Slashdot Mirror
What's the Business Case for Microsoft and Open Source?
Friend of perl developers everywhere, Jeremy Zawodny, has an intriguing question: "If you had to explain to Microsoft why they should change their
attitude toward Open Source, what would you say?" For more about this, read on...
From Jeremy: "If you had to explain to Microsoft why they should change their
attitude toward Open Source, what would you say? More to the point,
how can Microsoft benefit from better supporting or even adopting
Open Source in their business? (Replace IIS with Apache, for
example.) Does it make sense for them? Are there ways that they can
use Open Source as a competitive advantage without pissing off the
Open Source community in the process? Which of their products would
make sense on Open Source platforms? How can the Open Source
community help Microsoft? Or is this a lost cause? IBM has made it
work. Can Microsoft?
I ask these questions because I may have the chance to talk with folks at Microsoft about Open Source. And it only makes sense that I look to the community for input. So let's hear it. Flames won't help. Thoughtful answers and ideas very well could."
Microsoft have no intention of changing to open source, it's like trying to get someone to change their religion, not likely to happen. Why bother asking those questions, and concentrate on tackling MS head-on with quality open-source products?
Microsoft is a corporation, bound to it's shareholders, and is chartered to make a profit. In order to adopt an open source mentality, it would need to be demonstrated that open source is as profitable as closed-source projects. And, in the many years of the open source movement, I have not seen many open source projects that are highly profitable. So, therefore, I don't think that there is an argument that would convince microsoft to change their approach, other than federal injunction.
Weaseling out of things is important to learn. It's what separates us from the animals... except the weasel. -
As a guy who has to support IIS in mission-critical apps, I'd have to say that it would give them a lot of credibility in the enterprise if they opened the source just for IIS, for starters. At least once a quarter, somebody in our organization asks why we're not using Apache yet, and with the IIS security problems that crop up all the time, it's getting harder to answer that question.
I know what their answer is going to be, though. They don't want to open up IIS because it will expose all of the existing installations to attacks until patches are written. They'd rather keep it closed to protect the morons who don't apply patches than to open it up to fix the rest of the holes.
What's your damage, Heather?
Even though they may not consider it now, and they have considered it before, they should start embracing open source simply for choice.
I have a laptop which is a Sony Vaio, with WinXP Home, and it has one email client and one browser, among other one things.
I also have a dual-boot desktop (Win2K and Mandrake 8.2), and I enjoy working on the Mandrake side, because there's a choice of applications.
If I want to browse the web, I have Mozilla, Netscape, Konqueror, Galeon, Lynx... I'm not tied to one browser EVER. Even when an url is highlighted, I can choose which browser to open it into.
With email, again, there are many choices for me. I also have many security choices easily found, like do not display HTML email, do not allow JavaScript or popups, etc.
I prefer choice packaged with my OS. Not that I choose which ONE I get when I install, but the ability to choose them after install, using the best software for the task at hand.
With Microsoft, I'd wish that they'd embrace this notion, packaging not only their products, but also open source alternatives, so people can choose. And they should also take the notions that many of the open source projects have taken, and allow people to decide on their own security, and install with max security and let them open themselves as they desire.
Human nature is the same everywhere; the modes only are different. -- Earl of Chesterfield
Unlike the pro-open source evangelists like RMS, ESR etc. the whole pro and cons OSS thing is not an ideological question for MS.
The problem is that some open source program are a threat to MS market dominance. And MS gained that dominance by ruthlessly destroying all competitors. They act shark like - see, attack, kill. This made them the no. 1 in the software business. And not the quality of their products. (Some of their products are good despite what OSS zealots say.) If they give up their attitude towards OSS, they would have to give up their attitude towards competitors. And this would destroy their market dominance, making them an ordinary software company like any other.
So, "convincing MS of the benefits of OSS" is nonsense. There is no real benefit for them and they will never be convinced. And they have at least one very good argument for their behavoir - their outstanding economic success. You cannot convert a predator to a vegetarian.
Owner of a Mensa membership card.
On top of that, most opensource OSes are very modular. If you don't want this piece, you don't have to install it (Win2K server is a pain for changing some setups, like the dhcp server, the dns server, the active directory server, WINS master/backup -- at least, for me it was a pain to try to change, but, I'm not a MSCE). People like modular. I know that there is some fix for WinXP that does this to an extent (or it is supposed to).
Perhaps also the idea that, for the most part, you don't have to pay $100 for your bug fixes/upgrades. Granted, the upgrade money is how MS stays in buisness (ok, I know people will argue with this, but, it have probably been said before and will be again, they license software, that is how they make money), some people can't afford all of the upgrades -- and if they can, they don't know how the bugs were fixed or how to work with some of the new things -- sometimes old programs don't work anymore.
Those are a few ideas, I know that others will have lots more.
-CPM
---You're all I need, When the water runs deep, You're all I need, Now I cry my soul to sleep -- Collective Soul, Needs
At least once a quarter, somebody in our organization asks why we're not using Apache yet, and with the IIS security problems that crop up all the time, it's getting harder to answer that question.
Wouldn't it be easier to just start using Apache?
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
The sad truth is Microsoft has nothing to gain monetarily from moving to Open Source, and since they are a corporation, money is all that really matters. I don't mean this in a bad way, its just the way it is. There's so many hurdles that Microsoft would have to overcome to make things OSS.
Consider how much their legal dept would get the sweats over a shareholder law suit if they OSS everything and the stock drops because nobody buys software anymore -- they just download the OSS Microsoft code and compile it!
And that's only ONE of thousands of problems. They also have the standard problem of using a lot of code licensed from other people, how do they deal with that? Even if they wanted to OSS their software because there was a good reason, it would cost the millions if not billions in legal fees and programmer time just to get rid of all the licensed code depedencies in their software!
In short, forget about it. Use your energy on something else.
Eric S Raymond says in The Cathedral and the Bazaar that probably more than 90% of all software will never be sold. Most software sits in embedded systems, drivers that comes with hardware or are used for in-house solutions. It serves no need, or favors none, that such software is kept proprietary. Microsofts' current business model does not exactly encourage sharing such source, or such programs. When companies build systems that they do not intend to sell, why should they close source it, and why should they not take advantage of all free software out there?
- score -1, naive
- score -1, simplistic
This is a serious proposition and about as objectively applicable as "-1, Troll""Because we're going to wipe the floor with you".
Reality is defined by the maddest person in the room
Be careful what you ask for - if the source code to all Microsoft products were suddenly opened tomorrow, I'd have to think that Linux might suddenly lose some support.
And I for one would be cheering. So F&*(ing what if Linux loses some support, it's not like Linux is the be-all and end-all of operating systems. If the source code for Windows was opened tomorrow, Linux could use some of the good bits of Windows, and more to the point, anyone with enough programming knowledge could start adding the good bits of Linux to Windows.
