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.Net On Android Is Safe, Says Microsoft
An anonymous reader writes "With Oracle suing Google over 'unofficial' support for Java in Android, Microsoft has come out and said it has no intention of taking action against the Mono implementation of C# on the Linux-based mobile OS. That's good news for Novell, which is in the final stages of preparing MonoDroid for release. Miguel de Icaza is not concerned about legal challenges by Microsoft over .Net implementations, and even recommends that Google switch from using Java. However, Microsoft's Community Promise has been criticized by the Free Software Foundation for not going far enough to protect open source implementations from patent litigation, which is at the heart of the Oracle-Google case."
Some of the Oracle patents relate to Virtual Machines in general and not just the JVM. So how can Mono be safe from Oracle?
Almost every single company that has had dealings with Microsoft has been stabbed in the back by them...
IBM : OS/2
Stacker : Doublespace
Spyglass : Mosaic
Sun : Java
Everyone : plays4sure (DRM servers shut down leaving purchases useless)
Go : Mobile technology (at least I think the company was called Go)
Caldera : DR-DOS
Novell : Wordperfect
How many times does this have to happen before people see a pattern and avoid partnering with Microsoft? The bigger players can survive the knife between the shoulderblades... the smaller players *if they eventually get a payoff* still usually end up dead anyway.
I use both by choice all the time. The .NET platform is leaps and bounds ahead of the Java platform in nearly every way.
Oh, that's right, Java is licensed under the GPL, so it's inherently better. I forgot, ideology trumps technical merit. Now, in typical slashdot fashion, mod parent Insightful and me Troll. Thanks, and have a good day.
Similes are like metaphors
even microsoft doesn't like .net and is moving away from it. why would anyone use something that is about to be deprecated?
Considering a major release of the .NET framework happened in April, I'm going to go ahead and call you misinformed or a huge troll.
They don't like .NET yet they keep pumping versions after versions of the .NET Framework, C# and Silverlight. Citation needed? I'm not understanding you well.
Why, is it too MonoTonous?
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
They aren't deprecating anything but they have ceased development on a few dynamic .NET languages like IronRuby.
Oh, that's right, Java is licensed under the GPL, so it's inherently better.
To be fair, a decent contingent on slashdot was always saying that Java wasn't open source enough, and in light of the recent Oracle-Google lawsuit, it turns out they were right.
In the context of this particular story, I'm not sure how .NET doesn't look better than Java -- you've got one's parent company saying they won't sue you (even if that's not a great guarantee) and one that's actually suing you right now.
Except that poetmatt is just throwing out FUD. He is intentionally misrepresenting the fact that Microsoft has stopped officially supporting development of things like IronRuby as deprecating the entire platform. The fact that it is even modded as insightful despite being obviously false is quite telling for Slashdot.
From the FAQ:
How much will MonoDroid Cost?
We have not yet announced the pricing for MonoDroid, but you should anticipate that the price will be in the same range as MonoTouch ($400 USD for individual users, and $1,000 for enterprise users).
How is MonoDroid licensed?
MonoDroid is a commercial/proprietary offering that is built on top of the open source Mono project and is licensed on a per-developer basis.
Using your sig line to advertise for friends is lame.
It half sits on top of Dalvik and half on top of their own adaptation layer for native linux. But yes, it's at least half tainted. :)
Well... to be fair, there is a difference between Oracle suing the GOOGLE company and Microsoft promising not to sue YOU (user/developer) for using the Mono implementation... mainly because Novell/Microsoft relation.
I wonder how far would Microsoft allow Google to go in implementing a C# compiler/interpreter in the same way they are doing it with java...
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
IE was purchased by Microsoft. They didn't do some dirty trick, they found a company making a product they liked and purchased them. Not just the rights to their product, the brought on the developers and all that.
DR-DOS wasn't a product that MS ripped off... It was a product that ripped off MS. MS-DOS launched in 1981. DR-DOS launched in 1989 and was version numbed to be the same as MS-DOS. They weren't breaking any laws or anything, but DR-DOS was designed to be their own DOS, compatible with MS-DOS.
Wordperfect lost on its own merits. It was the be-all, end-all of office programs. However the developers failed to keep it up, failed to improve it, and Office eclipsed it. You ever try using it recently (it is still around, still in development)? It is a pile of crap. It lost because there was a superior competing product. You know, how capitalism is supposed to work and all that.
I'm not claiming MS has never done anything underhanded. However people whine and bitch far too much. That a given product failed doesn't mean MS did anything wrong, it may just mean that the product sucked.
Below are the en.swpat.org analyses. Two of the biggest things in Java's favour are that they have distributed OpenJDK under GPLv2, with the implied patent grant that gives, and Oracle is a member of OIN and there are thus a bunch of GCC and Classpath packages they've promised not to use their patents against.
swpat.org is a publicly editable wiki, help welcome.
Expert in software patents or patent law? Contribute to the ESP wiki!
