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Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters)
Here's a Reuters article claiming that the Free Software Foundation may block Novell from selling Linux. "'The community of people wants to do anything they can to interfere with this deal and all deals like it. They have every reason to be deeply concerned that this is the beginning of a significant patent aggression by Microsoft,' Eben Moglen, the Foundation's general counsel, said on Friday." The article is probably talking about the potential addition of language to GPLv3 to prohibit deals like the one with Microsoft.
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Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 4:36 UTC (Sat) by bcs (subscriber, #27943) [Link] Your guess is correct: see this article for clarification.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 14:50 UTC (Sat) by grouch (guest, #27289) [Link] Thanks for that link. Not quite the uproar that Reuters paints.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 16:08 UTC (Sat) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] That's to put it very mildly.
Unless you were already familar with what is going on you would come away from that article thinking that the FSF people hate Microsoft soooo much that they would destroy Novell by changing their software license simply out of spite.
The whole thing is completely misrepresented, has quotes taken out of context, and all sorts of other BS like that. This goes beyond just bad or lazy journalism, this was deliberate.
Makes you wonder WTF is up Reuter's butt to make them do something like this.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 3:35 UTC (Sun) by flewellyn (subscriber, #5047) [Link] When dealing with the news media, it's always wise to remember Hanlon's Razor.
I imagine that this is attributable not to malice, but to stupidity.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 10:45 UTC (Sun) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] Well I don't know what they are aiming at..
If it was stupidity then I'd figure it would just be innaccurate. But this has a lot of spin on it, it seems like preperation for further FUD down the road.
It seems like the article was intentially trying to make it look like the GPLv3 is a hostile response to the Novel/Microsoft deal rather then a genuine attempt (successfull or not) to update a very important software license.
"plant the seeds" of this sort of idea for the investor-type people that put money into Novell or Redhat, but have no idea (or only a very foggy idea) about software or software licenses. Make them figure that this is 'leftist bullshit' that is part of the (perceived) cloud of legality questions surrounding open source.
After all: Why would software programmers reject a multimillion (on their side) deal with increasing compatability with the largest and most successfull software seller in existance? Seems sort of like anti-corporatism from the side lines, which is obviously not good for "open source businesses" like Redhat or Novell.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 18:15 UTC (Sun) by vonbrand (subscriber, #4458) [Link] I have only to applaud efforts to make Linux and Windows more compatible, be it by being able to run Windows and Linux virtualized side by side, better Samba and Office compatibility, MSIE and Firefox et al respecting W3C and other standards, etc. But this is linked up with something completely different, the "MSFT won't sue SUSE customers over patents as long as they pay for the privilege" angle is the problem in the whole deal. And AFAICS this is blatantly against GPL(v2), but that would have to wind its tortuous way through the US court system to clarify. Not that any version of GPLv3 could make any real difference in this respect. (IANAL, so don't take my word for it)
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 5, 2007 8:05 UTC (Mon) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] Well ya.
but I was just talking about the perceptions of the sort of people that invest in Redhat or Novell.
All those folks are generally aren't going to understand the distinctions between 'working with Microsoft' vs 'exploiting patent loophole in gpl'.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 5, 2007 11:23 UTC (Mon) by arcticwolf (guest, #8341) [Link] That's just one more reason for Reuters to explain it to them instead of spreading more FUD, though.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 18:02 UTC (Sun) by vonbrand (subscriber, #4458) [Link] So this is leveraging NOVL + MSFT for the advancement of GPLv3, when GPLv2 is quite enough for stopping this idiocy? Sad reflection on the current interests of the FSF, IMHO.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 6, 2007 2:02 UTC (Tue) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] No GPLv2 is definately NOT quite enough.
This deal is perfectly legal under the GPLv2. Novell and Microsoft successfully found and exploited a loophole in the license.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 20:24 UTC (Sun) by edvac (guest, #13074) [Link] I read the article. This part stood out:"But, as FSF founder Richard M. Stallman himself has said, the Novell/Microsoft patent agreement is not in violation of the GPL version 2.". Could this mean that ms had their lawyers check over the GPL carefully to determine exactly what they could get away with? Is it wise to trust the ms juggernaut? Have they not deceived many others in the past? Something tells me the face of deception in this situation is not ugly, but actually appears quite pleasant and comforting... or maybe ms has finally seen the light and has decided to help Linux, free software developers and the open source movement flourish and create much more wonderful software.... I'm not counting on that.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 9:59 UTC (Sat) by dwalters (guest, #4207) [Link] Although Reuters have clearly skewed what Eben Moglen said, the fact remains that Novell will be in a difficult position from March when GPL 3 comes out.Greedy Novell executives felt they could ignore the spirit of the GPL, and weasel their patent pact with the devil around the GPL 2. Well I for one am glad this has backfired on them. In a couple of months they and Microsoft will feel the unbearable heat from the community-backed GPL 3, and they will be forced to renegotiate the deal. I'm amazed that Nat Friedman and Miguel de Icaza are still toeing the Novell party line on this. At least Jeremy Allison did the honourable thing and resigned. Kudos to him. I have very little sympathy for Novell; they deserve all the discomfort they're feeling right now for what they did. If they think this will just go away eventually, they're just plain wrong. The community won't forgive them until the patent pact is gone.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 11:42 UTC (Sat) by khim (guest, #9252) [Link] In a couple of months they and Microsoft will feel the unbearable heat from the community-backed GPL 3, and they will be forced to renegotiate the deal. You are quite wrong here. Even if GPL 3 will take of fast (and it's big [b]if[/b]) there are will b no "unbearable heat" right from the start. It will be slow process. And the deal is limited in time: 5 years. If by the end of this time there are will be Novell - it'll be free to pick GPL 3...
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 12:22 UTC (Sat) by ewan (subscriber, #5533) [Link] It's not a big if at all; it may be that many projects will take their time, but there's no real doubt that the FSF will move to GPLv3 for new releases of all of the code they control immediately; and they control many large and vital pieces of code.Even if only FSF held code moves to GPLv3 it's enough to prevent Novell from taking updates for critical components of their distros.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 16:15 UTC (Sat) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] I don't understand the legalities around this, but as I understand it Eben and the FSF folks aren't going to put anything into the GPlv3 that would make the MS/Novell deal illegal per-say.
They will try to set it up so that any sort of 'covenent' would automaticly extend to _all_ uses of the GPLv3 software, including redistribution by Novell customers to other and Novell customers contributing patches to upstream (and then that extending to all downstream users). This should make Microsoft's position uncomfortable as it will make their 'patent fud' less and less effective with Linux as people adopt GPLv3 licenses and they will probably pull out of the deal.. (hopefully with a huge financial penalty awarded to Novell)
(personally I feel that the Novell/Microsoft agreement is generally a very very good thing, as any sort of increased compatability with legacy Windows systems help Linux by a considurable ammount. If it wasn't for the patent BS (which is horrible), I'd be cheering them on)
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 18:25 UTC (Sat) by jbouzane (guest, #43125) [Link] The FSF has no power to retroactively modify the licensing agreementbetween MS and Novell. All they can do is add further restrictions to GPLv3 so that such deals cannot be made with GPLv3 unless such covenants apply to everyone. Therefore, it is Novell that would want to pull out of the deal, not MS. Furthermore, MS has left backdoors for themselves so they can cancel the deal with no penalty. At least, that's my understanding, but I obviously haven't read the contract.