I'm all for a blend of the good bits of Linux and windows. I'm a Sysadmin/Coder, and happy to hack on things, but when I build a box that has to reliably deal with things like bad power conditions, indifferent hardware, etc - I don't like Windows for various reasons, but I also don't like Linux, because there's too much complexity and _required_ system administration to keep it working. Building the Linux 'appliance' is tricky because it's not designed to be 'set and forget'.
Did I have a point? Oh yes - bring on the open Windows source code - and pity the poor suckers who have to try and grok that many million lines of code to start fixing things..
personally I'd be happy if MS would just adopt and adhere to open standards, even if there code wasn't open, at least then MS systems would be able to operate with other things without a lot of effort wasted on reverse engineering (is it a fault with 3rd party apps/sytems or is it an undocumented feature of MS? - most CEO's and the likes toe the MS party line so the 3rd party apps/systems are at fault, which in alot of cases is just plain wrong)
Linux can. Linux can .Use Linux
That Linux can! That Linux can! I do not like that Linux can!
Do you like open sourcing plan?
I do not like that Linux can. I do not like the open sourcing plan.
Would you like to free source share?
I would not like to free source share. I would not like it anywhere. I do not like open sourcing plan. I do not like that Linux can.
Would you like it very stable? Would you like it to enable?
I do not like it very stable. I do not like it to enable. I do not like to free source share. I do not like it anywhere. I do not like the open sourcing plan. I do not like that Linux can.
Would you use it in a X-Box? Would you use it if it ROCKS?
Not on X-box. Not if it rocks. Not if very stable. Not to enable. I would not let them free source share. I would not let them anywhere. I would not allow open sourcing plan. I do not like that Linux can.
Would you? Could you? In your biz? Use it! Use it! Here it is.
I would not, could not, in our biz.
You may like it. You will see. You may like it if it's free!
I would not, could not if it's free. Not in our biz! It should never be!
I do not like it on the X-box. I do not like it that it rocks. I do not like it amongst our biz. I do not like it that it is. I do not like they free source share. I do not like that anywhere. I do not like that Linux can. I do not like you Linux man!
service! service! service! service! Could you, would you, as a service?
Not as a service! Not if it's free! Not in my biz! Man! Let not it be! I would not, could not, on a X-box. I could not, would not, if it rocks. I will not use it if its stable. I will not use it even to enable. I will not let them free source share. I will not let them anywhere. I do not like open sourcing plan. I do not like that Linux can.
Say! if in copyleft? always free copyleft! Would you, could you, copyleft?
I would not, could not, in copyleft.
Would you, could you, why so nervous?
I would not, could not, I'm NOT nervous. Not as copyleft. Not as a service. Not in my biz. Not if it's free. I do not like that it can, you see. Not if it's stable. Not on X-box. Not to enable. Not if it rocks. I will not let them free source share. I do not like it anywhere!
You do not like open sourcing plan?
I do not like that Linux can.
Could you, would you use what we wrote?
I would not, could not, use what you wrote!
Would you, could you, to avoid your bloat?
I could not, would not, avoid bloat. I will not, will not, use what you wrote. I will not compete with them as a service. I will not because it makes us nervous. Not in our biz! Not if it's free! Not if it is! You let me be! I do not like it on the X-Box. I do not like it that it Rocks. I will not use it if it's stable. I do not like that it does enable. I do not like they free source share. I do not like it ANYWHERE I do not like open sourcing plan!I do not like that, Linux can.
You do not like it. So you say. Try it! Try it! And you may. Try it and you may, I say.
Man! If you will let me be, I will try it. You will see.
Say! I like open sourcing plan! I do! I like that, Linux can! And I would use it because it's stable. And I could use it to enable...
And I could charge for providing a service. And I could copyleft without being nervous. And in my biz. And still source free. For you can still charge for a service fee!
So I will use it on the networked X-box. And I will promote it because it ROCKS. And I will use it because it's stable. And I will use it to enable.
And I will use it here and there. Say! I can use it ANYWHERE!
I do so like open sourcing plan! Thank you! Thank you, Linux man!
By The Cat with the RedHat
It seems to me that Linux and open source are classic disruptive technologies. In this case the technology is not the OS itself (anyone here who can't name a dozen OS's in one breath?) but the GPL, the development model, and the worldwide linking of motivated developers into a slightly-cohesive competing co-operating group.
The GPL has provided a framework whereby a self-sustaining body of software has come into being. The body of developers don't rely on traditional business models to sustain themselves.
If Linux and open source become at all successful Microsoft is going to lose billions of dollars in revenue. Heck, they probably already are. I'm suprised they haven't sent the boys around to break RMS' and Linus Torvalds' kneecaps or roll over them with a bus.
This is a 'company' or community MS can't fight using traditional business models. They can't lower their prices enough to beat free. Many of open source products are at least of equivalent quality to MS products.
They've tried running attack PR campaigns, but to some extent attacking open source is as hard as attacking any other community spirited organisation, such as (for example) the Scouts or Guides, and all the bad press has so far rebounded on MS, it's a bit transparent after all. And how do you effectively attack people who are giving things away for free? It's like trying to claim that "Meals on Wheels" volunteers are evil because the food they deliver sometimes isn't absolutely perfect.
As an aside, I was in the Science Museum in London a few years ago and I saw a gas-fire powered room fan. The idea was that when it got too hot in summer, you lit this gas-fired engine and it turned a fan to blow (now warmer) air around the room to cool you down. It was a last trump of the old monopoly gas companies trying to show their product was as versatile as the new-fangled electricity. It shows the lengths an old monopoly would go to, to try and preserve their old business model in the face of a disruptive technology.
So, in a possibly vain attempt to get back on topic... I'll be interested to hear what you have to say. Because I feel only one of a few possibilities can actually happen. One is that open source limps along as a permanent embarrassing cousin to shrink wrap proprietary software. The other is that it more or less displaces shrink wrap commercial software.
My money is on the latter, and for a simple reason. MS has sent many companies down the tube by the simple expedient of knowing that the other company will eventually make a mistake, and then they are dead. MS has made many mistakes too - but the synergy of owning the OS and some popular apps meant they've had the revenue to recover from them, whereas companies reliant on a single app only had to trip once and they were gone.
Now the tables are turned. Open source isn't going away. If it can survive and get to where it has now, on an insignificant market share and difficult to use products, it isn't going away now it has growing market share and great things like KDE3 and Moz and GNOME and open office and so on that stand up against MS' core products.
Now it's MS that has to avoid making mistakes.... In my view that classic mistake they are making is concentrating on their market share and revenue rather than the customers. Look at the PR and mindshare disaster that Licencing 6 has proven to be. Just goes to prove the old saying that once a monopoly finishes dealing with it's competitors, it starts beating up on its customers.
MS contains some of the greatest developers in the world under one roof, probably THE greatest number of developers working for a single company. The problem is that so much of their work seems to be directed towards a 'scam' - keeping MS on top and killing other companies, rather than just turning out great products. It's proven a very effective strategy so far, the issue is can it survive against a community who isn't playing the same game?
So what can you say to MS about open source in general? It'll either eat them or live alongside them. Either way, they lose. And it's as inevitable as what happened to the horse and cart when the automobile was invented, and nothing they do can really change how this game is going to play out economically. So they may as well ignore it and hope it'll go away.
