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Microsoft Open Sources CoreCLR, the .NET Execution Engine
An anonymous reader writes: As part of Microsoft's continuing project to open source the .NET framework, the company has announced that CoreCLR, the execution engine for .NET Core, is now available on GitHub. CoreCLR handles things like garbage collection, compilation to machine code, and IL byte code loading. The .NET team said, "We have released the complete and up-to-date CoreCLR implementation, which includes RyuJIT, the .NET GC, native interop and many other .NET runtime components. ... We will be adding Linux and Mac implementations of platform-specific components over the next few months. We already have some Linux-specific code in .NET Core, but we're really just getting started on our ports. We wanted to open up the code first, so that we could all enjoy the cross-platform journey from the outset."
Because, you know, open sourcing by the devil has to be evil! :-)
In all seriousness though, does this make .NET more open than Java? In other words, RMS-acceptable?
My Stack Overflow user
If they're CLI, yeah, you'll be able to. You could already do that using mono. The problem is GUI applications that use WinForms which is not open-source and probably won't be for a looong time.
MS likes Linux as a server, on Azure.
https://github.com/dotnet/core...
https://github.com/dotnet/core...
If you weren't so hung up on flogging a dead horse for mod points, MS has covered patents and licensing in the codebase itself.
... when I see a working fork in the wild. Like mysql mariadb. When I see that ppl or companies can do that, I will believe it is open source. Interesting times ahead :-)
Aren't guys like you tired of bitching about Microsoft... for fucks sake, they are in the process of releasing their entire toolchain (from the bottom up) under the MIT licence.
Promissory Estoppel makes it legally binding, new CEO or not.
It looks like Mono has support for WinForms. I've never used it though, and usually used GTK# for GUI development on Linux.
Where did this myth that looking at code would expose you to legal issues come from? Has any court case actually gone through which hinged on a developer "poisoning" themselves for all eternity by looking at a competitors code base? I certainly haven't heard of any - even the original Compaq team did clean room implementations of the IBM Bios purely as a legal belt and braces, it wasn't based on any legal rulings in place.
Xamarian Mono or it's predecessor Ximian Mono. This is both a good and bad thing because while they're releasing the code, why aren't they working with Xamarian since they've already got a cross platform .NET environment? Or is this the old Microsoft with the Embrace, Extend, Eradicate mentality we're seeing here?
I've used Mono for a long time and while it doesn't have all the frameworks, it's great if you want to C# code and go cross platform. It's still .NET 4 compatible and things like WPF aren't in there so YMMV
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
Or they stop trying to license patents they hold on technologies that Linux uses. That would be a great gift for FOSS.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
They'd better not give up on Windows. With OSX and Linux both being Unix-like, NT is the only major alternative OS for Unix-haters.
The problem is not WinForms, but WPF. An increasing amount of applications use WPF because WinForms is considered 'deprecated' by Microsoft and people are encouraged to use WPF instead, which is the new 'hot stuff'.
I am not really here right now.
The GPL would have put a lot of other people off - part of the point of the CoreCLR is so you can push out a custom CLR with your own app.
WinForms has worked fine on Linux for a long time. WinForms in Mono. Even better if you declare a folder named "C:" and then declare 5-6 folders named "Program Files", "Program Files (x86)", "Users", "AppData", etc. under that. If you declare the right folder scheme, a large percentage of Windows applications will run perfectly on Mono as is.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Aren't guys like you tired of bitching about Microsoft... for fucks sake, they are in the process of releasing their entire toolchain (from the bottom up) under the MIT licence.
Parent is actually insightful. Naturally, I didn't RTFA, but the summary should have mentioned the license. I assumed this was yet another MS "open source" release under one of their shitty proprietary licenses (you know, the kind of "open source" that is so restrictive it practically comes with an NDA).
Using a Free license like MIT actually makes this more than an empty gesture. Yes, I actually confirmed the LICENSE.txt on the github project is MIT License.
Not this time, the new guy has decided that selling Windows is no longer the lock-in platform that makes us all buy Microsoft stuff.
Now, the Microsoft stuff they want use to all buy is services, and that means they have to supply said services across every platform possible.
So, open source .NET in the hope that it'll be cheaper to port it (ie you'll do it for them) and then all those lovely .NET apps that use things like Azure and Microsoft Ads will be ported to Linux and Mac and Microsoft can reap the revenue from more people consuming their services.
Its the same story really, only this time the lock-in has shifted slightly away from Windows.
Not anymore. Unix-haters now have this systemd operating system designed for them.
