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Top 25 Hottest Open-Source Projects at Microsoft Codeplex
willdavid writes "Via CNet, a link to a blog post with the top 25 most active open-source projects on Microsoft's Codeplex site. As the CNet blogger notes, 'Codeplex is interesting to me for several reasons, but primarily because it demonstrates something that I've argued for many years now: open source on the Windows platform is a huge opportunity for Microsoft. It is something for the company to embrace, not despise.'"
Anyone else have a bad feeling abut this?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Have you read the rest of the license? No MS fanboy here, but it is not exactly a draconian piece of legalese.
There are much better ways to attack MS. Try citing the company's track record of failing to observe laws, failing to deliver promised functionality, and failing to promote innovation in their dedicated developer base through patent threats, aggressive devaluation->buy-out tactics, questionable attempts at political influence (open standards in California anyone?)...
Then pose a question like, "Why would an open source developer choose to get into bed with a company like that?"
Just citing the license is a pretty weak argument especially if you have read it.
Regards.
It's probably because of braindead installers that expect an EULA.
I actually filed a bug about this on FileZilla and it was fixed (I think I filed against 2.29 and it was fixed in 2.30).
If it's happening to $YOUR_FAVORITE_FLOSS_PROJECT, then file a bug stating that the installer violates GPL.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Cry all you want about their OS's - they certainly have room for improvement. Their development tools are top notch. To be honest I do with they'd port an industrial strength CLR env to Linux along with all their class libraries, and Visual Studio/Orcas. It would be a ridiculously large undertaking but it would be god damn sweet to develop with MS tools on other OS's.
There's nothing wrong with open-source software that only runs on MS products. In fact, it's a step in the right direction. Consider that in the past, if you wanted some custom app on Windows or some custom VB macro for Excel, you had to buy it or pay some developer to create it. A free repository of open-source MS only apps can only benefit the Windows world the same was OSS helped *nix, and maybe drive down the cost of running a Windows only environment.
So "Open Source" now means it has to compile and run on all platforms?!?!?
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Contrary to popular belief, coding is not all free blow-jobs and beer. Those things cost MONEY!
I think it's pretty obvious. Microsoft wrote their own licenses because they don't want to be at the mercy of the FSF, and their willingness to alter license terms to suit their political agendas. This is the same reason Apple, Sun, Mozilla, Apache, and many others have their own licenses as well.
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What's the point of using open source software if you have to buy some expensive closed source package to use it. Such as SharePoint, Excel, IIS, Vista, etc. Open source only gives you all the advantages of open source if the entire software stack is open source. Otherwise, you can't modify the software, and you aren't free to fix all the bugs that you encounter.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
At least one of the listed projects, IronPython, runs with no problems on Mono. .NET targetted projects.
I assume the same can be said for much of the other
BTW, mose projects on SourceForge run on Linux ONLY. I guess the reason is to lock people into Linux, according to your dufus logic.
-- "I never gave these stories much credence." - HAL 9000
More about the issue in my parent post: There is more than one license.
The Microsoft Limited Permissive License (Ms-LPL) says, in part: "(F) Platform Limitation- The licenses granted in sections 2(A) & 2(B) extend only to the software or derivative works that you create that run on a Microsoft Windows operating system product."
Be very, very careful. If some of the Ms-LPL code is mixed with real open source code, there can be a license violation.
Ok, they rely on propietary products, but that doesn't mean they are useless to the Open Source Community.
See, it's open source, so porting any of those projects to other systems is quite simple and it's nothing compared to having to reverse engineer everything.
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Ale
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Another addition to my parent post: The Microsoft licenses are ALREADY causing confusion and dissension. See the anger and hostility in the discussions below.
The Microsoft Permissive License (Ms-PL) says in the sub-heading: "This license governs use of the accompanying software. If you use the software, you accept this license. If you do not accept the license, do not use the software."
Some of the people commenting in the discussions below are reading only what they believe are the license terms, and not seeing the sub-heading quoted above, which is ANOTHER license term, even though it is not formatted that way.
Again, the license says, "If you USE [my emphasis] the software, you accept this license."
Microsoft's multiple licenses with confusing formatting are already causing harm to the open source community. And Microsoft is just getting started with this.
You might have a (weak) point, but doesn't most of what you are saying boil down to "there are some open source advocates in the belly of the beast that should be encouraged."? That's not really saying much IMO.
Microsoft has such a long history of deception and other bad practices it should make any intelligent person suspicious of their intentions here. It was only a few months ago that they were threatening to sue the open source community. I know it's been said to death, but the bottom line is that if Microsoft as a company really wanted to embrace open source, and work with the open source community, the very first step is open file formats and cross-platform compatibility.
How can anyone trust Microsoft's open source efforts when at the same time they are fighting tooth and nail to eliminate any hope of open file formats and tying all of their open source projects to Windows? I know you are trying to be positive here, but isn't this just a tad naive of you as well? There simply is no reason to believe that this isn't just the same old divide and conquer marketing game from Microsoft. At least not yet.
Windows might have to go open source eventually just to remain relevant, but Microsoft will have to be dragged kicking and screaming to this conclusion, and it will likely take years. At a bare minimum, my expectation is that major structural and managerial changes will have to occur at Microsoft before any of that comes to pass, if it ever does.
Balmer would have to be fired for starters.
Why do you think Mono needs to run programs written for .NET/Windows? G++ can't compile many programs produced by Visual Studio, but I doubt you think G++ "will never be a solution unless Microsoft decides to support it". Why do you treat Mono differently?
.NET/Windows, just like G++ isn't intended to compile working programs that use the Windows API. Mono is great for Linux-only or cross-platform software projects, just like G++ is great for Linux-only or cross-platform software projects. Mono works great for projects that aim for compatibility with it, and G++ works great for projects that aim for compatibility with it.
Mono isn't intended to run programs written for
You're biased against the Common Language Infrastructure because it was created by Microsoft. I understand, because I hate Microsoft too, (I use only Linux on my desktop) but the CLI is a really great idea, and Mono is a really fantastic project. Give it a fair chance! Don't write it off just because it can't do something it's not intended to do!