Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative(opensource.org)
opensource.org
Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative
https://opensource.org/node/901
164 comments
> if we see Microsoft making tangible changes to their behavior, and we reward that with more derision and distrust, then we aren't exactly incentivizing them - or anyone wathcing - to do more
Well, if we are speaking of incentives, then here's one ...
Don't screw with open source or open standards or your legitimate competitors by unfair competition, because many people will never forget it, so don't be surprised if 10 years later you still have a negative image that lingers, in spite of your huge marketing department that keeps paying shills.
This is much like in society really. If somebody screws me or my family, I'll probably cut all ties with that person forever. Being marginalized is a natural reaction. Why should companies have their cake and eat it too?
Well, if we are speaking of incentives, then here's one ...
Don't screw with open source or open standards or your legitimate competitors by unfair competition, because many people will never forget it, so don't be surprised if 10 years later you still have a negative image that lingers, in spite of your huge marketing department that keeps paying shills.
This is much like in society really. If somebody screws me or my family, I'll probably cut all ties with that person forever. Being marginalized is a natural reaction. Why should companies have their cake and eat it too?
Microsoft can't undo the past, and they aren't going away. Your choice boils down to a single question: do you want the Microsoft of tomorrow to be different from the Microsoft of yesterday? If so, then quit hating and start celebrating the victories.
Their past makes their starting position now more difficult. They have to make up for their past deeds, after all.
Someone, who didn't do thing like Microsoft did, has it easier now. It sounds only fair to me.
Someone, who didn't do thing like Microsoft did, has it easier now. It sounds only fair to me.
They have nothing to atone for, and they don't owe you anything. Either you appreciate the steps they're taking, or you keep on living in the past.
Yes, they do. They used every dirty trick in the book, and invented a few new ones. They damaged the computing environment we all have to live in.
I have no problem pointing out, that this is the company that to this day possesses (and still abuses) advantages gained by playing dirty. If they want to have an image of a good guy, they have work hard on it. Harder, than any random company that appears out of the blue.
The standard they are judged by is and will be definitely affected by their past.
I have no problem pointing out, that this is the company that to this day possesses (and still abuses) advantages gained by playing dirty. If they want to have an image of a good guy, they have work hard on it. Harder, than any random company that appears out of the blue.
The standard they are judged by is and will be definitely affected by their past.
This.
We can’t forget or forgive the sins of the past, those who remember.
But generations will pass, and yesterday’s sinners will become conquerors, philantropes, savior of mankind.
In the end, history is written by the mighty and they can market themselves however they wish.
But some won’t forget, at least not this easily. It is the least we can do.
We can’t forget or forgive the sins of the past, those who remember.
But generations will pass, and yesterday’s sinners will become conquerors, philantropes, savior of mankind.
In the end, history is written by the mighty and they can market themselves however they wish.
But some won’t forget, at least not this easily. It is the least we can do.
Microsoft burned that bridge a long time ago. My organization's LOB app is going web-based next version, so we can finally update almost every computer to anything but Windows. For the very few users that still require some other Windows-only app, we'll probably still give them a Windows-based computer. We already have a GSuite setup in place so it's really just about giving our users something that isn't too much of a culture shock. I'm looking forward to it!
I'm confused, the article doesn't say anything negative about Microsoft. Did you intend to reply to some specific comment?
I'm replying to the general tone of the HN discussion, which is (or was at the time of comment) largely negative in most of the threads.
I'm aware that this behaviour is somewhat "popular" on HN, to make their comment kind-of "stand above all other's", but I'm not sure if that is actually a good idea.
The authors of those comments almost certainly won't notice your reply if it is in a new thread. And the others (like myself) are confused as soon as your fuzzy reference becomes more and more ambiguous.
The authors of those comments almost certainly won't notice your reply if it is in a new thread. And the others (like myself) are confused as soon as your fuzzy reference becomes more and more ambiguous.
I mean, that's not really the purpose of my comment. The purpose is more that I don't want to copy+paste my comment on the 30 different negative threads, nor do I think I should.
Indeed, it's a pity that discussion threads are trees rather than DAGs. In email and usenet, you can specify multiple entries in the "References" header, to theoretically you can refer to multiple parent messages. (Alas, that header isn't actually used for that purpose, but just to refer to parent, grantparent, etc. to have some redundancy in case of an incomplete archive or partially-private discussions.)
This is all fine and good. I hope their efforts are sincere. All money and support to free software is most likely good.
However, I've been part of the open source community for 25 years, and I remember the brutal marketing against the "cancer" of open source.
It will take a lot to convince me that there is not some underlying goal here that is not beneficial to free software.
How much has Microsoft really changed? I have windows on my gaming PC, and every day i have to ALT+F4 a stupid message to "review my privacy settings". There is no option for full privacy so i keep ALT+F4'ing the message and block all the telemetry stuff in my openbsd firewall.
I have a powershell script called deleteapps that removes all the apps that is reinstalled everytime there is an update. It also appears to be impossible to uninstall the xbox app. Onedrive keeps turning on even if I choose that I do not want to sync during the installation, set the option in onedrive to not start at launch.
Why fight the user to this level? Have they really turned "good"?
However, I've been part of the open source community for 25 years, and I remember the brutal marketing against the "cancer" of open source.
It will take a lot to convince me that there is not some underlying goal here that is not beneficial to free software.