Just think if MS would have done this over a decade ago when they released C# / .NET. It could have nearly replaced Java. I could see 3rd party "standards" created for widgets that would be cross-platform (like Swing, etc, for Java), that people could use to create their cross-platform windowed GUI type apps. The formal Windows APIs would be used for people wanting to create full blown Windows-only apps. However all the core functionality (non-gui stuff) would be cross-platform and if written properly could have driven both the "Swing"-ish community created GUI, as well as the official Windows GUI stuff.
Better known as 318230.
The new Windows is the cloud, or Azure as they call it. They want you to write your GUI for a mobile/web/whatever device and then have it connect to all-Microsoft stuff on Azure, along with Microsoft adverts and Microsoft appstore etc.
They've basically stopped believing that Windows is the only platform that gives them lock-in. Now all platforms will be lock-in!
This is why I don't like developing for Microsoft's stack. They seem to want to throw everything out every few years and start over.
Then again, it seems like the web business is like that, too. Damn. Doesn't anyone write non-disposable code any more?
People are never as simple as their stereotypes. This applies equally to Christians, Muslims, and Emacs-lovers.
Nice ad hominem. Not posting this anonymously, nor am I a Microsoft booster. Now will you go check your facts? It is indeed MIT licensed (as been cited a dozen times above), and does have a patent promise attached. What more do you want? Yes, there could be some clever devilry hidden about somewhere, but on its face it seems pretty legit and straightforward.
If you declare the right folder scheme,
What does this mean? Create directories? Or is this some strange disease you get along with mono?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The .NET runtime and compilers are unique, though, so it makes much more sense to open those up.
Other platforms have fine C/C++ compilers. The MS compiler is not needed there. All you have to do is write ANSI C/C++ and - yay! - you're portable. In fact, note how Microsoft is actually working to improve other compilers' integration with Visual Studio, so they can more easily target Android and iOS, which is very cool.
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
Keep in mind that, even with new APIs introduced, the old stacks still continue working just fine. WinForms or WPF apps will still run on Windows desktop machines decades from now, just like native Windows applications are still using Windows API calls written decades ago.
Also, despite rumors to the contrary, WPF is still being actively developed, although it's probably fair to say it's "peaked" as a technology, and is now transitioning into a maintenance mode. I'd have no qualms about creating a new WPF project tomorrow - so long as you know you're only targeting the Windows desktop. There are benefits to using a mature technology, and WPF is pretty mature at this point.
You really only need to use the new stack (WinRT) if you're planning to do cross-platform stuff across the entire Windows ecosystem (Metro/Surface/Mobile).
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
Now make the whole Visual Studio suite available for free to home users.
You might want to check out Visual Studio 2013 Community Edition... It's the same thing as VS2013 Professional; it's free until your "hobby" has 5 employees or $1 million in revenue
If it had been GPL i might have cared.
Because the only "free" license options that matter are the ones you care about. Yes Comrade Commissar, we will comply with your thought police party line or whatever #fileitunderomfgurdumb
God forbid Microsoft be the one to do something cool.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
WinForms is not "deprecated". They merely introduced what they thought would be its replacement (WPF). The replacement was inadequate because:
- It was only marginally compatible with existing WinForms code
- It was radically different and required scaling a very steep learning curve, which is detrimental to development deadlines. This slowed its adoption drastically.
- It didn't offer anything truly useful that couldn't be done with WinForms and a lot of glue code (developed decades ago, and is now battle-hardened production code)
Then they backpedaled on the replacement, and introduced the replacement's replacement (HTML5 and JS). The replacement's replacement was inadequate because:
- When you're used to working with strongly-typed languages, Javascript is a step backwards. This is even more true when you're working on a non-web app.
- HTML5 is a pain to work with in a non-browser situation. This is likely because HTML5 is purpose built to work within a browser window. Ditto for Javascript, really.
- There's no way in hell you can interface with years of tried-and-true libraries because they don't publish endpoints that Javascript can use. This is not a viable option for LoB development, which is what most MS-stack programmers are.
Now they've backpedaled on the replacement's replacement. And they've introduced the replacement's replacement's replacement ("Universal" apps). The jury is out on this one. Unless it allows something similar to WinForms-style event-driven programming techniques, it's likely to fail. That's really the big sticking-point for most MS-stack developers. There's nothing that comes close to being as useful with as easy a learning curve as the hassle-free, automatic callbacks ("events") built in to WinForms.