Also, I think that Novell is free to license all prior code licensed
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 9:36 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] (personally I feel that the Novell/Microsoft agreement is generally a very very good thing, as any sort of increased compatability with legacy Windows systems help Linux by a considurable ammount. If it wasn't for the patent BS (which is horrible), I'd be cheering them on)Many of us feel the same way. I guess that is what happens when you deal with Microsoft -- they insert this little clause here which is not very important after all but which would make Steve there so happy, you know... (By the way, for spelling-challenged posters I'd like to recommend the new Firefox 2.0.0.1. It has a built-in spell-checker which has automatically highlighted the words "compatability", "considurable" and "ammount" in the quote -- it even suggests the correct alternatives after double-clicking. I don't like the new tabs behavior so much though.)
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 11:20 UTC (Sun) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] sorry about the spelling. It's been a cronic problem for me since grade school (no joking). I just don't see the misspellings even when I re-read it several times.
Correcting mistakes Posted Feb 4, 2007 15:42 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] You know what they say about correcting other people -- that you always make even more mistakes in the process... Of course I meant "it even suggests some correct alternatives after right-clicking"! :D
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 18:52 UTC (Sun) by Arker (guest, #14205) [Link] (personally I feel that the Novell/Microsoft agreement is generally a very very good thing, as any sort of increased compatability with legacy Windows systems help Linux by a considurable ammount. If it wasn't for the patent BS (which is horrible), I'd be cheering them on) This is a red-herring though. Linux is an open book, and every GNU/Linux OS supports applicable open protocols. If Microsoft wants interoperability, they can interoperate. There's no need for any special deals to do it. They can implement the same open protocols. They can open their protocols and watch how quickly they are implemented over here as well. This deal has no genuine connection to that rhetoric. The interoperability problems are 100% MicroSofts doing, so it stretches credibility when they suddenly claim to want interoperability, but if they genuinely want it they can and should just do it.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 12:48 UTC (Sat) by niner (subscriber, #26151) [Link] I really miss the times when trolls and flaming where virtually unknown to LWN.
Well, happy witch hunt. Hope you'll get out of it what you wish for, and not more.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 13:47 UTC (Sat) by dwalters (guest, #4207) [Link] I'm sorry if my post came across as a troll or flame. The whole MS-Novell patent thing just infuriates me, and I guess it was too easy for me to get it off my chest as a comment response to the news article. Sorry.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 14:14 UTC (Sat) by ewan (subscriber, #5533) [Link] FWIW it doesn't read like a flame to me - not all criticism isunjustified, and when there are good, reasonable arguments for thinking that someone is behaving badly it's only fair to call them on it.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 14:26 UTC (Sat) by niner (subscriber, #26151) [Link] "Greedy Novell executives", "weasel", "pact with the devil", and whishing for developers to leave Novell does not sound like "justified criticism" or "reasonable arguments" to me.
Novell employs many developers of free software and has opened up quite a lot of code that they bought (e.g. YaST, AppArmor, and many others). They contributed much and just made this one mistake that has not had any bad consequences for the community whatsoever. So _maybe_ some people over reacted a little, here.
The Ars Technica article, mentioned by someone else tells the story quite nicely.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 15:45 UTC (Sat) by ewan (subscriber, #5533) [Link] Well, they carefully constructed the whole 'covenant not to sue' idearather then going for a straightforward licence to deliberately circumvent the GPLv2. That's unequivocally 'weasel words'.
So why did they do it? Maybe for the wodge of cash from MS? If so,
As for 'pact with the devil'; it's certainly a pact - and MS clearly wish
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 19:38 UTC (Sat) by jayorke (guest, #10685) [Link] Legal text is usually not straight forward and current laws and contracts are always considered when creating legal documents so is it always "weasel"-like?
Every good executive tries to make deals which bring profit to their company and give their company an advantage in the market place. Even the companies which make public statements in response to the activities of another company that many believe screwed up do so in hopes to improve their image and generate greater sales. So are all executives therefore "greedy"?
How you can defend the use of the word devil as balanced and fair makes no sense at all. That is about as sensible as comparing the blocking of GPL code from mixing with non-GPL code as a sort of ethnic cleansing and descrimination based on the pedigree of code. Nonsense. Microsoft is not the devil. Hate their software, hate their business practises, hate them in whatever way you want but your hate does not make them the devil. Many people buy Microsoft products and not because their souls are condemned, they are slaves of the devil, or satanic reasons.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 9:49 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] Nobody is surprised to see a weasel-like legal text. What is more surprising is to see a business agreement so carefully worded around the main license in Novell's flagship product, clearly against the wishes of its developers. Not only that; company executives publicly defended the deal, so calling them "weasels" is reasonable (if a bit harsh).Executives can rightfully be labeled as "greedy" when they try to make unjustified profits out of a bad deal for everyone else. A "covenant not to sue" is not a competitive advantage; it justifies (and leaves everyone else exposed to) unfair patent claims, and makes a quick dollar in exchange for bad long term prospects. I think that the original wording "pact with the devil" is closer to the point than your (and parent comment's) demonic connotations. As in the famous Faustian deal, most companies who tries to negotiate with Microsoft seems to win at first sight but is screwed afterwards. In fact, the conflicting declarations of Microsoft and Novell executives after the deal seem to confirm the screwing part. So I think "pact with the devil" is an appropriate metaphor.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 18:01 UTC (Sun) by pyellman (guest, #4997) [Link] @weasel: "It's not a patent cross-licensing agreement, it's a covenant not to sue". Not weaselly (hey, used firefox's spellcheck there) enough for you, niner?
@greedy: Our system provides are ready-made counter to the charge of greed: "We did it in the interest of our shareholders". The charge of greed barely ranks as a perjorative in our (U.S.) culture; many wear it as a badge of honor.
@devil: Are you saying I should never use the word "devil" unless referring specifically to Lucifer, fallen angel and Prince of Darkness? I can't say, "It was a real devil threading that needle"? Come on. The term "pact with the devil" has a well understood meaning in common usage, and the original poster is entirely within the bounds of normal discourse to use it to describe his feelings about the Novell/Microsoft deal.
Please, stop the attempts to neuter discourse.
Peter Yellman
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 19:15 UTC (Sun) by jayorke (guest, #10685) [Link] I'm not attempting to neuter discourse. I'm simply stating that using loaded language like "weaselly lawyers", "greedy executives", and "pact with the devil" shows that the evaluation of the situation is more likely biased. One could look through the other side of the lens and say:
"Novell, despite furor in the ranks, courageously decided to have their brilliant lawyers look hard for ways to come to the rescue of Novell's current and potential future customers who were living in fear of lawsuits from the mighty Microsoft. Fighting hard for their shareholders Novell executives found a way to take money from the incredibly wealthy and often monopolistic Microsoft to the advantage of shareholders who had suffered with Novell's stock value for so long. Their deal with the most prestigious of software companies will certainly pay off not only for Novell customers and shareholders but for all Linux users since Linux and related software will increase in their compatibility with the gold standard of operating systems, Windows Vista. Hooray and Bravo to Novell for coming to the rescue of customers and getting the most important software company to admit the emergence and importance of Linux!"
If you can't see how that is loaded with biased rhetoric then thats fine. Its easy to load sentences with loaded opinions but more worthwhile to talk about facts.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 19:45 UTC (Sun) by pyellman (guest, #4997) [Link] Perfect example. I would have no issues whatsoever with the "tone" of such comments. Contrary to your implication, the post you give above would give a very clear understanding of the opinions and viewpoints of the writer, and would be a fine starting point for a reasonable rebuttal. You have confused "dispassionate/passionate" with right/wrong, or perhaps meaningful/meaningless. Non-neutral language is perfectly acceptable in civil discourse. In any case, and most importantly, it's clear that your effort to censor the range of words available to others to express their opinions is, this case, a thinly disguised attack (and I'm using that term in the most neutral sense possible) on the _opinion_ of the original poster.
