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Silverlight Released, Linux Version Coming
Today Microsoft announced the release of Silverlight 1.0 for Windows and Mac OS X. This cross-browser, cross-platform browser plug-in is fully supported and competes directly with Adobe Flash. Included in this release was the promise from Microsoft to support the 100% compatible Linux version, called Moonlight.
They also provide a complete list of the supported codecs. I hope that, though I'm never touching *light with a 10-foot pole, this move makes Adobe finally release a x86_64 version of Flash (yeah, we all hate those banners and such, but being able to watch youtube videos without hacks like nspluginviewer would be quite nice. Besides, my nspluginviwer-ed version of Flash SUX at playing real time streaming video...).
My 0.02 cents
...stick to open formats and Free code ;-)
.net to kill off the huge popularity of Java, especially now that Java is moving to GPL they are trying extra hard to kill it off.
They are trying hard to encourage
Note that Moonlight is being developed **outside** of Microsoft, although it has the support (not just verbally, but engineering support) of Microsoft. So it can't be killed quite that easy.
Remeber that the Mono project has already independently implemented large parts of Silverlight in their Moonlight implementation with little or no help from Microsoft. Microsoft's official support will definitely be helpful when it comes to test suites and some further details, ie. the "last few percent", but it has already been demonstrated that the community is entirely capable of implementing and maintaining this platform by itself.
Some strange withdrawal by Microsoft will not result in a significant loss of resources here, and will not get in the way of replacing the proprietary Flash platform with a more free alternative. Kudos to the Mono team -- they have played their cards well here.
I can't wait to see the EULA that comes with it - my money is on a legal backdoor
Like I'm gonna let Billy boy put his binary in my linux box.
Actually, if we are talking what they have done in the past:
* The first version will be done in completely open, to show "They" want to work with the
community.
* The next version will have a couple things that are different, but not necessarily documented, so it is difficult to "Know" exactly what is being done, people will still use it because it is not too problematic
* Future versions will continue this trend, until the MS version has completely broken compatibility with other OS systems, and it will be the other companies just aren't cooperating.
Scott Carr
Doesn't this sound like the history of the browser all over again:
Someone comes out with a technology that threatens Microsoft's dominance: Netscape.
Microsoft develops a multiplatform technology to defeat it: IE on Mac.
Microsoft incorporates it into its OS to get it into 90% of the PCs.
Once the competition is destroyed, it levels off development, and ends support on non-Windows platforms: IE on Mac.
It'll support *light on Linux/OSX until Flash is defeated.
Why is the entire front page populated with stories by kdawson? Did the rest of the "editors" quit or something? It'd be nice to have more of a mix of stories on occasion.
Strange???
What happens when they release an update and decide NOT to release the specs for the new features?
Then Moonlight devs get to learn what it's like to be WINE developers!
I would hope that Novell were awake enough to include actual licenses for Microsoft patents in last year's pact. I would hope that would protect Mono and Moonlight from patent-fu.
So far, what they've done is create "yet-another-MS-proprietary-format" to compete with the existing standard. Microsoft's new tool offers almost nothing technically innovative (at which I must say I'm shocked, shocked!) and exists merely to compete with Flash for the simple reason that Flash exists and Microsoft doesn't own it. There's no immediate financial benefit to MS from this, since they're giving it away (the sample is always free, right?)
I don't expect the Mac version of this to last past the point where this gets to 50% market penetration (Mac IE, anyone?).
This is another exercise in Microsoft suckage, straight up.
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It's not so much that I think it's evil - more that I find myself profoundly distrustful of Microsoft's motives.
I mean it's possible the leopard really has changed its spots this time. But that's not the smart way to bet.
Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
Why? All they need to do is make a point-and-click "silverlight director" and dictate that everybody must use that to create their silverlight files.
... they'd be killing their own market and give room for a competitor to arise.
Because they are marketing it as a programmable language in Javascript/C#/Ruby/Python
So now people can pwn my linux box by exploiting microsoft bugs ?
DRM. I am certain the Linux version will not play DRM'd content.
Open letter from Adobe to Matt
Dear Matt,
I'm so sorry but real-world companies can't survive on misguided idealism, and if you haven't noticed, we need some money to pay the salaries of our employees. This means we'll not just open source our player, which is already a de facto standard, and s result for which we paid millions upon millions and years of hard work to build.
In fact we've still not released the Flash 9 spec out there, and when we release it, it'll be full of errors and incomplete, just like the previous flash specs were.
We open sourced parts of our platforms strategically, but only enough to appeal to the OSS crowds, and ensure our platform is seen as a standard, and not enough so we lose control. As you know The Flash scripting engine will be part of Firefox 4. We also open sources the Flex framework and soon the compiler an Eclipse plugin. It didn't sell well anyway, so what else could we do.