It is ISO/IEC 23270 (http://www.iso.org/iso/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=36768). That means it is not something under MS's control and just subject to their promises. Now that's not all of .NET, that is different, but comparing C# to Java and ignoring the face that C# is an open standard, like C++ and Java is not is a bit disingenuous.
It doesn't matter how much they assure that they won't go after free implementations. Without it written in legalese, irrevocable, it's a worthless statement.
What happens in, say, 5 years if/when Microsoft is feeling the pressure of competition? Let's say they're going bankrupt. Sound unlikely? Well, replace 5 years with 20 years. They'll find they have this lovely patent pool full of wonderful words which are potentially worth billions of dollars. Like every single example I can think of in the history of computing since 1980, of course they'll sue using their patents to draw out their death.
The same applies to any of the big names: Google (you're next), Oracle (already doing it), IBM (somehow never died), Sun (via Oracle), for starters. The nuclear weapon analogy holds nicely here too. The software patent mess is Mutually Assured Destruction. But amassing them and then saying "We won't use them"... what happens when your state collapses? Where do they go?
As long as your gnuts don't hurd
This is what Microsoft tried to do to Sun to get rid of their Java: Embrace -- Extend -- Extinguish /. is too short to really inform).
This is the sworn expert testimony in court in case Comes vs Microsoft of a mr. Ronald Alepin on 5 january 2007, about Microsoft's strategy in 1995: Groklaw transcript of Comes vs Microsoft document (page down a bit for the transcript).
(please read the whole thing for yourself. this quote here on
It's long ago, but maybe it can still be illuminating to read if you care about Microsoft's plans with their .NET platform and interoperability e.g. with Mono (I personally don't use .NET so I don't care, but your comment "..until Sun sued them for license issues.." nagged me as only partially true :-).
To be, or not to be: isn't that quite logical, Slashdot Beta?
Not sure where you're getting the "don't know how to program" crap. Java is the one with training wheels. C# has operator overloading, pointers (if you want 'em), closures, anonymous methods, covariance, contravariance, and a slew of other advanced features that require skill to properly implement. Not to mention LINQ + expression trees, which in itself is a reason to switch twice over.
.NET, but that's mostly a defense mechanism. At some point someone probably told you you were 1337 for using Java. The truth is that Java was made for people who would like to use C++ but can't understand pointers. C# has its share of idiots too, but it's got features for those of us who know how to code as well.
When it comes to strongly-typed JIT compiled languages, C# wins hands down. Java fans tend to look down on
I am a bit confused - what "any sort of work" are you doing that requires C++?
I can understand that certain things are easier in C++ due to the ability to more easily manipulate memory sections directly, but situations which absolutely require this are few and far between.
As well, .NET can invoke all parts of the Windows API via P/Invoke, as well as consume and surface COM interface implementations.
Except that Microsoft is *not* moving away from dynamic .NET languages. They just released a platform unifying and solidifying dynamic language support within the .NET Framework itself.
This support is head and shoulders above anything else. Imagine that the platform and not the languages actually has services for doing dynamic member lookup with advanced caching and global optimizations. Making a platform which generalizes how different dynamic languages such as EcmaScript, Ruby, Python and C# look up members is no small feat.
It means that the language implementations themselves shrink quite a lot.
What we have on one hand is *one* disgruntled ex-Microsoft employee being cited on Microsofts plans for the future. On the other hand we have concrete and recent actions by Microsoft which suggests that they are very much investing in making .NET a dynamic multi-language platform.
I have no doubt that working with implementing an "outside" language inside an organization like MS is an uphill battle. But I have real problems seeing this as a sign that MS is backing away from dynamic languages.
Reading slashdot one-liner: (irm http://rss.slashdot.org/Slashdot/slashdot).rdf.item | fl title,desc*
and with Windows 7, it appears (from what I've read) if you want do any sort of work, you still need to use C++.
You read wrong. You can program against any API* using C#. Mind you, C# can also be used in "unmanaged" (they call it "unsafe") mode - where you have access to pointers, pointer arithmetic, direct memory allocation etc.
All regular APIs are either COM or have already been wrapped or even re-implemented in .NET. .NET can easily interop with COM APIs.
I believe that the only place where you would want to drop top C/C++ would be for device drivers.
Reading slashdot one-liner: (irm http://rss.slashdot.org/Slashdot/slashdot).rdf.item | fl title,desc*
It doesn't matter. If you promise people you won't sue over something, you can't later change your mind and sue them. It's called promissory estoppel. If they tried, any competent judge would throw the case out before trial.
I can't say for 100% sure without examining their exact problem, but I would bet that your devs aren't very good and are trying to blame the tool rather than the craftsman. At least, I've never had problems solving similar problems with .NET. (Or Java or anything else, for that matter.)
Isn't this article about .NET running on Android? Is there going to be a Java or even C/C++ based stock exchange running on people's phones soon? It seems fairly clear that the OP was suggesting quality software of any scale could not be written in .NET.
I can hand-edit a java file and when I reopen the IDE, it'll pick up the changes. Try that in a Microsoft environment, and you'd better have a project backup.
Um, Visual Studio actually handles that just fine. So I think you're the one spouting off rubbish.