Peter Yellman
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 5, 2007 7:46 UTC (Mon) by jayorke (guest, #10685) [Link] If you believe it is a thinly disguised attack on the opinion of the original poster then I am not expressing myself clear enough. The message I am trying to convey is that it is more productive to attack the ideas you do not agree with than it is to attack the character of the people with those ideas. To paint Microsoft as a devil, executives as greedy, lawyers as weasels, and suggest certain Gnome contributers are dishonourable is to attack people that the poster probably doesn't even know to no benefit of the discussion about what was good or bad about the MS-Novell deal. If I disagree with you, what benefit does it do me or this discussion to call you names? For me to call you names or defamate your character for you stating your opinions or doing the job you think is best would tell more about me than you because I don't know you enough to say such things.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 5, 2007 16:57 UTC (Mon) by pyellman (guest, #4997) [Link] I'll start here by noting that you fell easily into hyperbole far beyond anything the original poster wrote with your absurd twisting of his use of a common metaphor, "pact with the devil", to suggest that he was saying that "their souls are condemned, they are slaves of the devil, or satanic reasons".
I'll also note that despite your claimed desire to debate ideas or facts about the deal, you have been quite circumspect in regard to revealing any of you own opinions on the matter. Instead you have limited yourself to attempts to neuter the opinions of other. However, be assured that such a practice itself eventually provides fairly reliable clues as to the position of the practitioner.
I take particular issue with your use of the term "biased" to refer to the opinions of the original poster, or indeed, to characterize the opinions of anyone you feel has crossed a certain language usage threshold. The implication of this characterization is that you yourself could or would be unbiased were you to bestow upon us your analysis of the Novell/Microsoft deal. This is of course laughable and insulting. Don't worry, everybody understands that when you point to another article and say something like "now here's a more unbiased analysis", your really saying "now here's someone whose opinions much more closely align with my own"!
In forums such as this I much prefer the term "opinion" rather than "bias" to characterize others' views. Bias has a negative and insulting connotation that opinion does not. If you want to reduce the level of name calling, that would be a good starting point. A debate between two people or positions each of whose boundaries are fairly clearly defined is much more meaningful and informative than one in which the positions are ambiguous. The real problem with bias is that it is so often hidden. Nothing is more destructive to meaningful discussion than the suspicion of a hidden bias. In fact, I would argue that any pejorative implication of the term applies strictly to the hidden form. An openly stated bias, such as "I work for Microsoft, and this is what I think of the deal", or "as a longtime SUSE user, I find myself inclined to give Novell the benefit of any doubts" is a demonstration of respect for your audience; to hide that information would demonstrate contempt. Some (myself included) feel that the deliberate and careful use of neutral language designed explicitly to create the illusion of impartiality is deception and a form of lying. Most people do understand this, and as such we have the phrase "that guy really triggers my bullshit detector" (or, hurray, "weasel wording"). For example, my bullshit detector was pegged in the red zone when I read the text of Novell execs' attempts to weasel-word their way through the thicket of implications of the patent portion of the Novell/Microsoft deal.
In that light, I invite you give your opinions on this matter. Call it a discussion if you will. I will be happy to take as my starting point the position "The Novell/Microsoft deal in whole or part presents a significant threat to Linux in particular with its potential to balkanize (can I use that term here?) both the code and the Linux community, and open source in general with its deliberate subversion (can I say "subvert"?) of the patent-related elements of the preeminent open source license, the GPL. Novell's defense of the deal has included a great deal of weasel-wording, particularly in regard to the patent covenant aspects of the deal. In making this deal, Novell has placed its short-term interest, in the form of immediate and or guaranteed cash payouts from Microsoft, ahead of the interests of those of the Linux community in general, and indeed, ahead of its own investments in Linux, as the deal has the obvious potential to damage the ecosystem which supports the development of the operating system and associated software. Finally, in making this deal with a corporation which is legendary and stands above all others for its commitment to scorched earth business practices, scofflaw ways, use of its vast financial resources to outlast and overwhelm any challenges to its interpretation of contracts, and destruction of competitors and erstwhile partners alike, Novell has entered into a veritable 'deal with the devil' which could eventually lead to its own destruction or irrelevance".
I'm eager to hear you summarize your position, especially since you have implied that, given the opportunity, you would demonstrate communication skills and a grasp of the facts that would be convincing and convey useful and novel information in a way that far exceeds that of the original poster. I would appreciate though, it if consisted of something other than essentially "we need to wait and see before rendering judgment", as such a position would really be an attempt to close, rather than open, discussion. I also would warn you that I will not be kind if you attempt to lay down a baseline whereby you characterize my position as "biased" and yours as "fact based". I wasn't born yesterday, and I'm not going to fall for that old trick.
I really needed to get this off my chest. Please try not to take it personally. As as tired as you and others may be of trolls and flamers here and in other forums, I am doubly so of people attempting to shut down others by calling them trolls, flamers, or criticizing their use of even mildly colorful language or commonly understood metaphors in presenting their opinions.
Peter Yellman
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 5, 2007 19:35 UTC (Mon) by jayorke (guest, #10685) [Link] My opinion on the deal is that it was an overall bad choice by Novell executives. Firstly, because a company so involved with open source should be more in touch with what the sentiment of the open source community is. Secondly, because patents in a time of rapid knowledge growth are an obstacle to science and I believe that Novell should be fighting to remove patents not using them for profit. I believe there is only so many ways to accomplish certain objectives and patents on the direct route between A and B are bad for scientific advancement because they don't allow for the fact that other individuals on a planet of 6 billion people are likely to arrive at similar conclusions in scientific fields. The likelihood of two painters painting identical pictures seems incredibly remote. The likelihood of two programmers or scientists coming up with similar processes to solve a problem does not seem that remote at all. Thirdly, I believe that a deal with Microsoft is risky since it is hard to see why there is benefit to Microsoft in making such a deal. ODF is an open spec free for them to use, Xen has published source so creating an OS capable of running in a Xen VM should be relatively easy for a company as large as Microsoft. It is a mystery to me why Microsoft felt it needed Novell at all and the three possibilities that come to mind are (a) Microsoft trying to improve their image, (b) Novell had patents that Microsoft was fearful of them applying, or (c) Microsoft has a hidden agenda.
That said, I believe the community as a whole is no more or less protected from patents before or after the deal. The risk was there before, and the risk is there after. The biggest issue is that a company everyone thought was going to be part of the team to use their own patents in any potential patent war has been sidelined by the agreement. This only matters if you believe Novell had the patent portfolio which was preventing Microsoft from taking action. If one believes that to be the case the community should be working towards getting Novell back onside rather than casting them out. Secondly, I have no reason to doubt that Novell executives felt the deal was a good one and didn't think (at least at that moment) they were selling out the open source community. Perhaps they were blinded a bit by the fact that at that moment Novell was somehow relevant to Microsoft and were focused on value to shareholders, but I highly doubt their thoughts at the time were "lets sell out to Microsoft" and "lets burn the open source community". Novell relies on the open source community for its products and many of its staff work in the open source community so any thoughts that Novell knowingly strategized to destroy open source makes no sense.