.... will probably be very difficult to transition to an open-source model. Basically they are in the widget IP licensing business, they only make money by selling complex components that other companies can script together. As such they have a very good business plan in targeting the mass market (consumer ignorance + millions of units). OpenSource makes business sense for small specialised niches (where the money is in the expertise/consulting e.g. tax laws), academia where you'd want to encourage uptake of new technology (which always require more hacking), and long-term infrastructure where you absolutely must be able to access data/devices beyond the longivity of any single supplier.
So long as MS can make high margins on the components, control the "works under Windows xyz" trademark, and can buy out any disruptive upstart, I really don't see why they'd be motivated to open-source anything.
LL
IBM is an OSS advocate because:
If I were to approach it, I might challenge MS to think outside the box and compete against themselves.
Take Apple's strategy of supporting an OSS-based OS (Darwin) and adding in strategic closed source bits to productize it. Perhaps they could move some small fraction of their $40 Billion war chest into support Darwin itself. Could you imagine the boost that Darwin would get from $4-$5 Billion? (Only 10-12% of the MS Cash holdings.) This could energize their developers on their current products to take OSS seriously and spur them to produce better products.
Perhaps more importantly, this could sap mindshare and community away from Linux. How many Enterprises would field an MS-supported Open Source OS before Linux? A lot, I think.
I c# went totally open source, it would at least have that over Java. In my experience 95% of developers have a negative attitude toward M$, and making c# open might help with this. I think developer opinion is important because they often choose which products/languages to use. Personally I would never choose M$ development languages over Java because of the closed/platform dependant nature.
I think it may be that one reason the M$ doesn't want to open source itself is that it would reveal that it's already using a buncha open source internally anyway. This would of course be a violation of the GPL and would open M$ to lotsa legal and pr problems. Just a theory of mine.
Pavlov wouldn't be so famous if he'd used a can opener instead of a bell.
I work with people who use Windows, although I
use Linux. Microsoft could help me and my
colleagues by trying to make their products work
better with my products. They seem to do the
opposite now. Just to take a minor example of
hundreds. I write text files with 80 character
lines. Word does not have a way of importing
these without taking line breaks as paragraph
breaks, and it cannot make them. (Apparently.
At least none of my very smart colleagues can
figure out how to get Word to do this.)
Some scientists use Microsoft Word, and others
use TeX/LaTeX. Microsoft could HELP the former
group by making Word, for example, easily import
eps. (Another thing my colleagues can't
manage to do.)
And then there is Xwindow. Why doesn't Windows
include something like VNC?
The answer is that Microsoft does not want to
make life easy for its customers who interact
with people like me. This is an attitude they
might change without serious harm to their
business model. They are using their customers
as pawns in their struggle to crush competition.
That is a strategy thay may not even be in their
long-term self-interest.
I know it may sound radical, but why not? Imagine a Bill and co. IRC meeting:
:) ... We can discuss the details tomorrow: schedule the "creative" team for tomorrow (need to polish the idea).
Bill: ok, this Linux thing is not passing away and the DoJ is costing a lot. We need to do something.
Co: yes, but what?
Bill: i don't know, but...WAIT...something comes to my mind
Co: What?!?!?
Bill: let's just talk to the DoJ and ask them to force us to bundle an alternative.
Co: WHAAAAT?
Bill: Yes, we can then "ask" our lovely oems to bundle the crapiest Linux version ever released. You know, all versions of everything that ever had a mayor bug together. Nothing will work right. Get basic the idea?
Co: Oh my god!
Bill: Yes, our god!
Co: Oh Bill. You know we love you!
Bill: Oh yeah!
unfinished: (adj.)
Consequently there is absolutely no reason for MS to open their products unless they are forced to by the courts.
"The new wave is not value-added; it's garbage-subtracted" - Esther Dyson, Dec 1994
Sure, the geeks want choice, but most people want nothing more complicated than a Microwave (if that complex, they sure as hell can't manage a VCR), and they want it to not change, ever.
My Journal
The negative mods are only useful for getting trolls and spammers off the list.
:)
If you consider someone's comment naive or simplistic, you can certainly post and say so (and risk getting modded down for being a troll). Or you might consider posting something more useful like explaining why you disagree (and risk getting modded down for being a troll).
I think yours was a rather simplistic suggestion. We're both off-topic.
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
Fact: "30% of Microsoft its revenue comes from the Operating System licensing alone."
This means they'll do practically anything to protect that.
Linux is moving quickly to 'embrace and extend' Windows with projects like wine, wineX and CrossOffice getting very good.
The Linux-Windows war used to be a kernel war initially, but soon it will be a win32 api war. If Microsoft doesn't launch it's version of Windows with a linux kernel underneath (MacOS X system architecture), they'll loose massive market share in the bigger enterprise market and OEM's. If that happens, all will be lost for Microsoft.
They currently are in a position to create a 'Microsoft Linux'; a linux kernel with their dll-base inserted with a proprietary kernel module (kernel fork needed because of Linus' policy). In that case they would be able to create the best 'Lindows' around, possibly loose some market space with applications like IIS being replaced with Apache and such, but with again a dominant position in the Intel OS marketplace.
Microsoft is afraid of such a move, because it'll be expensive and because of the antitrust suit (although, such a move could settle it: "We will make the following version of our kernel OpenSource").
BTW, Microsoft currently already sponsors certain GNU development, like with Perl on NT.
Conclusion:
- A Linux system running windows apps is a huge opportunity for the enterprise market and OEM's.
- If that happens MS will have lost their foundation. Either they try to make the ultimate mix of their Intellectual Property and the OpenSource world, or they'll face utter destruction. They have a window of oppertunity here, but wine is getting better fast!
- Getting them to understand this is quiet simple: they initially had the same fear of the Internet and the old MS guys understand the comparisation: the Internet was a chaotic and anarchistic network, Bill Gates said "they would never invest in it". Time has proven the contrary.
To beat a Microsoft Linux, we just need to work a little harder on wine and its integration in the desktop environments.
www.microsoftlinux.com
It's hard to believe that, even among "the Community" itself, so many people are barking up the wrong tree. The question asked about open source software, not free software. Obviously Microsoft can't justify free (beer) software to its shareholders. The relevant, and more subtle, question is whether Microsoft can justify releasing its source code. Releasing source code is distinct from giving away software.
Bear in mind, that Microsoft already does reveal its source code to people who pay enough. However, if it supplied its source code to anyone who bought the built product (even with side-conditions that the source could not be used to commercial advantage etc etc), that would still constitute open source software. And the advantage to Microsoft would be many, many more knowledgeable people finding bugs. And the disadvantages would be that someone might pinch some ideas from it to help a competing product and also that a million custom patches for their products would appear, and be sure to interfere with each other.
Any sufficiently self-referential snowcloned
Microsoft has no problems with using Open Source (in the case of BSD-licensed software), Microsoft has no problems with showing their (big) clients and universities the source code to their programs and packages.
