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Mono Unimplementable?
Prior Restraint writes "According to this ZDNet article, Tony Goodhew, a Microsoft program manager, implies that MS will license C# in such a way that Ximian won't be able to implement the ECMA standard." This comes on the heels of Ximian's announcement of working on .Net aka Mono [?] .
No, Hemos, he doesn't imply that. You infer that.
Most standards bodies will not accept anything patented as a standard unless the holder of the patent agrees to license for a small fee all their patents for this purpose.
It is extreamly common to use something patented in a standard, the owner of the patent just has a standard contract that anyone can agree to: for $x (often $10,000 so it is out of most open source pockets, but cheap for a company) your company can use the foloowing patents in any product as nessicary to impliment y. For instance you would license 8b10b encoding from IBM for fibre channel, but you would not have the right to use 8b10b on your own bus, only in your interface to fibre channel.
There are a couple RFCs which are legal agreement that anyone can as no charge use some patent for IP, so long as you follow some restrictions.
Any standards body that would let Microsoft keep open source out with patent games isn't a real standards body. Most members of technical standards bodies I know of (Members themselves, not the company they represent) are open source aware and pay some attention to these issues.
What this is really about is Microsoft's continued campaign against the GPL. All they are saying is that if there is a GPL'd .NET implementation out there, it may not be legal to mix it with Microsoft's proprietary .NET applications.
It's actually an issue that has been debated on gnu.misc.discuss for quite some time. In particular, the question as to whether distributed computing really expands the impact of the GPL or makes it pointless.
sigs are a waste of space
Why does the summary mention C#, when the article doesn't mention it or any other programming language? Is the submitter interpolating with no basis, or did he read a different article than the one linked to?
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The problem with Sun's Java as a platform strategy is two fold. First of all, as you point out in your post, Java is not a *free* language. The standard is completely controlled by Sun, and there are no free (as in free speech) implementations that have all of the features of Sun's version.
The second problem is slightly larger. Java is a nifty platform, but unfortunately it requires that you do all of your programming in Java the language. Microsoft's .NET allows you to pick and choose your language, and it has (supposedly, I haven't actually checked) included support for a wide array of languages. Java, as a platform, really only supports two languages: Java and Jython (and Jython isn't officially supported).
Of course, if you are a Java programmer you probably think that this is well and good, but most programmers are not Java programmers.
Not a competitor, but a replacement. Something that eliminates the bottleneck that Passport intends to become. Centralized controls are a danger. If two competing standards are each trying to be a centralized control, this doesn't eliminate the danger, it merely postpones it. The real answer is to design something that replicates the service provided without creating a central control point.
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
A fully-functioning (ahem) Linux can be compressed down and fit on a floppy disk. (Can you say, Linux Router Project? tomsrtbt? hal91? A full-out Red Hat system with Apache, Samba, NFS tools, Linuxconf-web, IDE-RAID, and all the dependencies for all that stuff, is only 72MB worth of disk fully expanded. Absolutely-fscking-minimal Win95, I mean, just enough to boot the system, is 102MB (IIRC, plus or minus a meg or two), forget about anything useful like a browser or an editor fancier than Notepad. And NT is bigger than that, by how many orders of magnitude, I don't know, when I left that job I quit using Windows for keeps.
NT is too big and too tightly coupled by far for any one man to keep all the twisty relationships between his ears, is Linus' point. There are at least two people on the planet (Linus and Alan) who can keep the Linux kernel between their ears; I don't doubt that Miguel could do the same thing if he tried... but then Miguel's celebrity points up precisely the major flaw in the whole Windows design package: We never tried to integrate the GUI into the OS. (One notices that the folks in Cupertino have realized the error of their ways...) Such strategy produces an extreme case of bloat which is difficult at best to get rid of... much less manage the code for.
The setting: Early 1999, a documents convention in Atlanta (all about printers and scanners and signature verification technology, etc...). On the stage, left to right, are Linus, a senior Microsoft marketroid, Maddog, and a Wall Street analyst. The Microsoft guy was running off at the mouth about all the huge labs they have in Redmond, where they can replicate any problem known to man. Linus jumps into the fray with a case involving the U.S. Post Office. (Those little barcodes you get on the bottom of all your envelopes? Those barcodes are put there by printers powered by Linux. Only thing that would run that reliably and had good vendor support.) It seems USPS was having a performance problem. They called Red Hat. Red Hat looked at it. They scratched their heads, and forwarded it to Linus. Linus looked at it, scratched his head, vi'ed a couple files, had an "aha" moment (discovered a race condition), tappity, tappity, tappity, compile, init 6, diff-pipe-mail, problem solved. Total turnaround time for USPS, 48 hours.