I summary, it looks like a bad deal but I do not believe that Novell would deliberately or knowingly put the open source community at risk when its whole direction is one that increases their reliance on a viable open source community and their contributions to that community are constantly increasing. Maybe they were blinded by Microsoft. If the open source community suffers then by default Novell would suffer so how could anyone truly believe they would purposely do that. Maybe Microsoft was able to pull the wool over their eyes, but maybe the whole deal was actually Microsoft protecting itself from a Novell patent and Novell trying to get something in return. I don't see easily what Microsoft gets out of the deal and that concerns me. For those reasons I don't support the deal.
A bad deal does not mean the lawyers are weaselly, the executives greedy, or Novell open source members which stick with the company dishonourable. Perhaps the lawyers did their job and found that the increased risk to the community was negligible, the executives found a way to increase revenue and corporate acceptance of Linux while Microsoft sought to protect itself from Novell patents, and the Novell open source staff stay on because they believe that Novell's goal is to build a stronger open source community and greater demand for Linux. Maybe the lawyers missed something, the Novell executives are too trusting, and the Novell open source employees are simply too busy to be worrying about lawsuits that may or may not ever exist. Who really knows other than those individuals. It is a risky deal, it has failed in community support, and one can only hope that community distaste for the agreement is as bad as it gets.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 5, 2007 23:29 UTC (Mon) by pyellman (guest, #4997) [Link] Thank you for the sensible reply. Now, on to business not necessarily in any order.
You wonder what could possibly be Microsoft's motivation this deal. This surprises me a little bit, since sensible theories on that have been offered here and many other places, many times. Rather than claiming any credit, I'll do my best to summarize those comments I have read. Microsoft's main interests in this deal are (1) to co-opt Novell and gain a powerful tool in its campaign of FUD against Linux, and (2) to balkanize or divide both the community and the code that go into the assemblage of a major Linux distribution; it's called divide and conquer and it's nothing to be shocked or surprised about. It also feels weird to have you describe Microsoft's agenda as "hidden". As a backhanded compliment, I can say that senior Microsoft executives are frequently quite direct about their aims, whether in public or in private emails.
You offer a number of theoretical avenues that would absolve Novell of any "blame" in this debacle, all of which have major holes in my opinion. First, you suggest that Novell might not have fully understood the implications of the patent-related provisions of the deal. Quite simply, this strains credulity; Novell has a stable of lawyers as large and talented as any in the industry. I propose to you that Novell's lawyers would be more offended by your suggestion that they "missed" the legal implications of significant portions of the contract than by my accusation that they deliberately helped craft an agreement that they thought might function as an end-run around the GPL. Second, you offer that Novell might not have considered or been blinded as to how Microsoft might use certain parts of the deal to ramp up its anti-Linux FUD campaign. This is where the term "deal with the devil" provides a useful rhetorical abstraction. Most people understand "deal with the devil" to mean agreeing to something with some immediate benefits to yourself with the full knowledge that the character of the other party would not allow them to enter into such a deal unless there were other provisions that would ultimately lead to greater harm, but all the while carefully avoiding consideration of those details. A "deal with the devil" implies a DELIBERATE or willful overlooking of these details, motivated by short-term self interest. In my opinion, this is a much more apt description of Novell's actions in this case. Finally, you grant that Novell "should" have been able to more accurately gauge community reaction to parts of this deal, but conclude by basically giving them a free pass on this issue. Let me remind you that the imminent launch of a wide-ranging patent and "IP" related assault by Microsoft against Linux has been a common subject of fearful speculation on forums supported by the Linux community for, as best as I can recall, about 3 or 4 years now. If Novell could not predict the community response to their actions in this regard, I think it is entirely fair to question whether they are or have ever been part of "the community". Personally, I think it's much more sensible to assume that Novell knew what the reaction would/might be, but chose to go ahead based on the immediate financial rewards.
Taken in its entirety, your post conveys a not uncommon sentiment: that the negative elements and outcomes of the deal are Microsoft's "fault" and that Novell is a substantially innocent or even an injured party, in that they (Novell) did not deliberately construct an agreement that they thought would harm Linux or the Linux community. In the first place, I don't think this is true; but even if were, even if the text of the agreement was so convoluted and obtuse that Novell execs honestly weren't aware of how Microsoft might use parts of the deal, or were unable to divine Microsoft's "true intentions", they are not absolved of guilt due to the "deal with devil" aspect. As an analogy, consider, in the Lord of the Rings movies, Gandalf's words when implored by Frodo to take the ring: "I would use the ring out of a desire to do good; but through me, the ring would wield a power to great and terrible to imagine". In this sequence is made clear that while it is the ring that is evil, it needs an agent to operate through, and Gandalf gets credit for refusing the temptation. On the other hand, while we can at some level understand that it is the ring that is the true evil, we cannot completely exonerate Boromir or Golum for succumbing to its temptations. If you dwell on it you might finally grasp how someone could hold Novell specifically at fault for making a Linux-related deal -- and one which includes a GPL shirking patent "covenant" -- with Linux's greatest, and perhaps only real enemy.
One thing I think we can agree on is that this agreement has not changed the patent landscape for Linux and open source software. The deal was never intended nor does it have the power to ACTUALLY affect the patent landscape for Linux and open source software -- only a real legal action, and judgment, could do that -- but rather the PERCEPTION of that patent landscape, and specifically, the perception of the risks of using or developing for any Linux distributions or Linux-centric products other than Novell's. I think and hope this effort to affect perceptions has been a failure. However, I believe this is due more to the vociferous and well articulated counter arguments raised by opponents and critics of the deal than by any lack of intent on the part those who crafted it. For that, we have to give credit to those "biased" people.
Peter Yellman
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 6, 2007 3:38 UTC (Tue) by jayorke (guest, #10685) [Link] >> "Microsoft's main interests in this deal are (1) to co-opt Novell and gain a powerful tool in its campaign of FUD against Linux, and (2) to balkanize or divide both the community and the code that go into the assemblage of a major Linux distribution; it's called divide and conquer and it's nothing to be shocked or surprised about."
Microsoft has said all that did they? So Novell must hate the community to have signed on to that then. You have it all figured out so cleanly. I wonder how well Microsoft stating it is selling Linux to large companies like Wal-Mart actually helps to create uncertainty around Linux. That is a hard message to understand in the context of FUD: "Linux is no good and large profitable companies are buying it from us"?? It seems to me they would want to hold off on any such deals and claim it was having a hard time finding a market for the licences it bought, or perhaps make all the sales really quietly, if it was to optimize their FUD campaign.
>> "First, you suggest that Novell might not have fully understood the implications of the patent-related provisions of the deal."
No, I suggest that they may have known full well that the GPL had not blocked providing idemnification in the past and taken to the next level the GPL would not prevent a convenant not to sue. I propose that an end run around the GPL was not "a goal", nor was it a goal to cause ill impact tp the community, but such legal wording was simply a way to take legal idemnification to another level protecting themselves from long drawn out lawsuits and giving customers piece of mind.
>> A "deal with the devil" implies a DELIBERATE or willful overlooking of these details, motivated by short-term self interest. In my opinion, this is a much more apt description of Novell's actions in this case.
So they were counting on Microsoft to use the deal as FUD or were counting on the deal destroying the community but were happy to sign as long as the price was right? Microsoft went to Novell asking if they could buy ammo for their FUD campaign, Novell gave them a quote for FUD ammo, and the deal was signed perhaps. Microsoft is selling licences of Novell products to third-parties that are laced with patent infringements that they plan on clamp down on? I don't think selling Linux licences to their own customers while knowing what the presumed licences of that software are would help a Microsoft case in the court room.
>> Let me remind you that the imminent launch of a wide-ranging patent and "IP" related assault by Microsoft against Linux has been a common subject of fearful speculation on forums supported by the Linux community for, as best as I can recall, about 3 or 4 years now
For 3 or 4 years now? I guess the community is a little off and it really wasn't that imminent then.
