need to invest during storage to reap the fruits later.
    • Re:OK (Score:4, Funny)

      by bobby ( 109046 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @04:09PM (#60071280)

      Nobody wants to see that. Oh the humanity!

    • by xack ( 5304745 )
      I think they should at least remove the activation keys for unsupported versions of Windows and provide a trade in program for people stuck with Windows Phones.
      • by xack ( 5304745 )
        Now that they use Chromium for Edge they should open source the old IE/Edge code for historical preservation and to help developers reverse engineer IE only web pages so they can be modernized. A TLS 1.3 stack for old IE will also help a long way.
        • by Merk42 ( 1906718 )

          Now that they use Chromium for Edge they should open source the old IE/Edge code for historical preservation and to help developers reverse engineer IE only web pages so they can be modernized. A TLS 1.3 stack for old IE will also help a long way.

          If the companies who required those IE only web pages could afford to moderinze them, then there wouldn't be a need for IE regardless of its engine.

    • Re: (Score:2, Flamebait)

      by thegarbz ( 1787294 )

      Time to open source Windows.

      Nope, doesn't work like that. The result of doing so is an IP clusterfuck. It won't ever happen. You may get specific parts of the OS open sourced just like specific tools and software from Microsoft is going open source, but in any case your black and white thinking is stupid. You can acknowledge that open source is not actually a cancer while still releasing proprietary code. The two ideologies are not mutually exclusive.

      • Oh yeah? Any patent as old as Windows is expired by now.
        • Oh yeah? Any patent as old as Windows is expired by now.

          What a stupid comment. Windows is a current product with current technologies and current IP in it. Sure the original patents may have expired, then be specific and ask for Open sourcing Windows 3.1 instead of "Windows".

          • Really, does MS Windows have any patents protecting it ? Name me 1 MS Windows patent.

            MS Windows was one of the last OSes to use a GUI interface. Prior art from Xerox and others will prevent any patent on the windowing system from being patentable.

          • Which patents do you think are covering current Windows "technologies"? I think you're pretending to know rather than actually thinking about it.
      • Wrong. It can work like that, don't make excuses for them. Microsoft has the means to open all IP. Other better and more complex operating systems were open sourced, nothing special about Microsoft's.

        • Wrong. It can work like that, don't make excuses for them.

          I'm not making excuses for them. I'm calling out directly a stupid comment that ignores the reality of idology.

          Other better and more complex operating systems were open sourced, nothing special about Microsoft's.

          Complexity and IP are two different things. The open source world should understand this more than anything given the insane amount of effort that is actually gone into circumventing IP law, and the many lawsuits that have both made and sunk companies in the process. Just open sourcing Windows won't be possible. There would need to be a very long and very active development and legal process to do

        • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward

          You've no idea what the fuck you're talking about. No, Microsoft doesn't have the means to open all IP. There are proprietary elements in the OS they have licensed for which they have no capacity to open the source code for.

          Furthermore, even if they rewrite the elements they've licensed, they still risk IP infringement suits because it's legally very difficult for them to claim clean room implementations when they've had access to licensed code.

          If they want to produce an open source OS, much like with .NET

    • by Greyfox ( 87712 )
      Yeah, problem is anyone who actually reads the windows source without proper preparation has their face melt like that Indiana Jones movie. Best they just keep a lid on it.

      I kid, I kid. In actuality, the problem is that anyone reading the source would quickly realize that just because someone is paid to develop software doesn't mean they crap unicorns and fairies. You see, normal people like to assume that the people who write their software are somewhat competent. So there's a tendency to, for example, a

      • by DeBaas ( 470886 )

        Now... aah, I see you looking at open source over there. Stop looking at open source. Open source isn't going to help you here! Because it also turns that that even though the open source guys say their code is more secure because it has more eyes on it, there are no eyes on it. There are millions of lines of open source code out there. Do you know how many have been audited for security? I'm thinking of a number that rhymes with schmero. No one's paying for that, so no one's doing that. And yes, it's probably slighty more than zero audited lines, but if you divide the number of lines that no one's ever looked at by the ones that someone has, it's close enough to be a rounding error.

