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Dvorak On Microsoft/Novell Deal
zaxios writes, "John C. Dvorak has weighed in on the recent Novell-Microsoft pact. Among his insights: 'Microsoft has been leery of doing too much with Linux because of all the weirdness with the licenses and the possibility that one false move would make a Microsoft product public domain at worst, or subject to the GPL at best.' But now, 'the idea is to create some sort of code that is jammed into Linux and whose sole purpose is to let some proprietary code run under Linux without actually "touching" Linux in any way that would subject the proprietary code to the GPL.' According to Dvorak, it's only a matter of time before Linux is 'cracked' by Microsoft, meaning Microsoft figures out a way to run proprietary code on it."
As scary as a 'Microsoft Linux' sounds, there'd actually be some significant advantages to Microsoft apps being able to run on Linux (as pointed out to me by another /. reader yesterday). To a system administrator, the prospect of having servers that cooperate better, and possibly a single secure desktop, is enticing. Hardcore Linux users probably scoff at the idea of running Office on a Linux box, but as a IT manager myself it sounds like a great idea. All of a sudden, I could rollout a single secure Linux O/S to all desktops and servers, then have the ability to run Windows apps when needed.
... they will probably either maintain a cooperative capability (a la Virtualization) that the Novell deal provides, or use their Linux foothold as a means to eventually entice Linux users back to Windows.
Is this Microsoft's intent? Unfortunately, probably not. I don't see them providing users with the ability to get rid of their Windows PCs
Who knows, the end result will be interesting for sure.
Crack - Free with every butt and set of boobs
yeah, because Oracle cracked Linux. So did Veritas (which I was personally running products from on Linux servers as much as 5 years ago).
/. taco, you're merely assisting MS's propaganda machine further demonize the GPL and Linux in general. I don't suppose you made charitable donations to SCO too, did you?
Bullsh*t. By putting this on the front page of
That was my first thought. There are many proprietory, closed source apps that run on Linux, with no legal or technical problems at all.
I am beginning to suspect that this Dvorak chap can't tell his arse from his elbow.
"Proudly Posting Without Reading The Article"
... meaning Microsoft figures out a way to run proprietary code on it.
What, like writing a program and distributing it as a binary-only for-pay title?
It's only GPL if you use someone else's code. Why in the fucking hell are we still hearing stupid shit like this in 2006?
> Nice reference to World War 1.
> Too bad that most Americans wont get it.
You certainly don't, considering that you didn't even reference the right war.
Or was I just treated to a demonstration of Dvorak's journalism technique?
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
I couldn't agree more. Dvorak has been proven to be an asshat so many times I can't begin to count them. I mean read this paragraph:
We already have something like that. It's called Java. Java hasn't put Linux to the torch. What makes Dvorak think that Microsoft will be able to do it?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Monopoly abuse to be sure, but it has worked for them in the past....
The only way they can do that in this case would be to destroy access to the toolchain...because without the toolchain, nobody can create new distributions.
This is where, as much as it pains me to admit it, with the GNU/Linux stuff, in a way RMS is right. The GNU project is very much the centre of gravity where Linux is concerned, because it is how Linux propogates itself.
Microsoft *could* sink Linux if it took out the FSF...but the good news there is that the FSF is very well protected by public opinion. If there is one thing Stallman genuinely *is* extremely good at, it's at least developing the appearance of holding the moral high ground. ESR was right when he wrote that Stallman has a thirst for martyrdom...Stallman recognises the power that martyrdom contains. He uses Gandhi's scorpionic tactics extremely well.
I have come to think of any Dvorak story posted by Slashdot as meta-flamebait. They know it is just going to cause the comments to degenerate into a total circus of hatred.
They're not just flamebait, they're flamebait on purpose. The purpose of the dvorak flamebait articles is generating clicks on the articles in question, and generating the ad revenue linked with those clicks. This has even been admitted by dvorak (or one of the dvoraks, since it's likely to just be a name they assign to writers), and this admission of guilt has appeared on slashdot.
The key thing to learn about this is to never, ever, browse to a dvorak article, because that is exactly what they want you to do.
Better yet, if Xen would work properly with Win98, I could run fresh virtualized images for each app.
Win98 on current machinery is friggin FAST. Now, run each app in its own environment, with limited network access (network ONLY to host running virtualization). Instant win98 network with 1 "computer" for each program.
The fact that SUSE (and other distributions) have ran non-GPL stuff before seems to elude him.
r ce.html
Novell is even in the process of making the code more vanilla and has ripped out non-OSS stuff from the kernel, even though this might mean some hardware won't run anymore.
Also read the following:
http://www.novell.com/linux/microsoft/faq_opensou
It is fun/sad to see that the FUD is coming only from people who are 'pro OSS'. I start to think they are not pro anything. They are just anti M$.
For all those who think that Novell is suddenly the anti-christ, understand that they support more then just one OSS project:
http://en.opensuse.org/Novell_Supported_Projects
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Maybe he's thinking that they'll write a kernel module to enforce DRM and product activation. Possibly also using it to try and make Microsoft apps only work under SUSE.
"It ain't a war against drugs.it's a war against personal freedom" --Bill Hicks
Oh man, you almost had it. It is, actually, called Mono, and it could run almost every code written for