>> Taken in its entirety, your post conveys a not uncommon sentiment: that the negative elements and outcomes of the deal are Microsoft's "fault" and that Novell is a substantially innocent or even an injured party, in that they (Novell) did not deliberately construct an agreement that they thought would harm Linux or the Linux community.
If something bad happens as a result of this deal then whether or not they did something deliberate or not would not absolve them of guilt. It would make them "less guilty" perhaps. The guilt would need to be shared amongst a whole lot of people I would think, (a) the person who placed the infriging code in the software, (b) the companies supporting Linux that did not try to prevent the patent lawsuit, (c) the government and its citizens for a patent system which might not deliver what the people actually want it to deliver, (d) the FSF for creating a licence which had the hole in the first place which supposedly creates a greater risk (which I don't really see), (e) the community for not being anal about patents (which would probably be impossible and a complete waste of resources) etc., etc.
I highly doubt this deal is the launching pad for a Microsoft attack against Linux. As Linux acceptance grows in the server room of large corporations, many of them also Microsoft customers (some who are now buying Linux licences through Microsoft), a patent attack by Microsoft against Linux components would likely backfire by creating Microsoft distrust where it did not exist before. Microsoft can ill afford to alienate large corporate customers and governments (especially the EU) by knocking out its only competition.
In the end I wouldn't be surprised to see Microsoft eventually embrace Linux fully when it can no longer keep the market away from it. They will likely have proprietary components running on top of Linux, probably their server components first, and if they can't avoid it they will probably create a proprietary desktop environment and application development framework on Linux. Linux is here to stay and Microsoft wouldn't be that bright if it didn't realize it. They will find a way to steer their customers through innovation and lock-in to their components regardless of what kernel they run on. To most people Windows isn't the back end OS, it is the visible layer at the front and all the applications that work with it.
Novell is currently taking their Netware OS and overlaying its services onto Linux. Maybe this is something that interests Microsoft. Microsoft, I recently read, designed Vista from the bottom up with a layered approach allowing them to avoid major bottom up OS upgrades in the future. Perhaps this layered approach could allow them flexibility in changing the backend without causing major impacts to the front end. If the presentation layer of a potential Windows on Linux wasn't based on X11 and was kept proprietary, Gnome apps wouldn't run on the Windows presentation layer any better than they do on Windows today (it works but doesn't look great). Windows apps written for a proprietary presenation layer wouldn't work on other desktops. There are so many alternatives for Microsoft to continue to dominate and I really don't see how public legal battles with the open source community would help their cause. I think the FUD campaign is nearing its end now that the Vista resources are being freed up. Phase 2 is probably going to be embrace to dominate.
Its all speculation of course, just like the fears of "what might happen" as a result of the Novell/MS deal.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 5, 2007 22:58 UTC (Mon) by jayorke (guest, #10685) [Link] I guess I should throw in a bit of rebuttal to your comments as well. You state: "The Novell/Microsoft deal in whole or part presents a significant threat to Linux in particular with its potential to balkanize both the code and the Linux community, and open source in general with its deliberate subversion of the patent-related elements of the preeminent open source license, the GPL."
I wonder which of the following is balkanizing the code and community more: (a) KDE vs Gnome, (b) Distro vs Distro, (c) licence versus licence, or (d) those protected by the deal or not protected by the deal? How much impact does the deal actually have in real terms considering many vendors provide legal idemnification to customers and those covered by the deal already had idemnification.
You state: "Novell's defense of the deal has included a great deal of weasel-wording, particularly in regard to the patent covenant aspects of the deal."
My understanding is the GPL disallows Linux code to contain patented material and forbids distribution of code containing patents that one is paying royalties to use. If the goal of MS or Novell was to prevent future long and drawn out lawsuits between them (such lawsuits not at all related to Linux have been going on for some time between them) then one way to do it would be to pay up front based on threat assessments, like insurance. Without the identification of any patents or pieces of software in the covenant not to sue the deal does not seem to conflict with the GPL. Call it weasel-like if you prefer, but if the GPL is focused on code in individual pieces of software and Novell is making a deal which is along the lines of legal liability insurance it doesn't take much for a lawyer to write an agreement not in conflict with the GPL. I would think it would be difficult to change the GPL to prevent the deal without removing the rights of companies to provide any form of legal protection (which would include idemnification), directly or through agreements with third parties, with respect to a piece of GPL'd software, directly specified or through blanket coverage, without extending that same protection to all users of that software. If that was the intent of the GPL originally then perhaps the original lawyers who wrote the GPL failed to do their jobs while Novell lawyers simply read the GPL and assumed that since all out blockage of legal protection was not prevented that it wasn't the intent. Maybe it isn't a case of "weaselly" but is more a case of "incompetence", or "lack of intent".
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 6, 2007 6:11 UTC (Tue) by pyellman (guest, #4997) [Link] > My understanding is the GPL disallows Linux code to contain patented material ..
Man, that's just so wrong I can barely even find motivation to correct you. Fortunately, I don't have to. Anyone can do a search through the GPL for the word patent, its not used that many times, and the language is clear enough. Really, the word appears rarely enough that it is reasonable to simply copy in all relevant portions of the license when debating that aspect of the license, to establish a baseline. That is, if you persist in inserting your (mis) interpretation of the patent-related portions of the GPL, I will respond by simply inserting the actual text.
Peter Yellman
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 6, 2007 8:05 UTC (Tue) by jbouzane (guest, #43125) [Link] > Man, that's just so wrong I can barely even find motivation to correctyou.
Really?
How about I quote a few sections of the GPL.
"If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent
So that covers the case where you are trying to distribute work covered
The condition being imposed is patent law. If you knowingly violate a
Similarly, if you knowingly insert patented code into a GPL application
That leaves only one case: writing an application from scratch (so you
The only way to distribute patented GPLed code is by granting an implicit
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 6, 2007 14:15 UTC (Tue) by pyellman (guest, #4997) [Link] Ok. So we have a new entry in the Wikipedia entry for "weasel wording". What you wrote most recently, is a bunch of silly weasel wording. It may or may not be true, a deeper analysis might find _some_ elements of truth, but why bother? It in no way supports or defends your statement "My understanding is the GPL disallows Linux code to contain patented material .." In fact, it contradicts it in many places. Your original statement was FUD bordering on lie. So give it a rest.
Peter Yellman
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 7, 2007 14:12 UTC (Wed) by jbouzane (guest, #43125) [Link] First, I would like to clear up a misunderstanding of yours. Please viewmy username. It is not the same as the one who made the original statement that you so strenuously objected to.
"What you wrote most recently, is a bunch of silly weasel wording."
According to Wikipedia (good to see you use quality source ;-)), weasel
"Man, that's just so wrong I can barely even find motivation to correct
Apparently, you didn't find the motivation, because, aside from a simple
You also claimed it was easy to quote sections of the GPL but failed to
Anyway, my point wasn't that patented code can't be distributed under the
In short, your comments here have demonstrated that you are nothing more
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 9, 2007 4:39 UTC (Fri) by pyellman (guest, #4997) [Link] Yes, I got the poster wrong. My bad.
The original statement (which you accuse me of focusing on as a strawman, but which was, after all, the statement I took issue with) was unqualified (in regard to the treatment of patents in the GPL), and objectively false.
In your most recent message, you introduce a number of qualifications -- notions I'm not sure that I disagree with -- but which in any case affirm my point. I'm not prepared to try to rebut you, since your discovery of three possibilities or patent related outcomes in the GPL section you copied left me, frankly, befuddled; I have no idea what you are talking about or how you could have arrived at such conclusions from the text presented, and therefore cannot muster a rebuttal.