Then he delivered the zinger.
There was dead silence in the room, and I've never seen anyone look quite so uncomfortable as that Microsoft marketroid sitting there in the spotlight between the two most vocal penguinheads on the planet....I must admit, though, it's fun to see other folks catching on to Linus' PR methods...
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I'd rather listen to [Sir Isaac] Newton than to [Microsoft's VP Craig] Mundie. He may have been dead for almost three hundred years, but despite that he stinks up the room less.
-- Linus
From the ZDNet article: Miguel de Icaza, Mono's founder, said, "The consensus is that [Microsoft] could stop someone from implementing the specs by using patents. [But] nothing in dot-Net is really innovative, so it would be simple to use alternative non-patented approaches."
I'm sure that Miguel understands the technical issues involved here far better than I do, but the more I hear about this whole Ximian/Microsoft interaction, the more it looks to me like Ximian is a skilled but naive bunch of American Indians being offered a sweet deal on some really nice beads.
Whatever "assistance" Microsoft is offering to Mono, they're not doing for altruistic reasons. I don't trust them.
My favorite quote from the article
nothing in dot-Net is really innovative, so it would be simple to use alternative non-patented approaches.
Doesn't that cover all M$ products?
http://Lenny.com
"Yes, Java can do most of what .NET will do. However, with .NET it all comes in one attractive package all ready to go. And it will support more than one language."
.NET does nto support any language except C#. Any other language will have to be seriously bastardised to work on the CLR including giving up some serious functionality like multiple inheretance. NONE of your C, C++, VB, or Java apps will run on it without a very serious rewrite. In fact it will never support JAVA or any other language which MS deems a competitor.
Somehow I would seriously doubt it will come in one package. If it's like any other MS product it will come in an insane array dependencies. When I installed the SOAP toolkit I had to upgrade IE to 5.5 and had to download pathched msxml3.dll set too. Just to be able to post to a soap server I had to download about 50 megabytes of stuff and not only that I had to install this crap on every PC in the shop which was going to run the code.
As for your second point.
How can you say it will support multiple languages when it does not support the four most popular languages on the planet? Look at VB.NET it looks nothing like VB 6.0 you might as well learn a whole new language (I guess ms is counting on that).
War is necrophilia.
Microsft is saying that if Ximian uses any of Microsoft's code (ie .NET runtime, libraries) then they are going to have licensing issues.
Ximian is saying that they aren't going to use any of this code so there won't be issues.
ZDNet is making the whole thing muddy so they get all the Slashdot effect and sell more advertising.
Note that both Microsoft and Ximian are corret here.
Fear: When you see B8 00 4C CD 21 and know what it means
There is nothing to stop Microsoft from deviating from the ECMA standard they submitted. Just like there was nothing that stopped them from deviating from the ECMA standard from Javascript that they passed. MARK MY WORDS: We will implement it, and they will change it. We can't extend them if they have more users than we do. We'll just end up writing a bunch of software that works on the "official" implementations and not end up being able to use stuff from them. (They will eat us alive this way -- and easily).
.NET. I think that all of the grumbling they are doing now is a bluff and is not serious.
They will LOVE that Linux developers are doing their work for them in pushing
Also, why not work with a standard that doesn't change? Java is here today, and is VERY open about its future direction. Do you think Java is slow? Well. . . how fast do you think IL interpreters will be on Linux for the next 3 years? (not as fast as Java during that time, I guarantee). Java isn't open source? That may be true, but Sun has a reputation for creating open standards if not open source software(NFS, NIS, their hardware spec, etc.) Microsoft doesn't have this reputation and have already screwed around with developers by "standardizing" ECMAscript and then turning around and breaking it. We know Microsoft isn't trustworthy, so we are going to help them and then try to trick them out of their own game???? What????
If we continue to fall for this, we are too stupid to compete with Microsoft. (So we shouldn't even play with them. . . competing with them wasn't the point anyway - the point was serving our own needs with great software).
Err, not really. See:
In an article I read, the MS rep. said that MONO would "probably" have to use MS IP. And, in the situation where MS IP was used, MS would have to look at how they license their IP because the GPL is so scary.
.NET implementation will also be scary.
