Microsoft's Platform Strategist Speaks On Linux

prostoalex writes "Martin Taylor, general manager for platform strategies at Microsoft, was interviewed by CRN magazine on Linux, open source development, and Microsoft's official stand on it."

Comments

Re:Windows OpenSource???

[automatix]

Speaking of... here is a good review of the contents of the win2000 zipfile. Suitable for developers to read (no direct excerpts or specifics), and quite amusing.

Re:Does Red-Hat cost more?

[chill]

Red Hat Professional Workstation = $99.95
RHEL 3 - Workstation = $179+
RHEL 3 - Enterprise Server = $299+
RHEL 3 - Advanced Server = $1,499+

The + means you can pay more depending on the support configuration.

HOWEVER, if you aren't interested in RHN and support, buy one and install it on a thousand machines. Fully legal, according to the EULA. Try that with Windows and see what happens...

Charles Hill

Re:Does Red-Hat cost more?

[DarkFencer]

Don't for get educational pricing:

RHEL 3 Workstation - $25
RHEL 3 Advanced Server - $50

No support included though, but all updates are.

Re:Does Red-Hat cost more?

[ComputerSlicer23]

Here's a copy of the license you had to agree to

You really should go read the EULA one more time. No, you can't install RedHat Enterprise on multiple machines and just run it. Not if you have a single support contract with RedHat. If you have original media from RedHat, you have 1 years worth of support that you can't opt out of.

If you have a single support contract with RedHat, then all of the systems are considered "Installed Systems" (as defined section I.A). RedHat has the right to come into your locations, and audit all of your "Installed Systems" (I.4). They can then invoice you for all of the extra systems you have installed. If are over your allotment of installed systems by more then 5%, they are allowed to invoice for an additional 20% penalty (later in I.4).

I'm not a lawyer, and that is my interpretation of it. However, if you took the binaries off the install CD and put them on a different CD (excluding a handful, primarily being redhat-logos and 3rd party stuff), you could install that, invoking the GPL license. However, a number of binaries on the CD, they could claim copyright on (XFree86 and Apache binaries for instance, and anything else which has a source license of BSD-like). I'm not sure what the license on the actual binaries are.

I'm not sure if the license inside of the RPM is the license for the binaries, or the original source. I'm assuming that it is only for the source.

The actual ISO image isn't GPL'ed. They own the copyright on that, so you can't just go give away a copy. They also own the copyright on all of the binaries. They might be compelled to allow you to transfer the some of the binaries, but they don't have to let you do it in the specific structured way they did. In fact they can't, as they have 3rd party software that they can't allow you to transfer.

Finally, whoever owns the support agreement, just agree to these terms, and can't get out of the terms for the first year after purchase (I.1.2). Everyone who has a support agreement, must not install the software on any additional machines. They got around the GPL requirements, by not making it a requirement on the binaries, but by making it a requirement for support (and not letting transferring the binaries to you, until you agree to this). According to the license you agreed to, unless RedHat makes a material breach of the license, or you agreed up front to a different set of terms, you are bound to the support contract for the term of 1 year.

So I wouldn't go around telling people they can violate a legal contract they have agreed to. It isn't a very smart thing to do. Unless you have a different agreement, or you have a sound legal analysis that contradicts this, I'm pretty sure you are committing copyright infringement if you have multiple copies installed.

For that matter, I'm not sure it is legal to use the software without support. There is nothing in the license which grants you rights to use it. (There is nothing saying you can't either, but it's not explicity stated that after the support is terminated you still have a license to use any of their copyrighted materials). However, I'm very doubtful that RedHat will be coming after anyone. That doesn't change the techincal points of the legality or not.

If anyone has any analysis that differs from this, I'm all ears. I'd love to be able to buy the first copy, and install it lots, and lots. However, I've carefully read the agreement, and I don't believe I can legally do that. Plus if I don't have the support agreement, I have to build all of my own updates. Really not something I'm looking forward to doing.

Kirby

Re:Does Red-Hat cost more?

[chill]

I've read it a dozen times, though IANAL.

Zip on down to Appendix #1...

"With the exception of certain image files identified in Section 2 below, the license terms for the components permit Customer to copy, modify, and redistribute the component, in both source code and binary code forms."

The software (RHEL) and support services are SEPARATE. Don't buy one, install a thousand times then use RHN -- you're in violation.

Hell, just borrow a copy from someone and install if you aren't going to use RHN or support.

Or am I mis-interpreting Appendix #1?

-Charles

Re:Does Red-Hat cost more?

[ComputerSlicer23]

You appear to be correct, you still will have to strip out a couple of RPM's, and rebuild the ISO's before you can distribute them. However, you do appear to have the right to do nearly anything you want with the RPM's you get (which I didn't know until just now).

While the support and software are separately licensed, you can't get a copy of RedHat's software without support (and you can't duplicate what RedHat gives out to anyone without modification).

I wonder how much trouble you'd get into just making new RPM's that are named the same, and just switching the blue and red bytes in the images.

I'm not sure that copying it and running it, will get you out of the other aspects of the terms "Installed Systems", but I'll buy into it for now. I'd actually have to get a real lawyer to be sure.

For my personal situation, I'd like to have a handful with support, and a ton without it. I'd prefer not to have to prove I did it correctly. Hence, I'm a White Box Linux fan... :-)

In 7 years of running Linux, I've never needed any support from anybody I couldn't get off mailing lists, deja news, and a good search engine. I don't have a problem paying for a copy, I'm just not interested in paying for that many copies for support I don't want or need. I need the support for Oracle (because Oracle could get support from RedHat on my behalf).

I think if you went to the trouble to strip off the RedHat RPM's, it'd all work out okay. Depending on how precisely "Installed Systems" is enforced in the Services contract. My next problem will be getting security updates on a regular basis.

Kirby

Re:Didn't read the article...

[Mysteray]

The whole paragraph:

Just because you have more people looking at the code does not guarantee a level of quality, because those people might not be the most-qualified people to do code review. I'm not [making] a disparaging comment on the open-source community. I'm just simply saying that more in number does not mean it's more in quality. Let's just say that. That said, it's something that we continue to look at to see at what level and how do we open it up and share. And at the end of the day, there are only about 14 to 25 guys that actually check code into the Linux kernel. Just because you have a bunch folks out in the community that have the access to look at open-source product means that, by default, it will be more secure or higher quality.

While amusing, it's pretty clear that he was misquoted.

Re:Windows OpenSource???

[BESTouff]

If anything, Linux is worse. Linus has stated numerous times he makes no effort whatsoever to retain binary compatibility even between minor point releases of the kernel.

You're just lying. Linus said he doesn't care about kernel drivers binary compatibility (i.e. NVidia). The kernel developpers do every effort to keep userspace compatibility though, I even remember some performance enhancements have been withdrawn because they were slightly incompatible with some obscure application (e.g. running child first right after fork).

Re:Windows OpenSource???

[Ubi_NL]

3) The code is likely just plain bad. It may need a major rewrite before others in the community could start to contribute.

According to someone who actually looked at the code it is pretty high quality

"Quality: Despite the above, the quality of the code is generally excellent. Modules are small, and procedures generally fit on a single screen. The commenting is very detailed about intentions, but doesn't fall into "add one to i" redundancy."