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Ballmer Admits 'Linux Changed Our Game'
wackybrit writes: "We've all known Linux has got Microsoft all worried, but they've always denied it. On Monday at a conference in LA, however, Steve Ballmer (of Microsoft) confessed that the FUD surrounding Linux isn't quite what it was made out to be. The Register has also covered the story in an easier to read fashion. They point out that Microsoft has just changed a page on their site which originally derided Linux, but now simply states what 'Windows does better.'"
My favourite Steve Ballmer quote from this article:
"We haven't figured out how to be lower priced than Linux"
(:
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The way I read that page was that they are trying to compare a homogenized Windows network with a Linux server connecting Windows clients together. Maybe I should read it some more times to see if they are also comparing a homogenized Linux network (or even a Unix-Linux heterogenous network).
They are really comparing whether Linux will run Microsoft applications / frameworks (eg ASP), not comparing similar or equivalent functionality.
No, I didn't expect them to be without bias, but all I really see is the same FUD presented in a different way.
This happened in 1998, but only inside MS.
... ... Availability/Reliability ... Scaleability/Performance ... Interoperability ...
I'm amazed they're doing what they now are.
From the (http://opensource.org/halloween/halloween2.php) anotated halloween docs, which were leaked in 1998:
------
Here are some notable quotes from the document, with hotlinks to where they are embedded. It's helpful to know that ``OSS'' is the author's abbreviation for ``Open Source Software''.
* Linux represents a best-of-breed UNIX, that is trusted in mission critical applications, and - due to it's open source code - has a long term credibility which exceeds many other competitive OS's.
* Most of the primary apps that people require when they move to Linux are already available for free. This includes web servers, POP clients, mail servers, text editors, etc
* An advanced Win32 GUI user would have a short learning cycle to become productive [under Linux].
* I previously had IE4/NT4 on the same box and by comparison the combination of Linux / Navigator ran at least 30-40% faster when rendering simple HTML + graphics.
* Long term, my simple experiments do indicate that Linux has a chance at the desktop market
* Consumers Love It.
* Linux's (real and perceived) virtues over Windows NT include: Customization
* Linux is emerging as a key operating system in the nascent thin server market
* Using today's server requirements, Linux is a credible alternative to commercial developed servers in many, high volume applications.
* The effect of patents and copyright in combatting Linux remains to be investigated.
* Note, however, that Compaq and Dell merely have to credibly threaten Linux adoption in order to push for lower OEM OS pricing.
Imagine the glint in a child's eyes when they see their new:
Microsoft - The Toys. The Game. Resistance is futile!
For reference see points:
-Windows users need a seperate account on *nix boxes
-Linux doesn't have native ASP support
-Linux doesn't have native Active Directory support
etc.
And this still doesn't stop some good old fashioned flaming FUD from slipping in, and I quote:
'Given the recent cutbacks and layoffs at many commercial Linux vendors, including Red Hat's recent 17 percent reduction in it workforce, it is questionable whether commercial Linux vendors will be around to provide support in the long term'
Not to mention the obligatory paragraph about why the GPL leads to anarchy.
So sure, maybe it's an improvement over the old page but as expected still mostly hot air blowing...
Some decent comparisons there, but then, along comes the FUD, I guess they couldn't resist:
Let's skip the meaningless "Better business alignment" and skip straight to the part that keeps the bullshit detector pegged at 10.
I think the GPL is pretty damn clear. If you redistribute the code, you have to license under the GPL. And if you don't like it, you can choose to completely ignore the GPL (thus falling back to copyright law).
Microsoft's "licenses" (which may change during the next upgrade, and even change randomly depending on the version of the product or where you bought it from, and may someday change AT ANY TIME), these licenses DO NOT allow ANY kind of re-distribution. They do not allow you to use the product you bought any way you like (even though this may not be enforcable, they assert it anyway). And you MUST accept the license, it's not optional. You could be sued by Microsoft for doing something in the privacy of your own home. Like using the wrong kind of remote access software (or whatever that one was). Or maybe this week the license will forbid copying MP3s. Or maybe next week it will allow Microsoft unilateral access to your pr0n collection. Who knows?
The GPL is straightforward, written in straightforward English, and most importantly of all, is exactly the same in all GPL'd software. You know exactly what you're getting and can reject it up front, if you want.