This is total FUD, because MONO is only implementing the EMCA standard and would never use MS IP to do it. After all, how could you make quality software if you filled it with/based it on crap?
MS is just creating FUD again by saying that the GPL is scary, so thus this Open/Free
ZDNet reports this propaganda like it's fact.
A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices. -- William James
You're confusing two different aspects of .NET: The application environment and the ASP tools.
.NET object model. Despite the source of these components, I am looking forward to being able to use Mono. This half of the .NET project is actually something I am looking forward to.
The Mono project will be implementing the Common Language Environment, C# compiler, and the
The cool part is that I will be able to use the graphical form designers to create the visual parts of my programs and then implement those in any language I choose: since I don't like C# or (ugh) VB, I'll use Python.NET. If necessary though, I can write some parts in C and subclass them from within python; no more worrying about tools like SIP and SWIG which are by nature imperfect since they must be reimplemented for every language pair.
Unfortunately, taking advantage of this would in the past have limited me solely to Windows, which IMHO outweighs all my possible gains. With Mono, however, I will be able to do all of the above in a cross-platform manner. Even if the Mono project does not release a graphical form designer, I can do that part in Windows and develop the rest in Linux, in my favorite programming language. The resulting program will then be able to run anywhere with only a recompilation.
The part you're worried about includes the Hailstorm initiative and other Microsoft muscle-flexing. Mono is not interested in this at all. Rather, the project implementing this half is GNU.Net, which is going to directly compete with Microsoft even as Mono complements it. If you are worried about this, GNU.Net is the project to watch for a Free (in all meanings of the word) replacement for it.
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Friends don't let friends misuse the subjunctive.
"One World, one Web, one Program" - Microsoft promotional ad
The Anti-Blog
> Miguel de Icaza, Mono's founder, said, "The
> consensus is that [Microsoft] could stop someone
> from implementing the specs by using patents.
> [But] nothing in dot-Net is really innovative,
> so it would be simple to use alternative
> non-patented approaches.
No one says "We're gonna screw you, and take over you own architecture, oh, and, you can't innovate either" quite like Miguel.
However, Jan van den Beld, ECMA secretary general, said the licence would cover only Microsoft's own implementation, not the standard itself. "There are no known rights owned by Microsoft that would require a licensing agreement," he said.
Miguel de Icaza, Mono's founder, said, "The consensus is that [Microsoft] could stop someone from implementing the specs by using patents. [But] nothing in dot-Net is really innovative, so it would be simple to use alternative non-patented approaches."
This says nothing about Mono being "unimplementable" as the /. headline questions. It's just Microsoft's implementation of the submitted standard that is in question, which is dealt with in the last sentence of the article quoted above.
AFAIK Microsoft cannot patent a "standard", unless it's one of those unofficial standards that they create through their monopoly.
Of course, that's not to say that Microsoft was stupid by using ECMA. They can claim that C# et al is an open standard while not actually allowing anyone to implement it.
Most likely, Microsoft will withdraw their submission from ECMA. If they do not, people will just implement based on the standards, at which point Microsoft will not be able to sue because the standards are open.
Regardless of what Microsoft does, the open-source folks will go ahead with their implementations of C# et al, even if Microsoft withdraws from the ECMA standards process.
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Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
Alternatively, you could look at this as the Open Source community's attempt to use Microsoft's own "embrace and extend" philosopy against them. Microsoft will be using its considerable resources to push this forward. Whether you like it or not, .NET will probably be a significant technology that we'll be dealing with for a long time to come. If an open-source "variation on the theme" can be created, I'm all for it.
BTW, I've had the opportunity to see Tony Goodhew speak. He's an impressive individual who really seems to know his stuff. While de Icaza and van den Beld seem to be dismissing his warning about licensing problems, I hope that they take the issue seriously.
** The opinions expressed here are my own, and do not reflect those of my employers - past, present, or future**
Think back in history. Think City-State. Think of a heavily fortified city at the cross roads of some very heavily travelled trade routes. .NET is the paving on the roads, while the fortified city is MS-Passport. And to move your goods through Passport, you have to pay a tax. Do you think given that model that billg cares whether he owns the roads or not? I don't think so. If I was in bill's shoes, I'd be all for people building roads to my kingdom.
And so who cares if .NET is proprietary or not? If it's easily available for, or ships with, 90+% of the desktops in the world, what does it matter? All of this Mono hype misses the point: what is really needed is a credible competitor for Passport. Forget .NET. Building a .NET work-alike merely reinforces the MS monopoly. We should really be setting our sites on building a competitor to the Passport services.