What Microsoft has a problem with, is with the GNU license.
JMHO
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Yes it's original and please Consider it as public domain, adapt and redistribute at will. Attribute to "NZheretic" if you wish.
I don't think Open Source is for MS.
Their lock in with proprietary applications and file formats is very profitable. They get to charge outrageous prices for their software, and have lost little market share.
Their actual customers are only starting to get upset with them, if they dropped prices down a bit, perhaps more inline with video games (computer, PS2) and announced that as the market price people would feel a lot less like they are gouging.
Going to open source would change lots, they would have real competition, profits would likely drop. They wouldn't have lock in. These are good for the consumer, but bad for MS, so they shouldn't do it.
Basically, for things shipped with Windows that are included merely to make Windows more attractive, there's no reason not to use existing alternatives. Or rather, the only reason is so they can continue the FUD about IP contamination or whatever.
Visit me on #weirdness on the Galaxynet.
They're in it for the money. And so far they're doing a good job of it. Please let me know how to make lots of money with Open Source.
They can stay closed source for all I care. What I don't like is their dirty tricks. You can win without playing dirty. And if nobody can win without playing dirty then the regulators have screwed up.
Nevermind about open source. I figure the best change to the software industry would be the reduction of software copyright protection to 7 years. That way people will actually have to come up with something innovative rather than releasing a new minimally improved version and stop supporting the older version (forcing upgrades).
If 7 years is too hard then fine longer, but 50+ years is way too long.
Jesus, didn't you notice they already declared war on Open Source? Don't help them pretend to be nice guys. They're not.
Microsoft is the disease. Open Source is the cure.
Slashdot has the answer to your question right here. I honestly don't see how one can change the views of Microsoft when they are making claims like that.
-- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
Part of the problem when tring to get a company Using Microsoft to switch to using Linux is more of an emotional switch then a technical one. You have to realize most of the time you are talking to the people who at the time put Windows into the buisness. So by sugesting that they change to Linux will put them in more of a defensive situation. And will not be open to listening to your ideas. Also you have to realized that they were also blinded by the cost of MS products. Its a situation where they invested a lot of money and to tell them to get rid of there investment. They will try to make there investment still seem like a good bet. The trick to get them to switch to a Linux envirment is very slow processes. The first thing you should do is offer Linux as a extention to windows. Just have them put a Linux box in for a job that may be small job. Like using it as a remote backup system. Dont make them feel like your relacing windows. Just make them feel that it will just compamint windows functions. Then slowly you put move services to Linux and less from Windows. And before you do the next upgrade you show the performance of the Linux box and the Total Cost of Ownership on that box. So the company gets use to the idea of a Linux box in the company and having a second one wont be a big problems. And after a couple years you can make the company mostly Linux. But dont rush it. You will get people defensive and then nothing will happen.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Microsoft is the only successful proprietary software product company. That is, they're the only company that can sell shrink-wrap software (or user licenses), walk away from them, and still make billions of dollars.
Every other proprietary software company must back up their products with service and support or they're kaput. These are the companies you can possibly convince to open source since their true business is supporting their products or supplying services based on them.
Microsoft going open source would be throwing away an extremely lucrative and unique monopoly.
* Games are an exception, and you may find some niche companies with a similar business model.
It's hard to know where Microsoft would benefit from Open Source (remembering that they can already, ahem, borrow BSD'd and similar code) without knowing how much each product contributes to the company financially and how much each product costs, but, if I were to hazard a few guesses, it would be these:
1. IIS==>bit bucket
IIS does not dominate its market and has a wretched reputation. IIS extensions are available under apache, and the apache license would allow Microsoft to make its own proprietary extensions to a Microsoft-supported license.
It would make a world of sense for MS to bite the bullet, declare apache their web server, and add MS-only content in the form of proprietary mods.
2. SQL Server.
Big asterisk here. If SQL Server contributes serious net dollars, I might continue to ride it for a while.
However, SQL Server faces fierce competition at the high end from Oracle and DB2. The continued visibility of Open Source is exposing it to danger in the middle from solutions like PostgreSQL and MySQL, products that conspire to take the profit out of the segment.
I can't help but think that Microsoft could learn something here from the tremendous success of Access. Nobody buys Access because it's a great database. They buy Access because it's a database they can use. Microsoft can open up SQL-Server or they could even get more radical:
base a new database on PostgreSQL, perhaps with extensions to ensure that current SQL-Server databases are cleanly supported.
Then, without having to R&D the database (and, not coincidentally, gaining a marketing point in terms of customer flexibility), focus on proprietary tools that make developing and admining the thing easier. Maybe special additions (as separate proprietary products) to help exploit the Windows platform.
3. The Access back-end.
As I said, nobody buys Access because it's a great database.
4. Outlook Express.
A little danger here, because it might make it easier to clone Exchange. However, this could be a sort of "reverse-samba": Outlooks showing up in all kinds of strange places and on all kinds of strange platforms where it never lived before. Why? PHBs. Nuff said.
5. NetMeeting.
C'mon, guys. The whole purpose of NetMeeting is to let people in remote locations participate in a meeting. MS doesn't charge for the basic client, anyway. Opening this means that Windows can communicate with anyone else using the NetMeeting softwareThis one seems like a no-brainer, especially as a revenue stream might be found in enhanced software for originating sites as opposed to mere participants.
6. Whatever MS calls it's instant messenger.
That would be a great stab at Yahoo and AOL, and, for MS, wonderful irony.
Anyway, those a re a few of my ideas.
The only thing they can do is fight their customers and the government to maintain their stranglehold, grabbing as much cash as they can get away with before they are pushed aside.
About micrsoft and open source???
We need to dust off and nuke em from orbit, that's the only way to be sure....
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
"You're going down, bitch. Join us or die."
--
ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US!
Microsoft needs to change its attitude towards Open Source for the same reason that the dinosaurs needed a near-earth asteroid search.
Unfortunately for them, they are as likely to understand Open Source as the dinosaurs were to understand the technology necessary for a near-earth asteroid search.
Unfortunately for us, the analogy is also likely to work in that it took the dinosaurs hundreds of millions of years to go extienct, and similarly Microsoft is likely to be around and dominating the planet for some time to come....
-Rob
Corporate infastructure is more of a "yes, sir" environment that does not allow for that much original thought. While original thought is a novel idea these days, great ideas can still spawn from free thinkers. Technology is about great ideas. Open Source is about collectively implementing ideas.
entitled "Satan and Goodness, How do we convince him to quit being evil?".
If people think that M$ still has a chance to see the light, then even Satan is redeemable.
I'm not sure you could make an effective case for Microsoft to use open source. Open source works for IBM because they are at heart a hardware company, and secondly a service provider; open source means less spent on software development and more software which runs on their hardware. Further, they can help open source projects and provide support and consulting to companies who run open source applications on IBM hardware. nVIDIA benefits in a similar way: they make hardware, and more OS support for their cards equals more potential buyers.