        Even if it were true no one looks a the code, just the fact that it is open will make developers pay more attention at their code. That's just human nature. When you know others can see your stuff means for most people they'll take better care.
        There were stories of commercial software that were open sourced that first needed to be sanitized for all the profanity in it.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Xylantiel ( 177496 )

      I see Embrace, Extend, Extinguish is alive and well. The dark side is strong with this president.

      My university just transitioned us into MS Exchange in the cloud, in the process declaring Outlook as the ONLY supported email client. In the process I found out that the OAuth2 standard is a standard in a similar way that "Office Open XML" (docx) is a standard... having just enough vendor-defined pieces to not actually be standard while allowing MS to pretend they are being open.

      Software openness is getting

      • I found out that the OAuth2 standard is a standard in a similar way that "Office Open XML" (docx) is a standard

        No, it's much worse. OAuth2 is more like a design pattern.

    • Maybe time for a MS Linux?
  • by blahplusplus ( 757119 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @03:52PM (#60071198)

    ... the public ate all the drm technologies and the PC is headed towards permanent lockdown with windows 10 given all the "fake platforms" like steam, uplay, origin, etc. Can only exist in a world of mass tech illiteracy.

    To think Microsoft and the tech industry had to do is wait for the general public to get internet to take over our machines since the average consumer is illiterate when it comes to technology.

    Microsoft and hardware companies are co-operating to lock down the PC, future cpu's won't be able to run/load windows 7/8, they will starve past versions of windows of any drivers for hardware. All new videocards for instance only have windows 10 drivers.

    https://www.computerworld.com/... [computerworld.com]

    Industries Plan to lock down the internet and the PC.

    https://tifca.com/wp-content/u... [tifca.com]

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      If that was the plan then Microsoft would have locked down the PC platform a decade ago.

      They actually did a lot for securing PCs and didn't abuse it. They are not the Microsoft of old.

      On the other hand you are right about acceptance, look how popular iPhones are.

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        If that was the plan then Microsoft would have locked down the PC platform a decade ago.

        Mass internet penetration and capable MOBILE phones didn't exist a decade ago, have you seen the profits on mobile and the app stores like google play/apple/amazon? (Aka a completely locked down devices on smartphones?)

        https://ibb.co/jkDrczb [ibb.co]

        This is why they are in a madd rush to kill "local applications" the internet has reached sufficient global penetration.

        Not only that the gaming public literally bought stolen games with mmo's, mmo's were you literally buying the same RPG but with with A CD/DVD missing

        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          Microsoft abandoned mobile. And what does it have to do with their open source stuff or locking down the PC platform.

        • by Kjella ( 173770 )

          Not only that the gaming public literally bought stolen games with mmo's, mmo's were you literally buying the same RPG but with with A CD/DVD missing contianing the "play disc" (aka the server exe they didn't give you) to play the game, what did you think mmo's were?

          Fancier MUDs? Online-only games have been a thing since you could get eaten by a grue. Yes, I hated it when they applied it to single player games and LAN-size offline multiplayer went away, but offline MMORPGs never made any sense to me. Having a huge community is the point of the game.

      • by Jerry ( 6400 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @06:29PM (#60071700)
        I would agree with the Microsoft of the present not being like the MS of old. I have been programming since 1959, when I learned how to use the IBM 540 gangpunch and the 402 Tabulator at a business school. Then it was on to collage and grad school, where I picked up Fortran IV. Eventually I started my own computer consulting business and used a variety of languages, beginning with Apple's UCSD Pascal and Borland's Turbo Pascal 3.02A, PowerBuilder, Visual FoxPro and finally culminating with the Qt API in 2004 till 2008, when I retired. I thought I would spend my retirement writing software that I wanted to write, not what I was paid to write. Since retiring I haven't written a line of code because I spent my time fishing and playing Minecraft with my grandsons. When MS bought Minecraft I thought they would wrap it in chains and lock out the java version. Instead, they have significantly improved both the Java and bedrock version, and joined with Nvidia to make an outstanding RTX version, soon to be released. When MS bought GitHub I thought it would be the end of open source on that platform, but it was not. MS is, apparently, not going the route that Apple took tricking FOSS developers and then locking up the code they wrote. I hope they continue down the path they are now walking and don't make FOSS merely a mask they wore to deceive consumers.
        • MS is, apparently, not going the route that Apple took tricking FOSS developers and then locking up the code they wrote. I hope they continue down the path they are now walking and don't make FOSS merely a mask they wore to deceive consumers.