Peter Yellman
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 9, 2007 15:09 UTC (Fri) by jbouzane (guest, #43125) [Link] Ah, my apologies for not being clear. After looking at my first post, Irealize that many of my remarks were poorly worded. For example, one of my concluding remarks was, "The only way to distribute patented GPLed code is by granting an implicit patent license to anyone willing to redistribute your code under the GPL." Obviously, that's not true because, for example, one may distribute GPLed code illegally or not own the patents that cover the code and therefore not have the rights to grant a patent license.
Anyway, thanks for the reply. I had written you off as a troll, but I see
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 12:18 UTC (Sat) by sylware (guest, #35259) [Link] Novell/MS got ECMA standardisation for .net clr. You know, that ECMA who was not able to see that MS "Open XML" was dependent on binary and proprietary file formats like WMF... Have you said sold to evil? And I live in Europe... shame on me. I think ECMA is not to be trusted at all.Now, Novell are pushing *hard* (The famous Novell Blog System) to make gnome dependent on mono (Novell controlled open source implementation of .net clr). You cannot have an recent "official gnome desktop" without the mono evil bloat installed because of one little app. I run gentoo, so I'm saved for the moment because of the mono use flag. Poor binary distro users...
And now everybody seems surprised that MS is "rewarding" Novell to make part of the open source world dependent on its technologies! Come on...
Well... use real high level dynamic languages when you need it, namely python/ruby/etc... stick to C/C++(with a garbage collector if you need one like inkscape) if you can. Have a look at the xfce desktop. Make your distro gnome desktop free from the mono trojan horse.
All this Novell/MS thing is REALLY fishy...
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 13:15 UTC (Sat) by pheldens (guest, #19366) [Link] Evolution uses mono too, for some years now, unless they took the dependency out after I stopped using it.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 14:41 UTC (Sat) by svkelley (guest, #37299) [Link] Novell (Ximian) pushes their mono agenda on planet.gnome.org through their mono apps. I am not phased by it. It is pretty obvious what the ximian people are doing. In the end, their goal is nothing short of changing Gnome into a mono clr based desktop. Miguel has been a shill for Microsoft for some time now. In fact, it is hard for me to bother with reading planet.gnome.org anymore what with his frequent postings on the latest Microsoft link.
Sean
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 0:07 UTC (Sun) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] I don't see it that way at all.
You know Microsoft does produce good stuff time to time. It's intellegent to have somebody who follows what Microsoft does and pays attention to the good that they produce, Microsoft certianly does it with Linux.
Plus programming GUI applications in C this day and age is becoming increasingly insane. Sure it's very appropriate for system files and developming shared libs and such, but your nuts to use it in a user interface were good and flexible UI design is preferable.
Gnome despirately needs a support managed code language for making complex user applications. Java is/was propriatory and python, while I like it, is still to slow for many types of applications. Mono fits the bill nicely.
Mono Posted Feb 4, 2007 18:19 UTC (Sun) by chrislee (subscriber, #4460) [Link] If anyone has a specific worry about Mono as used in Gnome (i.e., without the MS-compatibility spec), I'd really like to hear it. Otherwise, this just looks like more FUD.
Mono Posted Feb 4, 2007 18:28 UTC (Sun) by chrislee (subscriber, #4460) [Link] excuse me: s/spec/stack.
Mono Posted Feb 5, 2007 9:26 UTC (Mon) by dion (subscriber, #2764) [Link] Well, here's just one: Mono is a waste of time and potentially dangerous in the long run.
a) Waste of time: Mono starts from scratch, if they had chosen Java then they could have started building on one of the Free implementations.
b) Dangerous: The .net spec is controlled by MS (a hostile entity if there ever was one), this means that Mono will always be a second rate imitation of .Net, to say nothing of the dangers of MS patents.
I guess it's all good in the end, like Gnome before it, Mono has already served its purpose; to encourage the freeing up of the formerly non-Free code they replace.
The problem is work continues to be lost on Gnome and Mono even after Qt and Java was Freed.
Mono Posted Feb 5, 2007 14:57 UTC (Mon) by chrislee (subscriber, #4460) [Link] > a) Waste of time: Mono starts from scratch, if they had chosen Java then> they could have started building on one of the Free implementations.
I think Mono development was (at least partially) funded by people wanting to port windows apps to Linux, for the Munich city transition to Linux (is that right?). Now that Mono is in decent shape, isn't this a "sunk cost" argument?
> b) Dangerous: The .net spec is controlled by MS (a hostile entity if
The core .net spec (CIL, C#), as implemented (AFAIK) is covered by standards, and required protection from patent problems as a condition of obtaining this status. When Java is released under GPL3, then it will be even better patent-wise but it isn't to this point (speaking strictly legally, rather than as a matter of which paties are more trusted). I thought the Windows compatability stack is what caused people more worry because it is not covered by the standard. My understanding is that the core spec offers nice inter-language interface, that is significantly better than Java's, which is extremely useful for integrating native code and various scripting languages with the core application.
> The problem is work continues to be lost on Gnome and Mono even after Qt
This to me seems to be the real core of the objections that I see to Mono, rather than technical or legal issues. It looks from this end like of a personal grudge against Miguel and some of his projects, that is widely held in some communities. I haven't followed the history from that perspective, maybe it is justified to some extent -- I don't know.
My preferences for desktops and languages obviously don't line up with yours, but I think Qt and freed Java (when it happens) are great. Personally, I really like to use and program Gtk/GNOME, and I am glad that I have the option of using C#/Boo/iPython/... (although I haven't used them much yet). I am especially glad that it is becoming easier for .Net shops now to port their code to Linux, especially as this enables organizations and governments to transition to Linux.
Mono Posted Feb 5, 2007 19:02 UTC (Mon) by dion (subscriber, #2764) [Link] There are no .net applications to speak of or at least very few, so I can't believe that any porting advantage can be had from implementing .net, the fact that the gui stack is windows specific makes it even more useless as a porting aid.
Although one might hope that MS will push all the developers of their customers on to .net, because even though some of the application stack might be windows only a .net application will be much easier to port than a VC++/MFC application.
There is a much nicer integration with native code in .net I'll give you that, but there is nothing that makes that feature harder to implement with Java, so if that was what the Mono people were after then they could have cooked up that feature for Java and called it a day.
There is much better tool support for Java, many more developers who know Java and much more code available to integrate.
I don't think that people dislike Mono because Miguel has anything to do with it, although he does have a habit of talking up horrendous crap like COM, so I bet some feel that way.
I think we (users of Free software) would be in a better place if work had stopped on gtk and gnome the second Qt became Free software (before that there was a real danger of Qt ending up like Motif), not because Qt is so much better than GTK, but because then all the smart desktop people would be working on the same project, rather than compete with one another.
There is nothing gained IMHO from having two projects striving for the same goal, just look at all the harm fragmentation did to UNIX.
Mono Posted Feb 5, 2007 19:46 UTC (Mon) by chrislee (subscriber, #4460) [Link] > There are no .net applications to speak of or at least very few,
Is that true? I think (for now) these tend to be internal (to companies) apps and infrastructure code, rather than widespread desktop apps. I definitely see .net development around and .net compatability requirements for current projects.
> so I can't believe that any porting advantage can be had from implementing .net, the fact that the gui stack is windows specific makes it even more useless as a porting aid.