Microsoft depends entirely on software for its existence. Contributing to open source probably seems counterproductive from their point of view. Why should they loan out their expertise to support open source and possibly help competing products to emerge? Open source means revenue loss in the eyes of upper management. MS would have to change their business model to more consulting and service rather than software development in order to benefit from open source -- a big change considering how MS has grown by becoming the biggest software developer around.
3. The Access back-end.
As I said, nobody buys Access because it's a great database.
Yeah, and they'll never improve that back end because it drives sales of SQL server. Let me make this perfectly clear: making Access a better product would cannibalize sales of SQL Server, so MS will never make it good
Making good products is at odds with market segmentation. This is one of the fundamental benefits of free software- there is no market segmentation for code so the perfect never becomes the enemy of the good, as we see in the Access situation.
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
I'm not quite sure who you will be talking to and what exactly you mean, but if you're talking to the programmers, prepare to be surprised at the attitude. I was a contractor at Microsoft. What language did I program in? Perl. While there, I worked alongside Linux advocates and other free software fans. I heard more Windows bashing there than I have at my non-M$ jobs. The programmers there are geeks. They're likely to already agree with you.
Now if you're talking to the marketing or legal departments, good luck. I don't know if they can even turn on their computers.
The notion that Microsoft could learn from how IBM has handled Open Source ignores the fundamental difference between Ms and IBM. IBM has cleverly decided that hardware AND software margins are nice to have, but they are primarily a vehicle for services revenue. While Ms has a non-trivial consulting organization, (minuscule in comparison to IBM Global Services, though) it is chartered as a cost-recovery group (they try to bill enough to pay for themselves) but they are not a profit-and-loss center. MCS is there to plug in expertise where needed to advance strategic goals which all boil down to selling more and more lucrative software. Even if Microsoft owned ALL of computer systems consulting business (Windows AND UNIX/Linux) worldwide I don't believe it would not begin to approach the revenues it now receives from software. From a business point of view, "doing an IBM" and moving software to OpenSource hoping to make money on services would be insane for Ms. .Net does not get walled off from OS inputs.
The best hope is to get Ms to consider co-operating with key OpenSource projects like Ximan Mono so that the future MS world of
So mayby this time we can learn from history, the CBDTPA,DMCA and ilk legisilation should be raising a few "red flags" before they can do as much damage.
I like most people agree that it would be a long road to get MS into the Open Source Arena. MS's Shared Source initiative may be as far as they go. However, I'm not ever sure that something like MS switching to Apache would be good. If MS switched to Apache, I imagine that you would have something like 80-90% of the world's websites on Apache...I think there is some value to heterogeneity in the software world. If everyone was on Apache and some devastating hole was found, you would have 90% of the world's web servers compromised (yes, yes, I know it is less likely to happen than with IIS). I personally believe that good solid standards are the best thing in the software world. Interoperation is more important than a universal code base.
Yes?
"Do you want this built in a month using VB, or in 6 months using C?"
"I don't have the money to support a development team for 6 months"
But, point was, I don't really care what platform I use, or what language, or what technology, I use the one I feel comfortable with and that allows me to provide a working solution to the person requesting a job done. I don't cling to MS because they're MS, I stick to MS for the moment because that's what I know best. People should stick to Linux (or whatever) because they feel comfortable with it, not because of some zealous religious conviction. If Apache is the best webserver for a job, I'll go with it, it's just a damn webserver, if VB can do the same thing as a C program can, I'll use VB, it's just a damn language. To me these small MS/Linux/Mac fights are utterly pointless, use the tool that you feel comfortable with. A program is just code to make a computer do something useful, it's not a means to itself, no matter how lyrical people are about *their* language.
Wax-Museum Fire Results In Hundreds Of New Danny DeVito Statues
It is not in Microsoft's interest to change to open source. They have a tremendously successful business model making them one of the richest companies in the world. They are the sole-source supplier for the most popular computer software in the world. There is no rational reason for them to switch to selling and/or supporting open-source software.
Sure, we can all bitch about Microsoft products' security holes. We can gripe about performance and architectural issues. And many of those complaints are valid ones, but Microsoft is not in business to produces the most secure, high-performance, well-designed software in the world. Microsoft is in business to make money -- which they do very well.
The only rational points to argue are:
1. Microsoft's continued attacks on the open source movement are damaging their credibility and hurting their customers, many of whom want to integrate open source products into their Microsoft networks.
2. Microsoft's data storage and transmission formats should be opened up to allow value-added third-party vendors to produce products that use and manipulate the data. All that leaving the formats closed accomplishes is a delay while third-parties reverse engineer them.
3. Continued battles with the open source community are going to result in more public outcry for anti-trust action.
4. Microsoft has a PR problem right now due to their insistence on software audits at cash-strapped school systems, security holes, the Justice Department case against them, etc. Extending an olive branch to the open source movement might help reduce that PR problem.
Above all, remember that Microsoft is a for-profit business. They aren't going to get teary-eyed when you tell them about the comaraderie and inspiration that you feel when working on open-source products. They don't want to be part of some big, happy family. They want to rule the world.
I was going to write a long diatribe outlining a possible MS strategy, but then realized that publishing it on /. was like open source.
So, if MS is interested, they can contact me and I will do so for an initial fee of $457 and an annual subscription of $137.95. Support is on a per incident basis at $125.
I keep seeing these "What should MS do?" questions, and it's starting to grate...
So does Anonymous Coward have good karma?
Do you want this built in a month using VB, or in 6 months using C?
"Do you want this built in a month using Microsoft Visual Basic, or in a month using GNOME Basic?" This will be the situation once GNOME Basic progresses some more.
Even if "you can take the developer out of VB, but you can't take the VB out of the developer", you can take the developer out of a Microsoft environment while leaving the developer in what is essentially still VB. If you want to see this happen, fund the GNOME Basic project.
Will I retire or break 10K?
IBM has changed its business model: they no longer sell software products; they sell a "solution to a problem", which they use some of their own software products to solve. They provide a service, which is what their customers need, and it provides them with steady, subscription-style income that fosters a better and more honest relationship with their clients than the hit-and-run attitude developed by salespeople who only need to sell a product once. Plus, because it's clear from the outset that they're going to be selling a service, customers don't get pissed off (as they do with Microsoft) having to pay continuous fees. Make no mistake, both companies charge continuously: however, Microsoft charges for support (which gets people pissed off -- the product is supposed to work without help!) while IBM charges for the service (which includes support when things go wrong). It's the same thing, but with important psychological differences on both sides.
Microsoft is already seeing the value of selling services rather than products (spurred by the success of subscription-based AOL) and is slowly moving to software-as-a-service. However, their legacy of selling expensive products is making software-as-a-service very unpopular with their customers, who see it only as a way of charging many times for a product they used to buy only once. By changing their model to being entirely service-based, they would be free to use open source wherever it happened to be better than their in-house solutions (e.g. Apache) without it costing them any revenue. They could then contribute to the open-source products they use just like everybody else does.
