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Microsoft Hires Director of Linux Interoperability
AlexGr sends us to Todd Bishop's blog in the Seattle PI for news that Microsoft has brought someone aboard to serve as its Director of Linux Interoperability and head up the Microsoft/Novell Interoperability Lab. "...his name will be familiar to people in the open-source community. In an e-mail late Thursday night, a Microsoft representative said the role will be filled by Tom Hanrahan, who was most recently the director of engineering at the Linux Foundation, the group created through the recent combination of the Free Standards Group and the Open Source Development Labs."
Judas ! Go to the creationist museum where you belong.
NOW things will finally start getting better between MS and Linux!
Twinstiq, game news
Can you imagine how bad that guy gets razzed by his coworkers?!
...back in those days, it amounted to little more than a means to migrate from Netware to an NT domain. The Unix compatibility stuff that exists now amounts to about the same. I wonder what Microsoft has in mind with all this? It would be weird if it was more than "one way" compatibility.
Yet another Linux person that will work at MSFT for a short bit, then get the heck outta Redmond once he sees how screwed up things really are from the inside.
Evil is insidious.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Bill: Tom, I am your father.
Tom: Really?
Bill: No, but I hve tons of money for you!
Tom: Dark side it is!
I believe the title should be: Microsoft Hires Director of Linux Inoperability Slashdot should read through their posts more carefully in the future, so that typos like this doesn't happen.
That is what Microsoft would do if they were serious about interoperability with anyone. They'd support ODF -- natively, not through some third-party open source plugin. They'd drop OpenXML. And they'd stop lobbying governments who want to stardardize on a real document format.
Or, hell, send some developers over to the Wine project.
Since none of this is happening, I can only assume that this "Linux interoperability" guy is either a complete hypocrite, or is going to have no real power within the company.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
I have no idea why, but for some reason "Director of Linux Interoperability" brings to mind the US Drug Czar and the War on Drugs
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not entirely sure about the universe - Einstein
Cut the guy some slack, they're probably holding his family hostage. Seriously though, MS issue recruitment staff with MIB memory blanker gizmos. You meet, POOF!, and then believe them when they say "We are your friends! Ak. Akak Ak Ak!"
...Vista is just another Linux distribution. Buying Novell was the first step in establishing IP claims on Linux. The suits have already arrived to take away Linux...we just don't know it yet. This of course won't stop those of us who really know how Linux came about...but when Microsoft is done they will have the masses believing they invented it. Just my 2 cents. Hedghog
As director of Linux sue-ability?
I realize this was meant as "funny", but ... resist ... modding ... "flamebait" ...
Must
My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
And Brad Smith, senior vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary at Microsoft, is rumoured to have gotten quite concerned about this development. After reading case law on "duty of care" that an employer ought extend to employees he has arranged for Tom Hanrahan to immediately go on advanced "object avoidance course" which will be taught by crack martial arts instructors. Microsoft is refusing to confirm rumours that Hanrahan is currently in a Seattle gymn with 10 instructors & a number of pieces of "office furniture".
It would be good news.
If we lived in that universe where "Director of Linux Interoperability" actually meant what you think it means. Unfortunately, out in the REAL WORLD, that title actually means "Director of increasing the perception of interoperability with Linux system while actually making them less compatible."
So yeah, keep living in your dream world.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Microsoft had their own Unix back in the day:
Xenix
Didn't Microsoft and Sun sign a deal to "interoperate" a few years ago? Where has THAT gone?
BTW, Microsoft does not want to interoperate with Linux and OSS. They want it gone, so any "talk" about deals and smoke-mirror agreements will only flounder, stall, and drag on forever. Anybody who believe otherwise is just fooling themselves.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
I can't wait to read all sorts of interesting theories on how this will really work from people who have never been inside Microsoft, yet feel the need to 'enlighten' us with their ignorance. In order to help us positively identify people most participating in groupthink, please use one or more of the following memes so we can divvy out moderation points faster:
* Ballmer throwing chairs
* Embrace, extend, extinguish
* Clippy hate
* Funny BSOD jokes
In the meantime, I'm curious who took the job, because people will hate them for no reason now. Ah zealotry, without thee, what would I do on this site?
I'd say much sooner than that. These days Microsoft's cash cow is Office, not Windows. As GWB is having some trouble in maintaining his Google bomb, Microsoft will soon realize that MS-Office in Linux is a better business model for them than OpenOffice in Linux.
Would some of those who seem to have a brain built for more than just Pro Linux or pro Linux or anti- whatever rants PLEASE comment on whether they think this will be a good thing or a bad thing and why? because I don't know a thing about this person.