Mono largely ported the windows stack. This part isn't explicitly patent protected by MS, but Novell has pledged its own patents to the patent pool that protects free software, including Mono. I think that is why Fedora was OK to ship Mono.
> I don't think that people dislike Mono because Miguel has anything to do with it, although he does have a habit of talking up horrendous crap like COM, so I bet some feel that way.
I agree that the COM stuff was a mistake -- I think Miguel thinks that too. He basically says straight up that performance of Bonobo is unacceptable for fine-grained interfaces, and GNOME is progressively ripping-out that code. But I don't think this explains the tone (to use a bland word for it) of discussion of Miguel in forums like this.
> I think we (users of Free software) would be in a better place if work had stopped on gtk and gnome the second Qt became Free software (before that there was a real danger of Qt ending up like Motif), not because Qt is so much better than GTK, but because then all the smart desktop people would be working on the same project, rather than compete with one another.
This feels to me like someone telling me what to do and not do with my computer, as both a user and a developer, and I don't like it at all (after 13 (yikes!) years of using Linux I get touchy about that). Maybe I'm a bad person, but I like GNOME, and I probably wouldn't have done much for KDE because I'm not a big fan of C++.
I agree there is a real cost to the competition. However, there are important things that can be done with GTK that cannot be done with Qt (for example because Qt is under GPL and not LGPL), which is why it is used in a variety of projects where GPL is not chosen or not possible for various reasons. Also, there have been important differing philosophies in development of GNOME and KDE where they have competed and learned from one another. I'm not going to tell anyone they shouldn't use/like KDE.
But now I'm caught up in an old flame war :-(. Signing off!
Mono Posted Feb 5, 2007 20:06 UTC (Mon) by dion (subscriber, #2764) [Link] I'm certainly not telling anybody what to do with either their time nor their computers and I'm not saying that people who use gnome are bad people.
I'm not even saying that having gnome is a bad thing, there is value in an application stack friendly to proprietary software and competition does provide value in it self.
All I'm saying is that I think the duplicated effort is a great waste and I wish there was some way to mitigate that.
I'm sorry if I offended anyone.
Mono Posted Feb 5, 2007 22:25 UTC (Mon) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] >> There are no .net applications to speak of or at least very few,
> Is that true? I think (for now) these tend to be internal (to companies) apps and infrastructure code, rather than widespread desktop apps. I definitely see .net development around and .net compatability requirements for current projects.
From everything I've heard there is a crapload of apps all over the place in corporate-land.
It's like the Windows version of Perl pretty much. All sorts of speciality applications for doing whatever you need windows to do in a corporate environment.
Hopefully Java will see a strong uptake once it's open sourced, but right now Mono is supposadly able to Windows applications with binary-compatability about a third of the time. The next third of a time it will be able to run them with a recompile or small edits.
The thing is that is probably the best Mono can do. There are many tens of thousands of different calls and little things you can do with C# + winforms, but only about 10% or so are ever used by users for anything... So that is what Mono focuses on.
(typical Microsoft fasion, have a lot of stuff undocumented and undisclosed leaving it to be 'discovered' by enterprising programmers. You can see this evidenced in the fact that while Vista is designed to be backward compatable with Windows XP in terms of applications... Microsoft's own administrative applications fail to run on Vista at all)
So it can make it drasticly cheaper to move to Linux for many people who build internally used .NET apps, but it's not going to ever make desktop migration painless even if everybody used 'managed code' applications.
Companies can spend years building up a collection of VB.NET and .NET applications for the enterprise cranked out by this or that admin or the resident programmer. Hundreds of little stupid applications for doing this or that. Every single one of those is going to be a major barrier for a person adopting Linux as a replacement for Windows.
Also a nice thing about Mono is that you have classrooms all over the U.S. full of students learning how to program .NET. All over the place, hundreds of thousands of people buying books and playing around with this or that. Nobody has classes teaching Glibc Gnome desktop or KDE C++ programming. This is a complete mystery to most people. So a person with some experiance with C#, but no experiance with Linux/Gnome/KDE or whatever still should be able to make desktop Linux applications with a relatively little effort due to Mono.
I figure anything made to lower the cost of entry into Linux desktop/server is a good thing.
Mono Posted Feb 5, 2007 23:15 UTC (Mon) by svkelley (guest, #37299) [Link] My perception is unrelated to the desktop. My focus is only on embedded Linux so I really don't have a feel for C# desktop development. But I can tell you that the majority of all electrical and computer engineers that I hire program in C++ or Java. We wean them off the managed code tit and get them going in C and C++. I have never interviewed a candidate who had only C# or really much C# at all from University. But then again I don't hire system administrators who do IT work. I hire EEs, CoEs and CS majors exclusively from major universities.
From my perspective, all Mono does is make me ask, why bother with Linux anyway. Just use Windows, Visual Studio is a far far better IDE for developers than the Monodevelop joke.
Sean
Mono Posted Feb 6, 2007 2:09 UTC (Tue) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] Then if your programming in C++, then why bother using Linux? Visual Studio is obviously much superior C++ IDE compared to anything Linux has.
In fact, the only reason why you'd want to use Linux, at all, is if you want to prorgam in C or Perl.
;-)
Mono Posted Feb 6, 2007 2:29 UTC (Tue) by svkelley (guest, #37299) [Link] Good point. However, as my perspective is embedded, you should have phrased it in terms of whynot just use Windows CE with Visual Studio. My counter is that I don't like basing my embedded product's OS on a competitor. I become dependent on features that only they decide to apply to the next software release and I don't know what special deals they cut with other licensees. So I use Linux. But for me, C++ and C is quite preferred. I have never seen Linux as a compelling OS for the desktop. I use it on workstations for embedded development but personally use a Mac.
Hence, my argument that if you really want to develop C#, why bother with Mono's piss poor
It's just business, not ideals for me.
Sean
Mono Posted Feb 6, 2007 3:32 UTC (Tue) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] For embedded stuff, ya Mono is completely pointless. Java and C/C++ is probably very entrentched and there isn't much technical need for anything else, so far. It's quite a bit different in embedded arena were Windows and Microsoft are a minority player.
It will matter much more for you embedded developers, though, as the years go buy. It's how this sort of thing works, you can bet that Microsoft and friends are working their hardest to create a development platform were somebody out of highschool and six months of classes can do the same job your doing right now.
(BTW I don't like OS X very much, for anything. I own a Ibook and installed Debian over it. And I worked as a assistant administrator were my job was to keep a couple hundred OS X desktops healthy for art students, so it's not like I am rejecting it because I don't know it or anything.)
So LoTD may not matter to you, because I guess you don't care, but it does matter for people like Novell or Redhat or GNOME or KDE or whoever.
Also it's worth noting that Redhat was working with the Classpath/GCJ folks to create a viable alternative to Java, which helps to fill the same sort of nitch that Mono filled. With open source Java coming the point of having Mono is much diminished, but there is still plenty of room for it, IMO.
Why Mono? Posted Feb 6, 2007 2:11 UTC (Tue) by zlynx (subscriber, #2285) [Link] From my perspective, all Mono does is make me ask, why bother with Linux anyway. Just use Windows, Visual Studio is a far far better IDE for developers than the Monodevelop joke. As you can see, mono is better for desktop applications because it starts twice as fast as Java 1.6. Java is so slow that Sun added a new improved splash screen option to Java in order to distract the users. Once Java gets going, it is fast. But starting a Java application is a major event. Eclipse is so slow it has a confirmation dialog to close it, since you have to wait so long to restart! I enjoy coding in C++ because it's a challenge, and the result is very fast. The language is flexible so you can design in many ways, although this also leads to trouble. But a managed language has its own attractions and C# has some very nice features for GUI programming. My C# experiences have been much happier than with Java. C# is just more fun. It's also easy to mix it up with managed C++ or IronPython or Boo. And with open source it isn't strictly necessary, it is fun to run the same binaries on PowerPC, i386, x86_64 and Itanium. So I am definitely glad we have Mono for Linux.