C'mon Microsoft, nobody except a few PHB's are buying this intellectual property cancer unAmerican anti-GPL crap, so GIVE UP!
While Microsoft's new page is a nice change from the old one, it still contains quite a bit of their same old FUD. Here's a nice tidbit from the very bottom of the page:
To ensure proper management of its intellectual property rights, an OEM must carefully examine an array of licensing complexities around the General Public License (GPL) that govern Linux. These complexities have resulted in embedded and dedicated operating system companies such as Wind River saying that they are seeing "a growing problem due to the growing uncertainty of using GPL-based code in embedded devices". An example of this risk can be taken from NVIDIA. An NVIDIA programmer, in the course of developing a driver for one of its products, used a portion of code from a freely available video driver. The developer failed to realize the code was licensed under the GPL and would therefore require NVIDIA to release the source code for its entire driver. Because NVIDIA did not want to release the source code to its commercial software, the company incurred substantial cost to develop a new driver that did not contain the GPL code.
Companies need to recognize that in embedded and dedicated devices, such as server appliances, significant gray areas exist in the implications of the GPL's terms. Some forms of code linking and commingling may or may not trigger legal obligations under the GPL. As Michael Scott and Michael Krieger, a lawyer and computer science professor respectively, recently wrote, "Rare is the month when a lawyer who specializes in technology does not have a new client asking for help in untangling an open source code problem".
In other words, they are still yelling "GPL bad! MS good!", they're just using a more dignified approach now.
I find it especially telling to look at the example they used. They place all the blame for the NVIDIA programmer's mistake on the GPL. I'm sorry, but if you are going to use someone else's code in your program, it is your fault if you don't abide by their rules, not theirs.
Proven, comprehensive operating system platforms delivering seamless integration, industry-leading scalability and performance, broad application support, and solid reliability.
Yes, given Linux's extremely widespread use, including at some of the biggest Internet sites in the world, Linux certainly has this advantage.
Faster time-to-market via powerful tools and an extensible framework.
Linux's Posix-based environment is proven, extensible, mature, and very widely used. Its Internet, services, management, and GUI frameworks are also highly extensible and industry leading. An additional time-to-market advantage is the immediate availability of updates and bug fixes throughout the community. This is in contrast with Microsoft's centralized development style, in which I am completely dependent on their efforts to deliver bug fixes.
Ease of deployment, interoperability, and manageability in a heterogeneous environment.
Indeed: score another one for Linux. Its POSIX foundations, widest support for network protocols and services, and multitude of options for management (including command line, GUI-based and network based), make it the clear winner.
Better business alignment with straightforward licensing and clarity of intellectual property ownership.
Yes, I very much prefer the straightforward licensing and clarity of the GPL over the muddy and complex legal agreements with a company like Microsoft. Furthermore, licensing costs for Linux are predictable in perpetuity. And, as an added bonus, I do not need to hire expensive lawyers to analyze the GPL--it is a known, standard, predictable agreement.
I followed the link towards the bottom of the ms/linux comaprison where it says ms makes a better web server platform. The benchmark they are quoting is over 1 1/2 years old and show that the ms based system had faster hardware.
Run your operating system on faster hardware then claim it is faster than the opposition. One way to get benchmarks in your favour.
"This potentially ties the OEM to a particular Linux vendor's distribution and its support programs."
"This can tie the OEM to a particular, potentially financially unstable Linux vendor and its support programs"
"With Linux, the OEM will have to take on the extra integration work to incorporate an add-in JFS or opt for a vendor-specific Linux distribution such as Red Hat, tying the OEM to that vendor for ongoing upgrades, support, and maintenance at an extra cost."
Wow, M$ saying that being tied to a single vendor is a bad thing, for once, they're right !
--- There isn't any problem that can't be solved by a small, low yield nuclear device, is there??
Microsoft got big by taking the discount route to software: make what the other guy's making, but make it for a lower sticker price. Since it's harder to tell a rip-off from the original when it comes to software, they made a killing.
One Linux exposed the sham behind their strategy, they were stumped. They had gotten so used to price-dumping rivals out of business that they coudn't imagine a product without a company. And you know what? They still can't. They attack Red Hat, SuSE, Lindows and the others because they can't attack the developers themselves.