I have to disagree w/ you on somepoints. A professional admin is not a secretary. They should understand technology and be able to edit a config file. An admin who understands the CLI is faster and more powerful than a pretty GUI will excel. Sure, Linux has an excellent GUI(s) , but the pount is it's OPTIONAL.MS is so easy, anyone can edit the registry, huh?
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Wouldn't you want to have some say or credit in naming a piece of software where you have > 60% of the contribution?
At least he does not want to name it Richarm.
Linus named it all after himself!
Having GNU in the name is a credit not just to GNU, but to the thousands of developers who have contributed to the GNU system.. RMS is fighting for credit for you and me, and you don't even realize that.. It sucks that people choose to bash the same guy who brought you the very GPL which has led to all this Linux-success.. singlehandedly, and sometimes without an apartment to live in because of his insistence...
If you are so opposed to GNU and RMS, Why don't you stop using GNU/Linux and write your own GNU/Linux, Iamthefallen? And of course, GCC, , GDB, Emacs and all other GNU tools.. written by GNU (and again, largely by RMS)...
It's interesting to see Apple and how OS X uses an Open Source kernel (Darwin). Why shouldn't Microsoft be able to do the same thing?
They can keep closed sourced programs and user interface portion, but why not open up the kernel?
Ciryon
I would kick Bill in the head and call him an asshole.
This would not advance the case of free software, but it would make me feel good. Of course, if I kick hard enough, and with steel toed shoes...
Enough with the jokes, I think that there is nothing we can say to convince Kaiser Bill to cooperate with free software. It's too much of a threat to the Microsoft business model. It can only mean a decreased market share for Microsoft, there is no reason to cooperate. So far, all he can do is try to exterminate us, but he never will. As long as there are idealistic young people, free software cannot be stopped. They call us a cancer, but I like to think of us as cockroaches. We live in every city in the world, live off the scum behind the fridge (M$ official opinion of free software, until they can figure out how to "embrace" it), and for every one you squish there are 200 in the walls. We were poised to survive Y2K before it was even in the press.
Eventually, our community will reach a critical mass and cockroaches will taker over the world! No, I mean the Microsoft market share will inevitably shrink. Five years ago, people made fun of me for using Linux. It was barely a blip on the RADAR, nobody thought it would ever be on more than 0.5% of all systems, and now we are about 3%. As the rest of the world starts using computers, free software will be the choice (remember, only Americans enjoy US dominance). With their slow development cycles, funny licensing, and strict control, Microsoft will become a dinosaur. Maybe they will remain dominant in the US, but their grip is slipping in Asia (where more than half of the people live), and they are fighting for South America.
Finally, to answer the big question: How will we convince Microsoft that open source makes sense? We will wait. If you can code, code. I try to convince two people to switch to a non-Microsoft platform every year (argue gently, the proof is your low-maintenance system with all the necessary applications, and use a fellow geek as a shill). It is slow but steady progress.
That was my rant. You may now return to your regularly scheduled comments.
I hate when people bring that up. The security holes listed for linux is for EVERY distubution. If Redhat has a problem with imlib, every distro may have a probelm with it. SO if SUSE, Caldera and Mandrake have an imlib problem now, that's 4 listings! And a good 90% of the security problems are minor. (Alot of the MS ones are minor too.) Should we count a Eudora vulnerability as a MS vulnerability???? NO, but a third party app on Linux is counted, why is that?
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
The other place M$ can go is out of business. The only thing that can save them is unconstitutional law. Failing that, they are done. Would this be one of those lean years I read about M$ "smothing" proffits on, or have they just not had a reasonable product since 98? How many of you would recomend win2000? XP? don't make me laugh. Oh my, so many many lean years. How many can they take before the entire ponzi falls down on them? All of that anti-competitive spagetti code has told on them.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
There are huge problems with making a business case for Microsoft encouraging Open Source. Their business model in which they would evaluate the case is antithetical to all but a token onvolvement in Open Source. Any business case (Open Source or not) would need to either fit into (or expand on) their existing model, or come up with enough evidence that a new business model is superior to theirs.
If you have a superior business model for a Software company than Microsoft's, your time is better spent developing it into a real business rather than telling it to Microsoft. Please do so.
The other problem is you are talking to "Folks at Microsoft". From everything I've heard it's fairly easy to convince programmers and other developers at Microsoft that Open Source software is a good thing. The problem is that their Exeuctive Management is convinced that Freedom is a bad thing. What little use they make of Free Software with such a mindest is likely to be exploitive. Bill Gates has esentially said he really likes the idea of Open Source licenses like BSD, because Microsoft can take those programs, adapt them to thier needs, and not worry about contributing the changes back to the community. In my opinion, there has been more than enough exploitation along these lines, we don't need someone encouraging more.
In my opinion, the only really tactic is to toss the "Business Case" idea aside, and convince Microsoft that a healthy Free Software community is important to Microsoft. This is a tough call, but here are some arguments:
Key technologies they Microsoft makes a great deal of money off of were developed by a healthy Free Software community:
* Email
* World Wide Web
Having further development, in the Free Commons, will expand the computer industry as a whole. Microsoft currently has 90% of the industry, if it has only 70% of an industry three times as large, it's making more money. A healthy Free Software community can help make this happen without Microsoft having to shell out significant amounts of money.
On the flip side of the equation, many industries have a healthy commons and still make money hand over fist:
* Law
* Medicine
* Engineering
The bottom line is that Microsoft's executive management needs to be convinced that Freedom is not bad for their health before it's worth getting them involved in "Open Source".
----
Open mind, insert foot.
It has a plugin for Visual Studio, and allows them to create cross platform GUI apps, allowing Microsoft programs to "infiltrate" the Unix market. Show them the slot/socket event method as an example of an innovative solution created by a proprietary company, but made available to us through open source.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Comment removed based on user account deletion
...and I still don't know why would anyone ask such a question, because the answer is obvious -- Microsoft doesn't give a rat's ass about Open Source, and Open Source/Free Software/... certainly doesn't give rat's ass about Microsoft's business. They are enemies with incompatible interests, and the last thing they need is to care about is how the other will survive.
The question, which of them serves the interests of users and programmers is a completely different thing, and at this point it's pretty cleat that Microsoft is their enemy as well. If anything may be worth thinking about, it is what will happen when Microsoft will lose its driving ambition -- it grew out of one rich kid's effort to prove the world that he is not dumb and ugly, and that his BASIC interpreter is a worthy piece of software. That rich kid is now not any smarter but much older, and much more frustrated, so he has only about a decade left of being capable of controlling the company. Soon Microsoft will have nothing to fight for -- its profits don't really depend on crushing everyone else, Gates' ambition does. Microsoft may have enough inertia to continue antagonizing everyone, but more likely it will become a "dead" company, an equivalent of AT&T or IBM, and when that will happen they may adopt some semi-evil but more or less sane strategy that all other faceless corporations have. So for now good Microsoft is dead Microsoft, and maybe Microsoft with dead (physically or at least intellectually) Gates.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
What Microsoft is scared of (and should be I guess) is that if you open up the source, their products will loose sales. It will be even easier to steal their features, or simply steal the whole thing.