          How naive you are young padawan (I know you're not young but it still sounds cool), if that was true they wouldn't have made all their games with UWP which is literally dishonestly coded binaries. Their long term strategy is to push encrypted apps inside vm's so you don't get honest binaries.

          For the last 20 years we've lost modding and dedicated servers inside PC games, and F2P/MMO games are just literally stolen AAA games that would have been fully boxed product pre-internet. They want to push in game

          • by cusco ( 717999 )

            look at how Windows 10 is using active directory to control access to your filesystem.

            No idea what AD has to do with gaming, but securing and controlling access to resources is the whole POINT of Active Directory. Active Directory and NTFS ensured Microsoft's domination of corporate and government computing for the next two decades.

            • look at how Windows 10 is using active directory to control access to your filesystem.

              No idea what AD has to do with gaming, but securing and controlling access to resources is the whole POINT of Active Directory. Active Directory and NTFS ensured Microsoft's domination of corporate and government computing for the next two decades.

              Sigh, they want to prevent people from copying files, they are trying to move to a model where the file system and the power of the machine to go against their corporate policies is not exposed like mobile, that mean's preserving old software becomes a nightmare because it's inside encrypted binaries. Modding old software and games becomes madly difficult unless you have a PHD in math and can reverse engineer encrypted binaries. Things like DOSBOX and running old apps become a thing of the past. They wan

          • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

            For the last 20 years we've lost modding and dedicated servers inside PC games, and F2P/MMO games are just literally stolen AAA games that would have been fully boxed product pre-internet.

            Yeah, because the fact that the PC market has suffered immense piracy and the rise of console money had absolutely nothing to do with it.

            PCs were open. They were great sources for people to pirate games - even the industry was warning that the PC market was one where 90% piracy rate was unsustainable. The rise of the PS2

            • Yeah, because the fact that the PC market has suffered immense piracy and the rise of console money had absolutely nothing to do with it.

              You don't seem to grasp the game industry started stealing games and undermining game ownership by rebadging RPG's mmo's in 1997, aka they conned the public out of game ownership, then valve hacked half-life/cs in 2004. So don't give me this shit the industry is full of honest guys trying to make a buck. Without the internet they'd be forced to give us honestly coded games like quake 3 with dedicated servers and level editors. The are just using the internet to defraud gamers because they know their cu

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Open source doesn't matter at this point...

      Hogwash. You make some good points elsewhere in your post, but your headline is just that, hogwash.

    • You would be hard pressed to find anything I have ever said good about MS on slashdot. That said, I think asp.net is fantastic for knocking out database CRUD, especially for the lone developer. Everything I have looked at takes a ton of more code to output the same data. Yeah, the other stuff might be better for large companies, but for custom database crap done quickly, I actually think Microsoft did an excellent job with asp.net. And it scales to work with the ton of code to produce the same crap, if that

    • Remember Ken Olsen from DEC also called Unix "snake oil", and then not long after ended up having to support and sell it. It's a history of companies hoping you stick with their complicated systems with vendor lock-in, and avoid the more simple simple solutions with multiple sources.

      • by cusco ( 717999 )

        Except DEC and VMS actually were superior to almost anything else out there at the time. Greatest technology in the industry, but the worst salescritters in ANY industry.

    • You're using the wrong terminology. Your complaint is that Free Software doesn't matter at this point, not that Open Source doesn't matter at this point. Open source is hugely influential and has basically won, with respect to any broadly-adopted technology (there are some exceptions, of course). Free Software, with its goal of enabling users to control their own computers, has been less successful. I don't agree that it's completely dead, though, nor that it will ever die. It's just a niche and will sta

    • by cusco ( 717999 )

      Can only exist in a world of mass tech illiteracy.

      That describes the vast majority of humanity since "tech" consisted of fire and sharp rocks..

