Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Microsoft To Share Office Source Code

Posted by Hemos on from the aftershocks-to-ensue dept.

I_Love_Pocky! writes "According to this article, Microsoft is going to give its source code for Office 2003 to more than 30 different world governments. The purpose? So they can inspect the code for security flaws."

2 of 348 comments (clear)

  1. Bet this doesn't include . . . by acceleriter · · Score: 4, Informative
    . . . the DRM components and the secret file format parsers. Besides, all those governments, if they're that paranoid, should each worry about the other twenty-nine governments that will all have access to the supposed source.

    I'll believe it when the government of Randomistan announces that they received the source code and build tools, and have compiled a version that bit-for-bit matches the retail CD.

    --

    CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.

  2. Re:I'm wondering... by EvilGrin666 · · Score: 4, Informative

    They wont have a license to distribute the MS office code and any license they do have from MS is likely to be so encumbered that it would be incompatible with the opensource license.

    The only viable option a government wishing to do this is to do a clean room design. Unless of course there are patent restrictions.