To be honest, WinForms works just fine and will continue to do so for a long time. Universal apps will have their niche, and may even be an adequate replacement for WinForms, but that remains to be seen. I'm actually hoping for it at this point. I want some successes and some progress out of Redmond instead of another failure or another not-ready-for-primetime research project.
Now make the whole Visual Studio suite available for free to home users.
They did... The 2013 Community Edition was released a couple months ago and includes all the languages and even supports the Visual Studio plugins. It's not Ultimate, but can do pretty much everything a home user would need. The older express versions have been free for years too but didn't support plugins.
Given that you haven't stopped using the tired $ = S replacement in "Microsoft" almost 12 1/2 years after it was summarily called out as being childish and stupid (http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2002/07/22/m) I seriously doubt your "5 years after" claim.
It's relatively nice as far as VMs go, better designed than the JVM. This was a piece of good engineering work from Microsoft and I'm glad they're opening it. Welcome to the new world, MS guys. You don't seem to be acting quite so black and white anymore. Good on you.
And to the naysayers... well, it's a start. Be kind.
That is all.
Oh, that promise is legally binding? I don't think so. And CEOs change.
Yes, it is binding. Legal estoppel is the term. It is used when you act in good faith on a promise. It is in fact one of the strongest contract types you can imagine, because it is considered a one-sided contract that you do not even have to accept (like you do with e.g. license terms). If you can show that you acted on the promise, a patent case against you will be dismissed.
Reading slashdot one-liner: (irm http://rss.slashdot.org/Slashdot/slashdot).rdf.item | fl title,desc*
Except that people are willfully ignoring the massive patent exception to the MIT license. Even you gloss over it. At least the terms of the GPL are clearly spelled out, you don't know what will happen if you intentionally or even accidentally cross Microsoft's very limited patent grant.
It's not they're giving up Windows. The entire PC desktop market is slowly dying and many things it did are now being done on tablets and phones and elsewhere instead.
PC will become developers' and designers' workstation and nothing else, so Microsoft is probably trying to make its development toolset as popular as possible. It's the only area which won't be affected in foreseeable future.
I do... but then my customers are public sector (police, EMS) who can;t afford to keep replacing their systems every few years.
This is why I advocate multiple tier applications, like the MVC boys but without their "all-in-one project" mentality. Then you can write your server side stuff in a mature, reliable language and give some kids an API that they can use to build flashy GUIs in flash or javascript or whatever fashionable toy they like this month.
And, strangely enough, everybody is happy with this approach - the kids who get to play with new toys, the elders who get to keep a solid application running, and the bosses who get reliability and flashy at the same time!
So throw away your MVC frameworks and templates and embrace the service architecture.
There's already a very strong Java killer on the market.
Its name is Oracle.
You nailed it on the head. MS can only benefit by getting developers to push their product. By making it available on all platforms they will maintain and even grow the DEV base they have. I've developed in many platforms and I have found that for businesses MS offers the best set of tools. Migration from one version to another has always been smooth for me especially if I continue to work with the same .NET Framework version. Even migrating from one major .NET version to another is usually smooth.
The beauty of a library like .NET is that it is feature rich and very secure as long as it's patched when updates are made available. For the MS and Apple it's easy to make sure updates are pushed to clients. As for Linux I'm not sure how that works outside distributions that do not offer automatic updates.
I am aware of the Open Source / Free Software split. I also know that MIT/X11 is not a copyleft license. Let's not confuse this issue with facts. I don't really care what license they're releasing it under. That Microsoft can do this, not to a chorus of enraged howls, but to people pooh-poohing it as "too little too late," means that software freedom has won. I'm just saying though, it's probably a little premature to take RMS behind the shed. Winning is one thing, but there's no kill like overkill. Personally, I wouldn't cry if proprietary software stopped being a thing; I get paid either way.
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
They're just trying to help you. Every time you use $ in Microsoft's name, your argument loses credibility. You look childish, and therefore your argument looks childish, and people will simply ignore you. We know Microsoft has a lot of money, and like nearly every other company on the face of the planet, they are trying to make more. This should not be a surprise to you...
Does this mean Microsoft has developed cancer?
Seriously, while recent moves in this regard have been good, only a fool would ignore history. Microsoft, for as long as it has existed, has done countless morally dubious things in order to maintain control. The history is all right there for the googling. Just because they do a couple Good(tm) things doesn't magically mean they have suddenly realized the errors of their ways and are doing a 180. You can't erase ~40 years of assholry.
Based on the moves Microsoft has done lately, I will move my needle from "completely distrust" to "MAYBE it's not a trap" but still nowhere near the realm of "trustworthy"