  • Oh cut the shit (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 17, 2020 @03:56PM (#60071218)

    With all that self-reflecting crap and just follow the money. Back then MS had a comfortable stranglehold on all desktop and recurring corporate licensing revenue for OS and office software because they have always been primarily a legal+marketing company. Now that it's been loosened over the last 20 years they need to try embracing and extending open source to secure those revenue streams in the future.

    Which is perfectly fine because they are a public company and must generate profit for the owners (shareholders). Just don't go spouting all that mealy mouth feelgood garbage...it was simply a business decision.

  • Court's public documents shows Microsoft to be a pack of Liers, Cheats, and Thieves; sited references are easily found using Google "Microsoft Court". Basically, Linux solves problems; my customers demand results, and do not have time for PR Word Games. But other than that, Microsoft is OK.
  • by innocent_white_lamb ( 151825 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @04:11PM (#60071284)

    I haven't seen the part where they apologize for their fud and for backing SCO and for hijacking the XML standard committee and... the list goes on.

    "We were on the wrong side of history." Yeah, that's pretty obvious, but where's the rest of it. The part where they apologize and do all they can to make it up to the community seems to be missing.

  • Is Microsoft also admitting that the way they manipulated ISO for the OOXML "standard" was unethical?
  • by carlmenezes ( 204187 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @04:25PM (#60071356) Homepage
    The Microsoft I trust will do this: 1. Have an excellent cross platform code editor (in progress - VSCode is really good) that doesn't expect you to buy an enterprise license for Code Coverage (Visual Studio - looking at you) 2. Be standards compliant in all of their stacks (none of that embrace, extend, extinguish crap) 3. Have Windows run on the Linux kernel and make it open source 4. Champion a single open standard for Office style apps - an open standard for documents, spreadsheets and presentations at the minmum - I don't care if the office apps themselves are closed source as long as they are 100% standards compliant. It is time Microsoft gave people a means to keep their data portable.
    • 1. Have an excellent cross platform code editor (in progress - VSCode is really good)

      I don't understand why people think VSCode is good. It's not as good as any IDE.

  • who's capable of making a mistake.
    • (Not nice to see your ellipses symbols elided without warning by the comments-system. Using full-stops instead, it was supposed to be: Nice to see a president... ...who's capable of making a mistake.
  • Balmer came on a stage shouting developers! developers! developers!

    Microsoft was always good at making tools for developers. Especially after they more or less took over Borland after having sucked up all important employees into their .NET team.

    It's time for Microsoft to make Visual Studio open source. And by that I mean not just Visual Studio Code or Community or whatever. The whole thing. Open Source it.

    Also. Port Visual Studio to run on Linux. Or allow contributions to adapt it that way.

  • Thanks to his mismanagement, bad choices and inappropriate phrases, Steve Ballmer did a lot for open source (unintentionally).
  • I know better than to trust a damn thing M$ says or does.
  • by Your Average Joe ( 303066 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @06:31PM (#60071704)

    I do not belie them for a moment. They are only using it because Opensource is popular.

    Windows 10 and Samba compatibility are accidents just waiting to happen. Samba team cannot even get SYSVOL replication working. DFS from server 2003, yep too hard and never reverse engineered. After 2008r2 DFS-R is the default method of replicating the SYSVOL and SAMBA as well cannot deal with that. Domain trusts? Multiple domains? Integrated DNS? MIT Kerberos? Federation services? Rename a SAMBA domain? SMB 3.0/3.0.2/3.1.1? Support for Windows 2016 domain controllers? Support for Windows 2016 domain controllers? Permission issues requiring a sysvolreset of the ACL's?

    100% mess so Microsoft can require CALs and keep all the AD servers running Windows...

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @06:32PM (#60071710)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • He misspoke. He actually meant to say, "Microsoft President: We Are ... "

    Don't be fooled -- it's still M$, just with a prettier face.
  • by Z80a ( 971949 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @07:16PM (#60071840)

    Only two sides of the history

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @07:54PM (#60071924)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • by drolli ( 522659 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @08:08PM (#60071960) Journal

    Ok, now we understood how to earn money with it.

  • GPL with their campaign.
  • "Today, Microsoft is the single largest contributor to open-source projects in the world when it comes to businesses"

    It's not true. It's whitespace, which is the single largest contributor to open-source. Open-source would be unthinkable without it. Nobody would want to read open-source if it wasn't for it.