Why Mono? Posted Feb 14, 2007 22:57 UTC (Wed) by sylware (guest, #35259) [Link] I do not give a damn about mono. As far as I'm concern, java-like frameworks are evil and current high level dynamic languages(ruby/python...) are far better options. If I have to choose to a "middle ground" statically compiled language, I would choose ocaml/eiffel/D/etc which I would interface with the zillions of C/C++ rock solid libs around.What I'm concerned of is the "coup" in gnome community: "official gnome desktop" forces you to install the *extremely complex*, far from maturity, controversial, hundreds of thousands lines of C code hydra which is mono. Free to you to install a "mono-desktop" *on the side of gnome* and let's keep gnome on neutral ground which is C/C++ (C/C++ compilers are already painfully complex, time to avoid as much kludge as possible).
We are not MS/Novell, we can do better: let the user choose!
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 13:38 UTC (Sat) by tetromino (subscriber, #33846) [Link] Ars Technica has a wonderful article summarizing the Novell-MS deal : http://arstechnica.com/articles/columns/linux/linux-20070...IMHO, the whole controversy is 90% made of overblown online drama.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 3, 2007 17:12 UTC (Sat) by khim (guest, #9252) [Link] Yup. Unfortunately the remaining 10% are quite real Microsoft's attack of Free Software - so we can not forget about it. Microsoft and Novell had an option for "normal" patent grant: either to just non-GPLed components of Novell Linux (there are enough of them) or to all GPL-copyrighted software (like IBM did with RCU patents when they added RCU to Linux kernel). Instead they constructed "convenant not to sue" to circumvent the GPL. It's serious attack. May be it was blown out of proportin and may be it'll be even good thing in the end by showing that GPLv2 is not "perfect" (like Linus claims) and thus does need adjustment - but it was attack on GPL from Microsoft's side. What Novell though when they signed the deal - is irrelevant.
GPL 3 will be exciting Posted Feb 3, 2007 14:29 UTC (Sat) by marduk (subscriber, #3831) [Link] I'm still on the fence as far as GPL3 is concerned, but I still can't wait for its release. I just keep imagining the many potential lawsuits that could arise as companies/individuals attempt to get away with violating it. There could be people in court for decades.
GPL 3 will be exciting Posted Feb 3, 2007 20:37 UTC (Sat) by jayorke (guest, #10685) [Link] It will be interesting to watch for sure. Changing the rules in the middle of the game is filled with risks though. The unanswered questions are numerous. Will the changes lead to greater corporate adoption of Linux and corporate contributions to Linux (many key contributers are staff of a company) or less? Will the efforts of contributors be more divided or unified and improvements be accellerated or decellerated as a result? Will projects fork with different GPLv2 and GPLv3 versions if the project contributors are not unanimous in their support of licence changes on any particular project? Might GPLv3 trigger Microsoft cracking down on patent violators who distribute GPLv3 products if it sees GPLv3 as a greater threat than GPLv2 or just to stop GPLv3 in its tracks? Which projects will stick with GPLv2 and how will the availability of other competing GPLv3 projects changes the landscape in terms of community preference (e.g. if Linux kernel is GPLv2 and OpenSolaris is GPLv3)?
What will happen to the MS-Novell deal as a result of GPLv3 is probably the most unimportant factor in examining the potential changes considering the MS-Novell deal only protected Novell customers from theoretical but yet non-existant lawsuits on patent violations. The end result of the MS-Novell deal changes the level of legal protection one group gets but the protection does not cover the whole community and that seems to be the main complaint, however idemnification offered by companies exclusively to their customers does exactly the same thing in that it implies that a threat exists that idemnification will remove and protects one group while leaving others unprotected. I wonder if GPLv3 will change that as well.
GPL 3 will be exciting Posted Feb 4, 2007 19:15 UTC (Sun) by grouch (guest, #27289) [Link]
I picked this question out of your interesting comment because there is some indication of an answer at GPLv3 Discussion Committees. Among the corporations represented on the committees are Intel, Yahoo!, Red Hat, Google, Mozilla, Cisco, Qualcomm, Motorola, Apple, Sun, IBM, Trolltech, NEC, Hitachi, Panasonic, MySQL, AMD, HP, Sony, and Novell. (There are more).
GPL 3 will be exciting Posted Feb 5, 2007 7:13 UTC (Mon) by jayorke (guest, #10685) [Link] I know all those companies are involved in the discussion but that only ensures them a path for their concerns be heard. If there is a problem getting consensus I'm not sure what role these large corporations have in the final decision making. Their presence doesn't guarantee their acceptance of the end result nor determine which projects they would and wouldn't like to see GPLv3 apply to.
Perhaps the passage of GPLv3 will be universally accepted and become a bit of a non-event. On the other hand various companies, projects, or individuals may not accept GPLv3 and the degree to which that impacts the landscape will depend on which companies, projects, and individuals go one way or the other. Presumably a project with code under a BSD licence does not get full support by not being GPL and on the flip side presumably a project under a GPL licence does not get full support for not being BSD. This would also presumably be true comparing GPLv2 vs GPLv3 if support for GPLv3 is not near unanimous.
It will be interesting to watch what unfolds.
GPL 3 will be exciting Posted Feb 7, 2007 0:06 UTC (Wed) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] I would expect that it works the same as it does in the Linux kernel.
Sure all those companies get a say and their lawyers are consulted and such. Everything is done through intermediaries also.. You have the volenteers at the edges helping to filter out FAQs and nonsense to get good suggestions and then they pass those on.
Then you have the big companies and contributers and lawyers working on their own concernes and getting their input in.
Then you have the core group of people that debate and are the actual decision makers.
Then at the very top you have your 'benevolent dictator': RMS who is, I would expect, be the one with the final say in everything.
So it seems like it is designed after every other successfull open source project out there. They have a set bunch of goals and improvements that they want and they are working out the best way to make that happen.
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 19:54 UTC (Sun) by hingo (guest, #14792) [Link] This article actually contains one interesting factoid I had not realised or seen before:Linux sales accounted for 5 percent of the $967 million in revenue that Novell reported last year. The deal with Microsoft has turned into a far bigger cash generator as it calls for Microsoft to make two upfront payments totaling $348 million. If it is really true that Linux-sales are only 5% of Novell's revenue, it explains a lot. Even the deal with MS makes sense: Who cares if we lose our Linux customers, MS is paying us some real money here. It's almost as if even without this deal the right thing to do for Novell would be to finish with this Linux monkey business and do whatever it is that is generating the rest of the 95%. Of course, this all is only if, a strong if, the article has its facts right?
Novell could be banned from selling Linux (Reuters) Posted Feb 4, 2007 21:02 UTC (Sun) by pzb (guest, #656) [Link] According to Novell's latest earnings release (http://www.novell.com/company/ir/qresults/06q4/schedules.pdf), total revnue was US$967,277K for fiscal year 2006 (page 12). Of that US$53,442K, or 5.5%, was from "Open Platform solutions", which is the term used for the distribution business (page 14).
This does not include ZENworks Linux Management or support, training, and consulting related to Linux. It also does not include revenue from Linux-based products, like Open Enterprise Server.
So the statement "only 5%" is a little misleading, but overall the Linux revenue is far outweighed by the other product lines.
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