Recently we announced that we'll embrace open standards like MPEG4 for our video codec, but what we forgot to mention is we'll still require that you buy our owns streaming servers for live streaming, since we intentionally don't support the standard streaming protocol all other MPEG4 videos stream in.
It's also possible we'll sue the authors of Gnash, if they ever start to matter (they don't now), since our specification of the Flash format specifically says you're not allowed to build players with it, just Flash file exporters.
Basically, it's business like any business for us and Microsoft. Drop the idealism and get on with your life.
Sincerely, Adobe.
The "good authoring tools" are the stumbling block. Flash is popular because it is easy to develop for (well, at least for simple projects like online animation). Any competitor has a rather high bar to hurdle to make their stuff easier and better than Flash (well, better isn't too hard, but easier...).
Also, there's the fact that everybody already has Flash, so you have to fight the market inertia to get a foothold.
I read the internet for the articles.
Flash does suck in your case, but at the same time *someone* likes to develop using it. Who are these mysterious developers?
Because there is absolutely no incentive. Look at all the reasons Flash is being used: ads, quick games, video, music, forms, etc. With the exception of ads, there is a totally free (open source) method that could work (java, ajax, svg, ogg, etc.). So then why would the "FOSS" community want to reinvent something?
While making a plugin is not so difficult, who would develop for it if there is no content for it? And if there was content for it, why would they want to move from their already existing platforms (Flash) and switch to something new?
Actually I've seen some Nokia devices that support Flash, I think one of the mini tablets also runs Linux. So Flash *could* be more widely supported, and I suspect it *eventually* will. ... I'll bet Windows embedded devices will support Silverlight. ... But again, without content it doesn't matter.
Windows still won't ship with an OGG codec. I also remember reading that OGG was notably more CPU-intensive (still true?). While I have no objections to OGG, I do wish it was more widely supported (especially in some more popular mp3 players).
*** That's the biggest kicker. *** I personally think major FOSS "developer" products are seriously lacking when it comes to multimedia compared to commercial products (Flash, Director, etc.). Even if there was an perfect plugin, the SDK and all related tools including deployment would take a serious effort to polish to be even remotely competitive with current offerings.
A great goal, but unrealistic. In the end the commercial incentive for Flash (or Silverlight) are what pushes it forward, not any form of openness or accessibility. If you can't make money out of it, I doubt it will be widely used or developed.
Ultimately it would be in everyone's best interest to use what (non-proprietary) plugin systems that already exist interfaced with already open standards/technology.
Linux Resources
Yeah, there's some real light at the end of the tunnel. Just look at the OOXML ISO fiasco.
I don't know what you put in your Wheeties pal, but some of us take the null hypothesis with Microsoft to be "They're trying to fuck us over somehow".
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I'd like to know what the people at Microsoft have against anyone else having a slice of the computer software pie. While I appreciate the idea of competition, Microsoft isn't about competing fairly. It appears they will not be content until they are the only software company left. Do they have so little confidence in their own ability to compete that they must drive everyone else into oblivion?
Just for the record, I despise Flash in all of its incarnations. Most web sites only use it for annoying ads anyway, so avoiding it is a small loss. But why Microsoft feels it has to drive Flash out of the market with their monopolistic efforts is beyond me.
"My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right." --Senator Carl Schurz (1872)
I smell is the usual Miguel spin. Moonlight is a prototype. We don't have a 100% compatible implementation! Moonlight will depend on Mono. Novell will invest capacity in Silverlight implementation. But Novell will not invest in Gnash. And will Moonlight be GPL? Read between the lines of Icazas blog entry. We know the games Novell plays in support of Open XML standardization and other Microsoft garbage. Ok, they are hired to do it. Silverlight looks promising. But it will take a few years and could well become a second XPS. I don't trust the current Microsoft patent models.
Man, if you think MS's problem is lack of developer talent, you clearly haven't met anyone who works for MS.
Why would they being doing this supporting other platforms thing? Here's my best guess:
1) knock Adobe Flash down from the top of the hill
-why? Adobe has nearly the same distribution channels as Microsoft since Flash is installed on nearly all computers sold. Flash is an API Microsoft does not control and its multimedia underpinnings are a threat to Microsoft's media file formats, ie control.
2) Makes Silverlight look like it's good to everyone in the industry by supporting the three major platforms, Windows, Linux, Mac.
-why? initial support from the industry for one thing. Linux is embedded in way too many devices to be ignored and Mac isn't doing too bad either. As stated by the parent, this won't last if Silverlight is successful in displacing Flash in the market. Microsoft has NEVER been a friend to anybody who's not a Windows-only vendor and they've never considered other platforms in their business model/methods other than how they threaten the cash flow of the Windows monopoly.