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
Anything else is just smoke and mirrors.
Reminds me of "We're from the government and we're here to help." To which the reply goes, "You're confusing me, which is it? You're from the government, or you're here to help?"
Microsoft having someone with the title of "Director of Linux Interoperability" is one of those euphemisms. He's not going to improve interoperability, but he'll be addressing interoperability. Much of the interoperability between Microsoft operating systems and Linux have happened despite Microsoft, not with Microsoft's help. They fought SAMBA, for example.
Please remember Microsoft's long history of polluting standards and interfaces. They buggered such standards as HTML and Java. They have everything to lose with interoperability, and very little to gain. If they believe in interoperability, they would not oppose the move to open document standards.
Best regards.
Competition fosters innovation. If M$ gets rid of the competition, they will have no innovation.
Well then, maybe the competition should start competing, don't 'cha think? Considering the "competition" can't even give their products away for free, I gotta think that the problem is with the competition, itself, not MS.
I don't respond to AC's.
I know that yes/no/maybe/haha weren't entirely useful as tags except for a quick laugh (not debating the inherent usefulness of tags at all, which I feel debatable).
itsatrap would be completely apropos here.
Just sayin'... the tagging system currently may as well be a checkbox list of categories. Not exactly user generated.
linuzz rocks
OMG MS copies Apple again
Slashdot = -1 Redundant, Asperger, kdawson FUD, Libertarian, and Linux
It's like advertising: by generating news related to both Microsoft and Linux nearly every day they want people to make an automatic association between the two names; since Microsoft didn't succeed in destroying Linux, they're trying to get the role of Linux's most important authority in the world, taking away public attention from true Linux distributors.
I'm pretty sure this is one of their main goals; don't know if it's the first or a secondary one though.
ReactOS isn't a Linux variant by any means. It's an attempt to reimplement Windows completely from the ground up, without using any Linux components.
Game! - Where the stick is mightier than the sword!
Microsoft doesn't play with words like that. Just think of all the genuine advantages windows provides to users through WGA.
Tom, if you happen to read Slashdot, just how many of Novell's 30 pieces of silver do you get?
Sera
Slashdot, where armchair scientists get shouted down and armchair theologians get modded up.
You have to understand what "interop" means.
The idea is a simple one. You want to lock people into your own platform while providing a migration path away from the other platforms. In short you want your customers to see all other platforms as legacy systems.
This is the entire process behind SUA, Identity Services for UNIX, and the like.
It is also the idea behind Samba, WINE, Mono, etc.
Thus, from a Linux perspective, while it would make my life easier to have more UNIX/Linux interop from Microsoft, what we really need to help Linux along is better Windows interop for Linux. This means Samba 4 (with AD DC support), ideally a DCE/RPC implementation that is network compatable with DCOM, better support of Word Documents in Abiword and OOo, and the like. In short, Linux needs to be able to interop with Windows on every level, while forcing Microsoft to play catch-up in this game.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Remember that when Microsoft was trying to get into the file/print/email server game, Novell was the leader in the field. But to win, Microsoft merely had to more or less match their functionality and throw in some price cuts and desktop tie-ins to sweeten the deal.
With Linux, this is harder. They can't use a price advantage to 'choke off the air supply'. Or can they? To me, that's what the Novell patent deal is all about (from MS's point of view, at least). To un-freeify Linux. Microsoft is confident that they can compete on a level playing field. After all, they have a huge starting advantage, plus they still have the ability to tie their server products to their desktop products. But they can no longer undercut on price. That is, unless they convince the marketplace that free Linux is illegal, and the only way to get Linux is to pay Novell's price. Then they can once again price Novell out of the market.
At least one of the Linux-esque ways of doing business is running servers for free, or at least without per-seat licensing. If that goes away, at least a large part of those Linux fans will lose some of their attachment.
Posted from my Android phone. Oh, I can change this? There, that's better...
This is like Microsoft Works(tm), isn't it?
Please stop stalking me, bro.
Exactly.
"Microsoft Hires Director of Linux Interoperability"
translates as
"Fox wants to interoperate with henhouse". All in the name of efficiency, of course. For the fox.
In my opinion, there is a lot of misunderstanding about Microsoft. People get confused, and think Microsoft is a software company that is abusive. But maybe a better explanation is that Microsoft is an abuse company that uses software as its vehicle to deliver abuse.
REAL managers can make a profit without being adversarial. Managers who have difficulty thinking carefully must work for abusive companies.
Correction. I should have said:
Foxes want to interoperate with penguins. Only to help the world, of course. And because foxes think penguins are cute. (Copyright Fox P.R. agency 2007)
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