Here's the kicker, though. If Ximian releases Mono under the GPL, what happens when you run binaries created by .NET? You wouldn't be able to legally run those on Mono, or at least you couldn't distribute those binaries to Mono users. Basically Ximian has an opportunity to create a version of .NET that is incompatible with non-GPL versions of .NET.
I think Ximian would be shooting itself in the foot by doing so, but there's no reason they can't. It wouldn't benefit Mono users by doing that, but it sure would fracture the .NET community. I'm sure this is the scenario Microsoft wants to avoid. Frankly I think I would see this as being childish on Ximians part if they do release Mono on the GPL. They should keep it under a BSD licence so any program created by any .NEt compiler can run on it.
No, Thursday's out. How about never - is never good for you?
Am I the only one who thinks it would be much smarter for a competitor to use their own technology. MS has alway been a tough competitior, why does Ximian think they will succeed with this? They should be pressuring Sun to GPL Java (would make sence on the heels of recent news about MS abandoning it) and build an architecture based on that. I think that our own Free .NET type implementation (that also runs on Windows) would be a better strategy than trying to play catch up to a Huge multibillion dollar company that controls the market to start with.
Prior Restraint writes "According to this ZDNet article, Tony Goodhew, a Microsoft program manager, implies that MS will license C# in such a way that Ximian won't be able to implement the ECMA standard." This comes on the heels of Ximian's announcement of working on
Maybe I'm missing something, but I'm not sure why one would want to implement .Net without needing to. Sure, the collaborate concepts behind it are great... but if we think Outlook is dangerous now, what does the future bring with the .Net strategy? Lost privacy? Stupid security bugs everywhere? Pay-to-play software?
Similar to the way that Outlook's address book vulnerabilities put at risk everyone with an e-mail address, what are the chances that .Net vulnerabilities will have reprocussions across all Internet services and platforms?
I'm hoping that .Net will finally mobilize the consumer to ditch Windows and get some competition back into the OS field. After all, Microsoft apparently can't even get IIS right, and that sounds a lot less sophisticated than what .Net attempts.
Bobo hates cans.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
A freely implementable standard is a successful standard. Examples are TCP/IP and the PC architecture.
.NET is already well on it's way to becoming a failure as a standard.
However, there are many technologies that never became standards. Remember MicroChannel from IBM? It never succeeded because IBM held the licensing rights.
You can't have it both ways. Either it is freely implementable or you have to pay, whether it is in the form of licensing fees or other restrictions.
If Microsoft want to tightly control implementations, then in my opinion
Surely there must be some real development going on in the free software world that could be covered instead. A Linux-powered robot that recognizes human faces or Sun's study of Gnome usability?
Unsettling MOTD at my ISP.
In the article, ECMA's geral secretary refutes the MS claims. It's probably some lame misunderstanding. And if not, they've dug a nice big hole for themselves.
-- Another senseless waste of fine bytes.
They talk about how easy to use arrays are in C#, compared to C++, but anyone writing in C++ would have no trouble in creating their own array class templates, and would have the option of how each class function behaved at their disposal.
This seems like a bloated Visual Basic way of doing things, but on the other hand people may find it faster to create software with.
The issue of COM hopefully won't be a problem. C# claims it will make COM programming easier, but it's not the only way; Machine code doesn't remember which language it used to be.
I don't think I'm very happy. I always fall asleep to the sound of my own screams.
No, I am not an Air Supply fan, but this particular post is about as airheaded as Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blond.
.NET, but has no actual comments from anyone from MS.
I read the ZDNet article and responded in kind there. This is not news. A quote was taken from Tony Goodhew, but the quote is not printed. It is alleged to have suggested that Microsoft might hinder Ximian from implementing
From this conjecture, a whole article is created. Hell, Dorothy, your house might fly out of Kansas and land on the wicked witch. Sure, it is more likely that MS will hinder Ximian, but it is still just an OPINION and not news.
What appalls me the most is when intelligent people I normally agree with, start acting as stupid as those I disagree with. I have come to expect idiots opposing me, but to see those on "my side" acting like idiots turning conjecture into "hard news" is really appalling.
Most likely, I will be flamed for suggesting that this is not really news, but a bunch of snippets pieced together, but I really don't care. I am tired of everyone high fiving anytime MS steps, even when there is no evidence that anything is happening. I will stand behind you when you catch them at work, but I cannot stand up when the story is not a story.
Peace!