Their attack strategy is like a hammer. It's good against other rocks, but worthless against a pond. How do you break the form of something that has no form?
You guys saw him admitting that Linux made them change their ways.
I read it as "The reason the cost of Windows hasn't gone down is because of Linux."
Democrats or Republicans. They are both taking us to the same place and they are not afraid of us anymore.
This is true. Microsoft does tend to impose the One True Way (TM), which can simplify some things. However, other people regard the fact that you can choose the best technologies for your application as a positive.
Also often true, but: a) a lot of those capabilities are Windows tools that you probably wouldn't use in a Linux project unless you had to for compatibility reasons, b) a lot of them were open source packages that are usually packaged by the various distributions and are an apt-get away from installing, c) if they're open source, the extra licensing costs are zero anyway, and d) who says building everything into the OS is a good idea anyway?
And Windows is perfect?
It's good news that MS are changing their arguments to push their products over Linux-based solutions, because it tends to suggest that their customers (at least in this application domains) weren't listening to their old ones.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Wow, I just took a look at the top three items of the Win2k/Linux comparisons, and it's really good FUD:
Linux:
- No support for SSO, thus requiring end users to use at least two logon names and passwordsone for Windows and one for Linux/UNIX.
What? Have you ever heard about OpenLDAP? Kerberos? Samba? even NIS allows you to do that!
- Support for CIFS but only via Samba, not as an integrated, tested solution.
Not integrated and tested by who?? HP, NEC, SGI, IBM, Apple... all them sell Samba based solutions. I'm quite sure that Samba implementation of CIFS is way betters than MS's, well known for being broken and quite buggy...(on purpose maybe?)
- [...]it is questionable whether commercial Linux vendors will be around to provide support in the long term, [...]
<sarcasm>Yea, I'm sure IBM, HP, Sun, Dell, Intel, and SGI will all go out of business next week... and then, I will not be able to contact any other linux Company, that will not have access to the src, and will not be able to provide support for my uber-closed Linux systems</sarcasm>
Win2k:
- Integrated support for Windows NT®, FTP, HTTP, Appletalk, and Novell environments, which enables consolidated administration in heterogeneous networks. Wow! They have "integrated support" for FTP and HTTP!!! OMG!
And you only need to patch it every 5min!
<sarcasm>I doubt that any OSS operating system will ever match that level of astounding functionality</sarcasm>
Not to mention that MS ftpd is one of the worst ftp implementations I have ever seen.
BTW, have you every tried to get Appletalk working on Win2k? I had to do it once, I would prefer to burn in hell for the rest of eternity than having to do it again...
I will not bother with the rest of the list... but it's funny how people can bluntly lie like this and get away with it... *sigh*
Enough time wasted with this, I'm going back to work with my "inferior" OS, that saves my company loads of money, not to mention headaches... thanks God that I have a smart boss(hi Carl!) that isn't fooled by shit like this...
\\Uriel
"When in doubt, use brute force." Ken Thompson
I am not going to go through every point MSFT has on that page, but what I hope to show is that they are not changing their strategy, just their tactics to carry out the strategy.
It used to be that MSFT FUD was a set of bald faced lies, apparently the hope was that no one would check them out at all. Well people did, found out they were lies and went to Linux.
All of the new MSFT FUD is now more subtle, and appears to have supporting material in some cases. Now you can even check this stuff out, and if you are not very knowledgeable about software you can be fooled.
Point 1
Sum up as "Linux/Samba is not really compatible with Windows networking."
In fact Linux, and Samba do support almost all features of CIFS. When Samba has been incompatible it is because MSFT changed their implementation. For this matter, Win95 and Win98 are incompatible with W2K CIFS networking.
Point 2
Sum up as "Linux is not fully compatible with Active Directory"
True enough, but Linux is compatible to the extent that Active Directory is compatible with LDAP. In truth, MSFT is the one failing to comply with existing standards...neat how they twist this one around.
Point 5
Sum up as "IIS 5 is faster than Linux for SpecWeb99"
This is just FUD. The link they point to seems to agree with their assertion but how about this link instead. It sure seems to tell a different story on identically configured hardware.
Point 11
Sum up as "Windows has reliable drivers that are signed by MSFT, Linux doesn't"
Windows has NEVER had reliable drivers. Not all the best drivers are signed by MSFT if at all.