If there were no piracy, and no one wanting to steal other peoples work, Microsoft could open up their source totally. This is not the case.
I would love for Microsoft to open up at least the most vital pieces of software (those that will help me develop and debug applications for windows), but preferable the whole thing.
So what you need to do is to give Microsoft a case where they can profit from having open source. I would say that they could profit in terms of users finding their bugs, and giving them solutions (as long as they have an organization who can do this, i.e. get the information from the users/developers into Microsoft and support them) back. They have problems with speed, stability, and security. This could be a reason to carefully open the source to give more real world testing.
The other reason would be to help developers build better applications for windows.
Other than that, why would they? If you have more good reasons, tell them;) But remember that it must be a gain to them, simply giving their work away won't cut it.
(They could always hire me, and I could show them good ways of open up their sources to the public. I am actually serious here. Gimme a job.)
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Microsoft is positioned (if they dodge antitrust bullets for a little longer, and get government help) for being the only software vendor for all intents and purposes. They're quite capable of leveraging that until it snaps off in their hands, too. You have no idea how ruthless they can become in ideal circumstances. It's like taking advantage of loopholes in the rules: you cannot beat them in fair competition, because it isn't.
That makes it Them on one side, and The World on the other. Hence, Free Software, which is what you do when you can't ever get rich (or in some cases even survive) selling software in competition with Microsoft, but you want to get your software out there, and you don't want them to use it against you. It's not about competing with Microsoft at all, it's a doomsday scenario based on the idea that people will carry proprietary software to the most obscene and ugly extreme.
The only thing Microsoft can do in relation to Free Software is try and make it illegal, or cripple as many Free Software authors as possible- it makes no sense for them to embrace the ecological reaction to their damaging presence. So, they are putting out viral licensing that makes anyone who has agreed to the terms, liable for Microsoft prosecution at any time, and vulnerable to several admissions of guilt contained in the 'shared source' license itself. I don't know if they're pushing for legislation to make Free Software illegal, but it would be an effective way of using their lobbying situation (they've dumped millions into lobbying and have in fact bought off ALL the available lobbyists so competing interests cannot get their view across to the politicians).
Your advice on the topic of Free Software should be "milk the current situation as hard as you possibly can, because unlike any previous proprietary software vendor you have destroyed the market so completely that people code for nothing now, if they're not working for you. Short of killing or disabling those people, you can't compete or make use of that, because they're doing this in direct reaction to what you've done, and there's more of them, and they're better than you, and self-perpetuating."
"So cash in now, and run like hell, because you've managed to scorch your own earth, and you have all the future of typewriter-ribbon monopolies or a ruthless guild of shoeshine boys. People will pick worse and cheaper over better and more expensive, even if you do manage to do better work- and cleaning up the mess you've caused doing 'worse and cheaper' will cost you, hugely."
"Pretend to be listening, cash in bigtime, and bail out before your company does an Enron. You've destroyed your own 'biological niche' and all that remains is a clever exit strategy."
maybe that was his point. with everything MS moving towards a subscription model, and licensing so expensive already, how long until everyone starts to realize the savings of not using MS products?
do not read this line twice.
The problem is that right now, there isn't a case for Microsoft to go open source with any core technologies. Lets face it, it would cut revenues, and they do not yet have a strong services business, or many other things that are important to make this sort of thing work. At this point in time, it would kill Microsoft.
That being said, I expect them to to move more toward open source. When you compare Win 2k to NT4, Win 2k is far more based on open, established standards, and is consequently a far better product. While some of these standards have been extended, Microsoft has discovered the hard way, that some of these extensions are worth giving back to the comminity.
I think that the Operating System market as we know it is dying, and that things are not sustainable in their current state. I think that the MS execs know this, and that in a couple years will start to adopt more open source approaches to software development as they need to account for saturating operating system markets. I don't think that subscription licensing for servers will pay because I would never subscribe to a EULA with an expiration date for anything mission-critical.
So what I say is this-- not yet. There is no case, but as the markets shrink, there will be a strong case. Microsoft should start exploring this area now in small ways, but hold off for another couple years from large commitments.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Look there is no way M$ is going to either OS its s/w or adopt OS. It simply doesnt make business sense for them to do so. M$ is primarily a software company (neglect Xbox, webtv et al) unlike IBM which is a service based company. With the whole industry transitioning to services-centric focus from a product-centric focus, its time M$ ditched its product only approach and moved to a service based approach.
What M$ should do to adopt OS is bundle OS s/w with Windows. For e.g. it need not write IIS and other s/w which do not provide way more returns. Just bundle apache with Windows. Saves them a hell lot of developement effort. Then provide support for apache on Windows and mint money outta it. Similarly, to fight the increasing trend of linux being adopted, why not release a version of Linux on Windows. Stuff like that..should interest M$.
Assuming M$ does that there are two ways it could go. Ppl will start using Linux more. So either the Linux base will increase or ppl being comfortable with Linux on Win, will ditch pure linux installs, choosing to use the M4 version of Linux instead.
Either way, M$ can always provide support and service and mint money. Whether it is helpful for the OSS community or not, is something that remains to be seen.
This is quite true. The reason Microsoft should switch to open-source is that in the 10-year term, open-source is what will matter. They can currently milk their customers today, but they will lose them tomorrow. They make large profits today at the expense of profits tomorrow, or they can start down the path of open-source which will allow them on the playing field tomorrow.
Microsoft has always had a policy of being the first to destroy their own market-share, because it's better that they do so to themselves than another company do it. If they don't switch to open-source now, another company will destroy their market-share.
Engineering and the Ultimate
Open source is not about business. In the long run, companies will never generate the same revenue with open source products that can be generated by just attempting to build monopolies around closed source systems.
Open source is not about money. Open source is about the fact that human beings are reaching a level where we no longer need to just drive our technology around money. As we continue to use computers to heal ourselves, defend ourselves, entertain ourselves, and so on, we will find that it benefits us all to stop letting the greed of people like Bill Gates and Co. get in our way. This isn't about silly economic systems like capitalism and communism, this is about a new social system under which we realize that sharing our technology and related information allows us all to get what we want faster and with greater ease than we ever will when we fight over proprietary systems.
Open source needs to be concerned with being open source. There is no reason for us to waste our time worrying about Microsoft; all it does is waste our time and hold us back. Stop trying to convert Microsoft, do not waste time working to be better than Microsoft, just let open source move forward on its own and open source will lead the computing world in good time.
Fact: "30% of Microsoft its revenue comes from the Operating System licensing alone."
This means they'll do practically anything to protect that.
That is the problem Microsoft has. Instead of focusing on growth markets they are messing around with things that is part of their traditional culture. It is obvious that the Linux heat is preasuring them and they are fighting it like Don Quixote.
its not a matter of what i would say.. its how i would say it... with a gun.
-gerbik
this guys actually has a clue..M$ is in business to MAKE MONEY, the more the better. If there was a way to support OSS, make money and do some good you don't think they jump on it if just for the good PR which they desperately need. To expect anything else but a bottom line profit motive from a corporation is naive in the extreme...