  • by higuita ( 129722 ) on Sunday May 17, 2020 @10:10PM (#60072220) Homepage

    All their "open source love" is just for fighting back on places where they already lost: server, development, programming languages, bad name, cloud, browser, patents

    -server, they try hard to support linux inside windows, run docker so they don't bleed more windows server salves
    -development: linux is full of awesome tools and windows development was being dropped in all places but big companies that already had their windows development process and were too inflexible to change. Running linux inside windows, porting all those tools to windows make some migrations void of reason
    - programing languages: java, python, ruby, node, etc all those have a huge open source base and people used it instead of the MS C#. by finally trying to open source more the C# (but still keep a close control over it), it tried to be a better option for developers
    - bad name: fighting open source was a huge battle that was giving MS a bad name, every time someone talked about MS with people that know/use open source, those people would rejected it quickly. That was ok for MS 15 years ago, but now those young people have management roles and they were getting the door closed in a unexpected way. Even internally this bad name was causing problem, people leaving the company had to explain that it was not their fault when applying to new jobs.
    - cloud: MS gets now more money from cloud and linux than from their windows and office sales. Ignoring the linux market was a huge problem in selling the cloud
    -browser: yes, after the IE6 being pushed so hard and being a so inferior product, people stopped using ANY IE unless they were forced to... Renaming it to EDGE didn't solved the problem, people really only use IE because they are forced by ancient enterprise sites or because they are way too clueless. So MS gave up and now use chromium source code... not because they love open source, but because edge was a waste of resources, the battle for the internet was already lost
    -patents: they for years tried to attack open source with patents, but almost all of then were workaround... the only one that gave more problems was the FAT long names patent, but smartphone builders really didn't care much and preferred to pay and ignore the problem. in the other side, MS was being hit by many patents trolls, where their patents were useless as they didn't had any product, they could not fight back. On the other side, they were using open source tools now and some had patents from other companies, that allow open source usage... so MS to be able to use then safely, decided it was finally time to drop the patent war and join the OIN... not because of love, just a way to turn a useless thing in to marketing campaign and get access to more patents

    But all this is not open source love, it is "if you cant beat then, join then!". Now for markets where MS is still strong, they do not really care about open source.
    - Office, they still have a broken ODF implementation, so people use their semi-open office formats... if open source is good, using a standard office format would be the first step
    - games: DirectX is still sold as the better way to get games working, where directx 12 and vulkan are really mostly the same. They try to pull down vulkan for no reason, where vulkan is a open standard and all directx (direct3d really, as directx is dead years ago) is a closed API. They can say that games take years to change, but if they love open source, they must drop closed formats and APIs and use the open source ones
    - Windows: yes you can run linux programs inside windows now... how about the reverse? running windows programs in linux? if they love open source, why not commit to some official windows to linux translation libs to support that. Wine is really reverse engineering, MS could help if they really love open source.
    - Several server stacks, like AD, exchange and several others, many aren't even good, but enterprises do buy then because is what MS certifications sell to the people that are required to take then to try to

    • by Kjella ( 173770 )

      All their "open source love" is just for fighting back on places where they already lost: server, development, programming languages, bad name, cloud, browser, patents (...) But all this is not open source love, it is "if you cant beat then, join then!". Now for markets where MS is still strong, they do not really care about open source.

      Yeah. The good thing is there's usually more failing companies than succeeding companies. So if they help us build open platfoms where they fail, I'm okay with that... I don't think any company is ever really on the customer's side anyway. It's not how profit driven companies work.

    • But all this is not open source love, it is "if you cant beat then, join then!"

      It reminds me of the saying "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."

      Nice write-up by the way, it was a good read. Thanks!

  • They still are on the wrong side.

  • Microsoft is the single largest contributor to open-source projects in the world

    Any proof about this statement? They have a lot of contributors to their own Open Source projects as visible on GitHub. But GitHub is hardly the Open Source universe. Does MS also contribute to open source projects which they do not own, or have a direct stake in (e.g. Linux patches for their hypervisor).
    I don't recall seeing any Microsoft backed Apache projects.

  • You people remain on the wrong side of history, and will probably stay there for as long as you exist.
  • Fuck off.

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