The situation is only somewhat better than Windows for Linux to be fair. First off most drivers are delivered with an MD5 checksum, which is good enough for most uses. Secondly you get the source most of the time. Finally, since when has NASA written drivers for MSFT ? (Thanks to Don Becker, NASA GSFC.)
Point 16
My favorite..."The GPL is nasty and dangerous and can force you to give away all your secrets."
First off the GPL is easy to understand, and very consistent. You get quite a lot for a simple price, "our changes to the code are to be made public with your codes binary release."
MSFT has a problem with this because they are in the business of keeping code secret, not open sharing of ideas. Frankly that is OK, and can be a fair way to do business, despite what many OSS evangelists will tell you. What it fails to be however is an advantage to the consumer of the final product.
Don't post innacurate information
If you do, I swear by my pretty floral bonnet I will end you.
Not to mention, the new guide isn't very fair either:
Look at these quotes from the story:
Perhaps now that they can't prop up their financial statements, they are trying to spin it by saying "we were trying to compete on price with something our competition gives away for free." Where have I heard that before? Let me see, oh yes, during the anti-trust trial, I believe, from that other browser maker.The recent statements about it being Apple's fault they haven't sold half as many versions of Office v.X as they had projected could also play into this strategy. "We would have made our quarterly projections, if Apple would have just advertised OS X more!"
As someone on the varbusiness site noted, Microsoft is *NEVER* friendly nor admits to FUD or mistakes *UNLESS* they are preparing some sort of new attack on their competition. I would watch that space for upcoming announcements with regard to new Microsoft licencing restrictions (Trying to make it illegal to use Win on the same computer as Linux??) or something else.
You know, for all the crap we give Bill. I bet he would actually be pretty interesting to meet. I mean it's HIM and not us (or our parents) that made a fortune selling products that the general consumer jumped all over.
I wonder if he reads this site on a daily basis just like the rest of us. I've heard people say he's not that great of a programmer, but I bet he still knows his stuff.
For all we know, he could very well secretly have linux boxes that he plays around on.
In the end, I believe that Microsoft will use some BSD variant similar to what Macintosh has done... I mean, they copied before and it worked... Why not follow the same philosophy again?
IF they did do that... I bet slowly and surely, a WHOLE LOT of people on this site would start to reconsider windows. Not to mention the corporate world.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
This sig under construction. Please check back later.
Elsewhere in the document I found the phrase integrated application integration. I can only conclude that the author has gorged himself on buzzwords and succumbed to FUD poisoning.
Would it be unfair in this context for me to report what happened when I tried to post a comment to the varbusiness story? I got: If your car has major structural flaws due to faulty engineering and shoddy workmanship, would you weld a "reliability framework" of 2" pipe around it? Or just get rid of it?
Then we return to Microsoft's phobia of GPL virality: Implication: if the accidentally included code belonged to Microsoft, NVIDIA would have been allowed to incorporate it for free, and would not have "incurred substantial cost". I doubt that. Anyhow, this whining about "substantial cost" implies that the owners of the (non)plagiarized code somehow victimized NVIDIA. This is like saying that since you wouldn't lend me your car for my upcoming vacation, I "incurred substantial cost" renting one.
- Linux supports many kinds of authentication via PAM. The only uses of clear text authentication I can think of are telnet, ftp and r*. Any OS supporting these legacy protocols must necessarily allow clear text authentication.
- I think the complaint about "configurations of individual permissions" refers to some additional refinement of permissions in Windows. In reality, the Unix permissions scheme adapts fairly well to real-world issues, providing good security without too much inconvenience. The Windows permission scheme, in contrast, appears over-complicated, poorly understood by Windows admins, and frequently ignored/bypassed.
- Any encryption natively supported by Windows, except for the simplest symmetric cipher implementations, is highly suspect. Not being subject to peer review, it could contain accidental or deliberate weaknesses that reduce the entropy of keys of leak portions of key material. It is well known that the NSA puts pressure on commercial vendors to introduce back doors - they did so with Crypto AG and Gretag.
I'm not sure the FUD-filled utterances of Microsoft deserve this level of scrutiny. They are aiming for that narrow group of "appliance" OEM's who are so lacking in skills and self-confidence that they might cave and pay Microsoft for protection.So just what makes Microsoft fear Linux so much?