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
A) Nothing. As far as I'm concerned, Microsoft can just keep on gouging the idiots who are too lazy or risk averse to switch, and open source will keep supplying to the people who have a clue.
Honestly, would you want to support (directly or indirectly) businesses that both clueless enough to use IIS and too lazy to patch it? Basically I don't want to write software that's dumb enough for people like that to use. Microsoft can keep them, and keep spoon feeding them for all I care. In that respect, market segmentation is a good thing: it keeps idiots away from open source, rather than having them drag it down with demands for it to ship with one big button labelled "Do stuff."
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
That's true but beside the point. M$ is going away as their performance suffers from all their old sins. If they don't change anything soon, they will be gone. If they can change things up, just a little, they can then force it down people's throats with their monopoly channels.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
We can continue to wish for MS to open-source more of its software, but it isn't going to happen in the way that we want - not now, not ever. Remember that Microsoft is a public company, and thus has an obligation to its stockholders to protect certain interestes. Thus:
-- Microsoft can see that open source is a good idea, and is getting on the open-source bandwagon (for both PR benefits and for other more real benefits) in some areas. For example, HUGE portions of the Windows CE operating system are public and visible to the world. Several other MS products also have source code available. However, these are under a much more restrictive license than GNU or BSD.
-- Microsoft is in a very different position than many of the companies that have "made open source work." Microsoft SELLS OPERATING SYSTEMS. They can't make open source work by releasing their intellectual property to the wind. They can do some open source stuff, but it has to be limited by relatively restricting licenses -- otherwise, they are giving away the very thing that keeps them profitable.
-- Microsoft has to protect their intellectual property and their marketing position at all costs. The way to protect their intellectual property is to have limits on their available source code. The way to protect their marketing position is to always try to offer something that is not available through open source means.
I personally use both purchased and open source software all the time. A huge portion of the software that I have paid for is Microsoft. I would like to see open source continue on as a thorn in the side of Microsoft, spurring it on and forcing it to make higher quality products. I also hope that open source continues to provide alternatives to Microsoft for those who don't want to pay for expensive software. However, I think there is a place for both Microsoft and Open Source in the future. I don't expect either to go away anytime soon.
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
OSS is inherently a collaborative effort. Microsoft has historically taken a confrontational stance in the marketplace to the point where they have angered their competitors to such a degree that they are unlikely to be able to play in a collaborative enviroment where that collaboration is based on anything other than the threat of the alternative confrontation which their partners in collaboration would otherwise face.
This historical lesson learned by Microsoft's competitors over the first 15 years of Microsoft's existance, has poisoned the waters and will effect any relationships Microsoft forges in the marketplace for many years into the future.
This situation nessecerily precludes the type of collaboration required for successful OSS development, so Microsoft can not reasonably take any position other than the one they have thus far, without creating an enviroment where they will have excluded themselves from the marketplace through their own actions.
It's almost sad, but this is the current condition of Microsoft in the software industry, regardless of whether anyone could convince them of the error of their ways.
--CTH
--Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
Once this was the case, however the real importance of C# is that it finaly merges the Basic and C code development lines. At this point C# provides the full power of C (with some bizare omissions like structure initializers) plus the convenience of VB. The market perception that C# is about Java is only really 40% right, C# is pitched against Java because Java is the language to beat, but the real target audience is Visual Basic programmers who would like a programming language that is as easy to prototype in as a scripting language while still allowing very large projects to be supported.
Equally the suggestion in the intro to the article that Microsoft should switch from IIS to Apache is amazingly clueless. Apache is a great Web server for UNIX boxes, but IIS is a better Web server for NT. IIS is integrated into the O/S at a very fundamental level so that for example the Web server can use the system level file protections to control access to Web resources.
The features that have caused security problems with both Apache and IIS are active code. In the case of IIS three scripting langauages are integrated into the Web server (and more can be added). In the case of Apache the security weaknesses inherent in the CGI design (particularly when a CGI module is written in csh) leads to predictable problems. I don't see that a real difference can be made between the OSS and Microsoft approach here, both groups adopted what is an intrinsically insecure architecture for reasons of expediency and ignorance. Once the feature was in there was no way for the grown ups to take it out again because people used the feature.
I recently started using Visual C#, its the best program development environment I have seen since the VAX LSE. The editor does have some iritating features (like the lack of mouse-less editing), but it does have a lot of cool features like bringing up the template for a method as you enter it - even for user defined methods. The IDE looks and feels like a professional tool, there are few traces of ego-centric features that looked cool to the designer but are not so great for the user - although as with XMLSpy the editor makes the bizare assumption that my preference for editing XML Schemas is through some bizare graphical language of the authors invention rather than as XML schema.
Compare Visual Studio with the UNIX - Emacs - Make IDE and I am afraid the comparison is not favorable to open source.
I am much less interested in open source than I am in extensibility. Unless you want to do a security audit the only reason to want source is to maintain or extend a program. I much prefer a well written and supported extension mechanism than someone chucking a few meg of code at me. The .NET extension mechanisms allow me to write my own language and then use Visual Studio as my IDE for it - and get all the debugging, assistant etc. features for free. That seems somewhat better to me than creating a fork of the emacs and gcc tree for my new language and recreating all those features.
YMMV, but those people who believe that OSS is the one true faith are wrong. There is plenty of room for both models in the market of ideas.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
But the real iron to me seems to be - why would anyone well off do that? Shrink-wrap software only imrpoves in quality when a lot of people buy it - if only a few people (no matter how well off) bought into a subscription, then how would they get better quality than a free version everyone else is using?
Perhaps I could see really well individuals paying to have a sort of "custom home IT" person or two that did custom apps for them. Like, say a guy who spent all day programming enhancements to Bill Gates house.
Hmm, perhaps I should find some wealty individual and offer to be a "computer butler" of sorts, for something like 1M per year. Or even not that much, but with a great budget and the ability to use the house while they are away.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Collaborators wouldn't have to trust Microsoft, and if MS did anything too stupid, they'd only provoke a fork.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
The new MS Business plan:
1: GPL Everything.
2: Cease all development activity (--> R&D budget == 0)
3: Lay off all lawyers
4: Divvy up the $40 billion in cash thushly:
a: Pay off all debt and legal claims.
b: 30% of remainder to MS Investors
c: 30% to charity
d: 30% to FSF. Lets face it, they put the Gnu in Gnu/Linux!
e: 10% to executive level for being nice guys.
5: Any employees left could provide commercial support contracts for formerly Microsoft products.
6: A FSF-style "Microsoft Software Foundation" funded by corporate charity etc. should be founded to foster continued development on Microsoft products and technologies.
"But actually trying to use m4 as a general-purpose langage would be deeply perverse" --ESR
Why should they ?
Just because some nerds on slashdot don't like MS ?
MS is doing really well. That may change in the future, but for now I have to say they know what they are doing, so whatever open source policy they come up with is probably best for them and their shareholders.
The Cat with the RedHat says : if Microsoft does not learn from this "story", other will reap clients from them, gladly.