Posted on 07/27/2007 5:16:42 AM PDT by ShadowAce
Microsoft wants more open source software to run on Windows. Microsoft also wants its own Open Source Initiative (OSI) approved license. Perhaps they really can get along.
On the software side, Microsoft today announced a partnership with open source solution vendor SpikeSource to eventually certify all of SpikeSource's SpikeIgnited solutions on the Microsoft Windows platform.
The move could make dozens of popular open source solutions available to Windows users in a fully supported manner. SpikeSource solutions include the gambit of content management, CRM and collaboration solutions. The first SpikeIgnited solution being made Windows-certified is the Drupal content management solution. Throughout the second half of 2007, SpikeSource plans on rolling out additional offerings.
SpikeSource noted that there are many challenges associated with getting solutions originally running on Linux to run and be supported on Windows.
"Some challenges are specific to the OS; for example, management and monitoring functionality needed to change to take advantage of Windows Services, WMI and other Windows administrative features," Dominic Sartorio director of product management of SpikeSource, told internetnews.com.
"There are also interoperability issues, such as single sign-on. We needed to make adjustments to work well with ActiveDirectory instead of OpenLDAP, for example."
The partnership with Microsoft will help, though, in making it all work. Sartorio added that Microsoft's interoperability lab has been very supportive, freeing up resources as needed to provide guidance and point SpikeSource to the right tools.
The new partnership with SpikeSource does not, however, include any Microsoft indemnification component to this collaborative effort. Microsoft has alleged that open source software infringes more than 235 Microsoft patents.
A Microsoft spokesperson explained that SpikeSource is overseeing the certification. Customers of Windows-certified products from SpikeSource receive support, updates and maintenance for the SpikeIgnited solution, including middleware and application software. SpikeSource partners receive training on SpikeIgnited solutions while the Windows operating system is sold and supported by Microsoft.
The partnership also does not have any direct financial component. The Microsoft spokesperson noted that the agreement is for certification and collaboration to bring new open source applications to market on the Microsoft Windows platform. It does not include monetary investment on the part of either company.
Microsoft today also launched a new site intended to provide even more information about Microsoft's open source plans.
Among those plans, according to the Microsoft spokesperson, is the intention by Microsoft to submit the Microsoft Shared Source licenses to the OSI for approval. Such an approval would mean that the Microsoft licenses would be considered to be bona fide open source.
Microsoft's Shared Source Licenses were simplified in 2005 down to three core licenses: The Permissive License (Ms-PL), The Community License (Ms-CL) and the Reference License (Ms-RL). At the time they were originally released, Microsoft earned rare praise from the open source community.
Don’t believe MS. This is just a placation stall tactic........
Embrace, Extend, Extinguish...
Keep your friends close....Your enemies even closer.........
> Keep your friends close....Your enemies even closer.........
No one should be surprised at Microsoft's activities with regard to Open Source.
Microsoft exists for two purposes, both stated clearly by Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer, multiple times over the years:
The second purpose was stated in 1976 by Bill Gates, in response to the hobbyist community (the original "open source" movement) believing that hardware is valuable, and that software was essentially a support function for the hardware, and should be available to all at nominal charge. Gates vowed to crush that belief, by inverting it: make hardware a commodity, and sell software at outrageous profits.
And he specifically vowed to destroy the hobbyist / open-source community.
Those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it.
I don’t have a problem with #1.
I have a really big problem with #2......
#1 is fine. It's annoying at times, if one believes that moral scruples and fierce competitive business practices are not necessarily mutually exclusive. But so be it, MS doesn't give a rat's ass what anyone thinks of their business practices, and their stockholders enjoy ever-increasing return on their investment. I have no argument with that.
#2 -- Bill Gates' vow -- to destroy the hobbyist / open-source community -- is well-documented, just as well-documented as Nikita Khrushchev's famous shoe-banging vow to "bury" America.
We were not surprised that the Russian Communists acted on their vow, decade after decade.
Why should we be surprised that Microsoft continues to act on Gates' vow, decade after decade?
Only newbies to computing (say, those who have been at it less than 25 years) are unaware that Gates is the self-described Enemy of Software Freedom. He gave himself that label three decades ago, and wears it proudly to this day. Ballmer is his hatchet man, nothing else.
Only damn fools believe that Microsoft has any intent other than to destroy Open Source.
...and anyone else that gets in their way, software corporations, hardware corporations, computer manufacturers, chip manufacturers, cell phone manufacturers..........
> ...and anyone else that gets in their way, software corporations, hardware corporations, computer manufacturers, chip manufacturers, cell phone manufacturers..........
Yes, but those other entities are only peripheral to MS's goal of destroying Open Source. MS knows it can out-compete other corporations, and the hardware/chip/phone folks are viewed as merely markets for software.
MS is smart -- they know that the only real danger they face is from a MORAL IDEAL -- the generally accepted concept that sharing is better than hoarding, that "playing well with others" is a Good Thing, even in business.
Microsoft does not "play well with others", never has, never will. They are a predatory business, run by a megalomaniacal, neurotic nerd with a decades-old grudge, and more moeny than he knows what to do with.
Thank god his business is software, not armaments.
They should buy Chrysler...........
Actually, they've been fairly flat for quite some time, so perhaps it's not working as well as it did in the past.
I trust Micro$oft as much as I do the N.Koreans or the muslims.
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