3) Make a platform to replace the browser neutral AJAX kits and eventually bring it all home to Windows-only.
-why? AJAX is spread all over the place and businesses are migrating old apps and/or creating new apps which run on any browser/platform. There is no NEED for Windows in this world and Silverlight brings that all home to Bill, Steve, and the friendly people at Microsoft.
Microsofts motives in everything they have done over the past 15+ years has been to keep Windows in a position of power and control. There has never been any desire to profit from cross platform software and nothing shows they've changed. This attempt at cross platform support is only a tool, or hammer if you will. It's going to smack everyone but Windows users on the head. But Microsoft has changed you might say. Just look at how they are manipulating the ISO process in attempts to get a proprietary format, MS-OOXML, as an international standard. They have not changed and Silverlight on Linux and Mac is nothing but a carrot hanging over the trap. There is no trusting of Microsoft and Novell is the fool for thinking once again, they can play in the pen with the wolf. IMO.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
I still consider this to be a bad idea, to use a closed source proprietary plugin for creating content on the web. Microsoft says they are supporting Linux, but this assumes Linux is the only operating system besides Windows people use. It leaves those who run FreeBSD and other OSs still pretty much in the same situation and leaves us in a similar predicament as we were before, proprietary closed source plugins that can only be used on paritcular OSs, locking people out of viewing web content on a broad range of other platforms.
Really we ought to be looking to improving the browser html/css/javascript/svg environment itself including SVG and SMIL and adding all the features it needs so it can complete with things like silverlight, and do so in a matter where it can be viewed using an open source software program. SVG and SMIL support has been coming along much too slowly in firefox even though the internet is being ruined by multitudes of proprietary flash content pages.
They want to kill off Adobe, not Linux.
I never said that. But a Microsoft programer are use to programming Microsoft Products on Microsoft OS's. If they did some say more programming for Linux I am sure they will go in some sections boy that was easy, much easier in windows, We should incorprate this feature or programming method into the next version of Windows/Visual Studios. As a primarly Linux/Unix developer when I have to do windows programming I always feel like I am dealing with more Black Boxes that tend to break, eg Call this library to get this information from the OS, vs. Open this virtual File and read in the information about the OS. It has its plusses and minuses, But with more experience with different platforms the better programers they become. I would say that a lot of Linux Developers stay away from Visual Studios and it hurts them too. Because they fail to learn what development platforms makes Windows better then Linux.
I know that MS has a lot of talented developers and a Lot of them will be able to code circles around me... But also I would be able to code circles around other MS developers. But what happends people get stuck into thinking the same way and keep recoding the same problems over and over again, while a different perspective will be able to fix the problems.
Sometimes there are problems that they didn't even know there was a problem yet.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Indeed, Microsoft has destroyed some of the best minds of our generation.
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
good for you. Nothings ever good enough unless it is under your terms, precisely, is it? I suppose you don't use the Linux kernel, it is GPLv2? Horror of horrors...
They want to kill off Adobe, not Linux.
Wow! Where have you been? Microsoft wants to kill-off everyone who isn't Microsoft.
"I once preached peaceful coexistence with Windows. You may laugh at my expense - I deserve it." Be's Jean-Louis Gass
this poster provides a good starting point. and this article. Basically both companies are looking to leverage more than just an in-browser animation scheme, rather another layer between the web and the desktop. (and of course the Google wants in on this too, right?) It's anyones chance to dominante.
Not everyone's going to install Silverlight just to view your site. If you're targeting your site at techies, go ahead, but if you're not then Flash is likely still the right move. Especially as you've got a deadline, you'd have to gamble the final 1.1 will be out of the door by then.
It's true there's some parallels, but Xaml is much more flexible.
Xaml at it's core is essentially an object instantiation language. It allows developers to declaratively create objects, describe their members, and relate them to other objects. As long as the objects referenced follow some simple rules, said Xaml is compiled down and loaded, either while building an application or on the fly, as may be the case with Silverlight.
It's handy when the UI and Codebehind for a Window or Canvas can be worked on independently by the designer and developer, and have both parts compile down to the same class. It also makes for some interesting solutions if you want to alter look or behavior after shipping.
...but I don't understand why Microsoft even needs its own closed source implementation when it's actively supporting an OSS implementation. Surely the OSS implementation could be ported to Windows, and probably will be anyway sooner or later.
The only reason for a closed source edition that I can think of are that Microsoft is using the OSS support for PR purposes only, and has future plans to make sure they're incompatible over time.