MS Rep: So, the deal is $20 per unit then.
Dell Rep: Actually, you know, we've really been seriously looking at this Linux thing. We've been considering offering it as an option on our desktop machines.
MS Rep:People aren't going to buy that. Can you just sign here please?
Dell Rep:We're not so sure. Many customers are really mad as MS at the moment. If we heavily promoted Linux on the desktop...
MS Rep:Ok, I hear what your saying. $15 a unit.
Dell Rep:$10.
MS Rep:You've got to be kidding!
Dell Rep:We actually have a few people working on our own Linux distribution at the moment. With StarOffice on top, well, it's real pretty. You want to see it?
MS RepOk, OK! $10 a unit it is.
One of the main reasons MS must fear Linux is because it gives OEMs a serious negociating position. MS aren't used to that.
Trying not to drop into an ad-hominem cheapshot
The last project that I know of which Gates authored was a ROM Basic. The Basic interpreters which followed for various early microcomputers were written by his assciates at MSFT. Of course whether or not Bill still writes code I have no actual knowlege, but nothing I've read from MSFT suggests that he acts in any capacity but architect / vision-leader.
I think this 'aura' of a brilliant coder plus his wealth is exactly the primary MSFT strategic advantage. I know dozens of lawyers, MBA's, executives who seem to beleive the following:
This guy (company) is fabuloulsy successful so their product must be just wonderful
and:
He's this really brilliant programmer / geek and that's the basis of it all
And because these folks haven't got a tech background they're basically taking it on faith. honestly it's insidious, I've seen an entire company (very big one) in a different business say 'wow that's great, lets emulate it ... ohh and yes lets also go with MS in the Data Center! [doh!]. (They fired an MIS director and then a CIO who couldn't make this fine strategy actually work in practice.)
Now what *is* true about Bill (IMO) is that he's really bright (and that his early commercial coding was largely in either assembler or on DEC PDP / Vaxen used for emulation of 8080/z90/x86 systems). Where to my knowlege he applies this is strategy and architecture, and if I don't like his choices, I'm the first to admit they've been effective (if underhanded and illegal) in the market.
Second, for 2 decades MSFT aggressively hired the very best and brightest CS grads. A freind who teaches in one of the better university CS departments observed this and on that basis only started investing in MSFT. That was a very good investment strategy for him :-).
Today I think even the financial types are beginning to realize that some of this is smoke & mirrors. I think the combination of unreasonable licensing changes and the slap on the wrist they just got from SEC are just the sort of thing that these people pay attention to.
Microsoft has always been brought more or less kicking and screaming into standard technologies. netbui vs tcp/ip; WINS vs DNS; NT Domains vs Kerberos|LDAP. Often they have implemented open technology (DCE) in the internals, just not making these the preferred API's.
Of course the whole time I and other opensource types have been looking on and saying *yikes* you want to put this cruft in an enterprise??! MSFT is highly feature driven and lusers love features. Nowhere near enough coders (or architects) work to the priciple that the least code that will do the job is usually the best solution.
Througout, Gates has pushed Basic as the language of choice [shrug]. Gates I don't really want to meet, his original partner Paul Allen, also a billionaire who has said "Blame me for having to type the backslash" ... he doesn't want to meet me in an alley :-)
I will say that I'm glad Gates is focussing on technology again. .NET has promise, and the mono initiative will make it open. His foundation is also giving big money in important areas of medical research and he cares about the right stuff, (e.g. HIV/AIDS).
Linux is Linux, if One need clarify their dist: <Dist>/GNU Linux
bsds are of course just BSD
You might think of the GPL whatever you want, but there are 2 undeniable facts:
1) It does not randomly change like Microosft's EULAs
2) All restrictions that apply to GPL also apply to MS EULAs (but not vice-versa, obviously).
This is a great example of pure FUD being spewed by Microsoft, they are blatantly misrepresenting the facts. In this case it's pretty much an outright lie.
Talk about lack of professionalism! Microsoft is a many billion dollar company, you'd think they'd have more professionalism by now. Then again, look at the current U.S. economy, it seems a lot of large companies these days lack professionalism, they're run by money grubbing greedy bastards.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden