De Icaza Regrets Novell/Microsoft Pact

Ian Lamont writes "Novell Vice President and GNOME architect Miguel de Icaza sounded off at a MIX 08 panel on a number of topics. First, he claimed that he was 'not happy' with Novell's cross-patent licensing agreement with Microsoft, saying that if he had his way, the company would have stayed with the open-source community. He also said that neither Windows nor Linux are relevant in the long term, thanks to Web 2.0 business models: 'They might be fantastic products ... but Google has shown itself to be a cash cow. There is a feature beyond selling corporate [software] and patents ... it's going to be owning end users.' He also tangled with Mike Schroepfer, a Mozilla engineering executive, about extending patent protection for Moonlight to third parties. However, de Icaza did say that Novell has 'done the best it could to balance open-source interests with patent indemnification.' We discussed the beginnings of the deal between Microsoft and Novell back in 2006."

Comments

Web 2.0 eh?

[serviscope_minor]

First .NET, now Web 2.0 (I hate that phrase). He knows a bandwagon when he sees one.

But I still fail to see how Web 2.0 will make an operating system irrelevant. The browser has to run on something. The server has to run on something too. And with the talk about "local web 2.0 apps", they might even be the same machine. Then you'll really need a good OS to schedule and mediate the needless and vast layers of extra complexity.

Re:Web 2.0 eh?

[ComputerSlicer23]

I think he means this in the same way that Marc Andreessen meant it back in ~1996 or so when he talked about making the Browser as the new platform. In same ways, the way Java is a platform, and makes the OS "irrelavent". Essentially, all of them see Web Applications as the destroyer of coupling and vendor lock-in (well at least to Vendor desktop software, you'll be just as locked in to the Web 2.0 applications if they have your data, and won't let you share or mix and match). The thought being that, as long as the OS/platform has a decent Web Browser, it doesn't matter if it's Linux, FreeBSD, QNX, Windows XP/Vista, or MacOS. The experience you have with Google Mail is mostly derived from the quality of the browser implementation of specific technologies, and Google's ability to deal with the sub-standard aspects of that implementation across browers. It's pretty much identical to me on my Windows machine, on my Linux machine, or my MacOS machine. Thus the OS is irrelevant.

I'm not sure I believe in the mindset of these folks. They are moving off into a land of even less reliable, less robust, and less secure. However, having control of the central server, and only being dependent upon the browser and less dependent upon DLL's upon a remote machine is interesting. However, I'm not convinced that in the long run it'll be a viable solution. I really like owning my data. I really like having it all work off line. I know work is being done in those areas, it'll definitely be interesting.

Again, the point of this isn't the the Operating system will be less useful, or necessary. It is just that any good user agent will get you access to enough "applications" that are good enough, it won't matter what Operating System you run. Any "native" OS applications that aren't browsers could just as easily be replaced with Web 2.0 applications, and move along with life.

Not that I agree with any of it, it's merely my explaination of the perspective I think those folks are bringing to the problem.

Kirby

Re:Web 2.0 eh?

[msuzio]

I remember when Marc and some other bigwigs demoed their initial vision for Netscape 4.0 to a firm I was with in 1996 (maybe they just called it "Communicator", I don't remember the exact package we were being sold on). It looked like a complete desktop environment, the browser went full-screen and suddenly widgets were flying all over and we were pretty much being shown a WebOS.

I have never seen an audience so under-whelmed and outright scared. They just could not deal with the notion that Netscape was proposing that the OS was irrelevant. "But... but... where's my Windows desktop?".

They left essentially being told "no, please don't work on this -- we wouldn't want it". I had the strange feeling they heard that a lot, and whatever this concept was it died pretty stillborn. The version of Communicator they finally came out with was far far less ambitious than the demo I saw that day.

GNOME going in too many directions

[lotzmana]

To me de Icaza was always the leading technologist of GNOME. Sadly he went into a direction that contributed to the loss of focus of what GNOME is. With indemnification or not, many of the main contributors to GNOME will not include anything that uses Mono.

Sun for certain will not work with a direct competitor to Java. Red Hat will rightfully avoid including something that requires them to go in bed with Microsoft over patents.

Linux kernel development shows that big free software projects need both enthusiast but also corporate contributors. So GNOME, not unlike the kernel, garnered support by companies like Sun, but also countless small guy contributors. With Mono de Icaza put powerful centrifugal forces that work against GNOME.

just my .02$

Re:Poor judgement

[mabhatter654]

People at Microsoft that spun the deal are grinning ear-to-ear right now... he's making them very happy! Microsoft successfully "collared" a once 100% closed source company from embracing open source business and they gave them enough money to buy the second most successful Linux vendor and "collar" them too.

He just realized what slashdot "jerks" were saying from the start. Any Novell open source is "fruit of the poisoned tree" to the community. Even previously open projects they worked on like samba were in serious trouble of being hijacked by MS IP. (note how MS tried to hijack them in the EU settlement after trying to pay off Novell failed) Novell can only "share" stuff like Moonlight and Mono with other COMPANIES that have Cross-license agreements with MS... SCO, Apple, IBM, etc. Even if they write stuff from scratch (they're not covered for copying MS technology either!!) it's always considered "poisoned" because nobody outside Novell can prove that MS IP wasn't looked at to develop the tech. (That's what SCO started suing IBM for at the beginning) The agreement they signed didn't allow them to DEVELOP technology WITH Microsoft, only not to have their customer sued for using the products Novell provided. He's realizing that's a BIG difference to what he was selling when telling every body the deal was so great.

In short the suits "above" him knew this up front, what the deal really meet and they took the money anyway. He's the only person "surprised" by this.

Re:Ah. I see.

[DarkProphet]

Oh, well, that just makes it all better now, doesn't it? Miguel says he's sorry, guys. Will you forgive him?
<Engage flame retardant vestments of the pious>
No. I swear this idiot thinks he is the next Linus or something. He has made one stupid decision after another in regards to Microsoft and pseudo-MS technology, and now its biting him in the ass. His stupid mistakes are the reason I can no longer run SuSE in good conscience. I hope MS ends up shoving it up his ass and Novell takes a hit for their trouble. Thats what they get for screwing up my fave Linux Distro.

OTOH, if it wasn't for their collective ignorance, I'd have never discovered Kubuntu, which totally rocks. So, thanks Miguel for being a sellout. You have been assimilated and I have been freed. Have a nice day.

Re:Not slashdottish

[Amtiskaw]

Seems to me his comments relate specifically to Novell's patent deal with Microsoft, not his efforts to produce free software implementations of Microsoft's stuff.

I'm always disappointed when I see the abuse heaped on de Icaza by the Slashdot crowd, simply because he doesn't quite hate Microsoft enough. The guy has spent years developing free applications, and has likely written ten times more open source code than his detractors will ever produce. If you actually read his opinions or listen to him speak, it's clear that he is committed to the ideals of free software, he just doesn't buy into the whole partisan "micro$oft sux!" attitude. I wish people would get some perspective on this issue and learn that you can disagree with someone in an informed manner without resorting to childish name-calling. That kind of behavior reflects far worse on the abusers, and confirms the wider perception of Slashdot geeks as childish and belligerent fundamentalists.

Microsoft's dominance is a fact, we (e.g. the free software community) may not like it, but we have to deal with it. De Icaza's stance is that people will use .NET and Silverlight regardless of whether they are available for Linux or not. If they're not available then it is Linux that will suffer, as it will not be able to offer as rich a user experience as Windows. So he has undertaken the job of helping produce compatible open source implementations for Linux (and other OS's). I don't imagine many people have a problem with this in concept. It's no different from what the Wine project is doing, and they don't seem to get keelhauled for being Microsoft shills every time they are mentioned on Slashdot.

His more controversial stance is that suggesting that the Microsoft technologies like .NET, Silverlight and OOXML are actually quite good, and that free software developers should make use of them to develop software, instead of just seeing them as a way to help migration away from Windows. This I have difficulty with. I support open standards, and while parts .NET are standardised, their development is hardly open in the way say HTML or C++ is open. But in truth, the free software community has failed to provide a real alternative to technologies like .NET or Silverlight. For example, where is the open standard alternative to Flash and Silverlight? Sure, a combination of SVG, JavaScript and a few other things might get you a similar level of functionality, but the end-to-end ecosystem of a coalesced product, browser plug-ins, developer tools, examples and learning material just isn't there, despite the community having had years to produce it.

Ultimately, it isn't good enough to say to users and developers, you can choose between great proprietary solutions and mediocre open ones. Free software needs to be as good as or better than non-free software if it is to succeed. If it isn't, then most people will inevitably choose the proprietary solutions and free software developers will have to clone them to keep up. So if people don't agree with Miguel de Icaza, then maybe they should concentrate less on attacking him and more on producing great open solutions that will blow Microsoft and everyone else's out of the water.