How much has Microsoft really changed? I have windows on my gaming PC, and every day i have to ALT+F4 a stupid message to "review my privacy settings". There is no option for full privacy so i keep ALT+F4'ing the message and block all the telemetry stuff in my openbsd firewall.
I have a powershell script called deleteapps that removes all the apps that is reinstalled everytime there is an update. It also appears to be impossible to uninstall the xbox app. Onedrive keeps turning on even if I choose that I do not want to sync during the installation, set the option in onedrive to not start at launch.
Why fight the user to this level? Have they really turned "good"?
Same feeling here, MS used to call OSS as cancer and tried so hard to kill it, now it begins to "embrace" that old cancer, I hope it will not become the real tumor and damage the so-far-so-good OSS society from within. People learn history for a reason, I'm still very suspicious at this point.
Microsoft is a large company made up of many people, and I don't find it that hard to believe that the demographics, both within and without the company, have shifted in favor of open source.
Of course they haven't turned good. "Open Source" is a buzzword in business right now and just like "cloud" the intended audience for the word has no idea what it actually means.
To be fair, the messaging about open source/free software/GPL/Linux being cancerous was Steve Ballmer's. Steve Ballmer is no longer member of Microsoft's board of directors and his past comments don't really speak to Microsoft's current leadership.
With respect to additional OSI funding, I can't really hypothesize a bad outcome.
With respect to additional OSI funding, I can't really hypothesize a bad outcome.
I also remember the brutal marketing against the "cancer" of Microsoft.
I was referring to an actual quote by Ballmer.
I'm sure many on the open source side have had less than flattering words for Microsoft too, however Steve Ballmer said, and I quote: "Linux is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches"
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_...
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_...
> However, I've been part of the open source community for 25 years, and I remember the brutal marketing against the "cancer" of open source.
25 years, so that's since 1992.
Do you also remember IBM? Did you hold it against IBM when they started to become actively part of the open source community?
Microsoft is changing from a proprietary software company pur-sang to a more service-oriented (and, like Google & Facebook, privacy-invasive) company. We need to forgive Microsoft and move on not out of love for Microsoft but for our own sanity. New threats have arisen.
What Microsoft did (see the Halloween documents for a peak into that), any other big, powerful company or monopoly could've (and has, see e.g. IBM or Intel) done in the past.
As of now, the invasive privacy concerns en masse (by a plethora of corporations and governments) are a much bigger threat to our liberty than Microsoft.
25 years, so that's since 1992.
Do you also remember IBM? Did you hold it against IBM when they started to become actively part of the open source community?
Microsoft is changing from a proprietary software company pur-sang to a more service-oriented (and, like Google & Facebook, privacy-invasive) company. We need to forgive Microsoft and move on not out of love for Microsoft but for our own sanity. New threats have arisen.
What Microsoft did (see the Halloween documents for a peak into that), any other big, powerful company or monopoly could've (and has, see e.g. IBM or Intel) done in the past.
As of now, the invasive privacy concerns en masse (by a plethora of corporations and governments) are a much bigger threat to our liberty than Microsoft.
I can't help but think of the irony of mentioning IBM in your comparison to Microsoft considering Microsoft indirectly bankrolled, via BayStar, the SCO lawsuit against IBM for the alleged violations of IBM's Unix licenses in the development of Linux code at IBM.
Yeah, that's irony. There's more.
A former monopolist getting flak from a current monopolist who tricked IBM with MS-DOS [1].
If you want to be pedantic on the history of Microsoft, however, I'd like to remind you of the history of IBM [2]. Of particular relevance are the parts "IBM in Germany and Nazi Occupied Europe" and "1969: Antitrust, the Unbundling of software and services".
Do we still (respectively ~75 and ~50 years later) hold this against IBM? No, we don't. Its longer ago than Microsoft's practices, so I understand people still hold a grudge (heck, I'm one of them, I still tend to avoid Microsoft products). It'll take some time. But that doesn't mean my grudge is still rational.
[1] http://thisdayintechhistory.com/11/06/ibm-signs-a-deal-with-...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_IBM
A former monopolist getting flak from a current monopolist who tricked IBM with MS-DOS [1].
If you want to be pedantic on the history of Microsoft, however, I'd like to remind you of the history of IBM [2]. Of particular relevance are the parts "IBM in Germany and Nazi Occupied Europe" and "1969: Antitrust, the Unbundling of software and services".
Do we still (respectively ~75 and ~50 years later) hold this against IBM? No, we don't. Its longer ago than Microsoft's practices, so I understand people still hold a grudge (heck, I'm one of them, I still tend to avoid Microsoft products). It'll take some time. But that doesn't mean my grudge is still rational.
[1] http://thisdayintechhistory.com/11/06/ibm-signs-a-deal-with-...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_IBM
I remember when IBM was running ads on TV for Linux, and I don't remember them getting the kind of push-back Microsoft is.
And IBM used to be seriously rapacious.
More to the point:
> Have they really turned "good"?
"Good" and "bad" presume human morality, which groups don't have. Groups view the world as "good for the group" or "bad for the group", or "in line with policy" or "contrary to policy", or on some other axis which is not entirely parallel to the whole "good"/"bad" thing individuals mostly follow.
Point being, Microsoft will do what it always does: Attempt to improve its next quarterly balance sheet. Same as IBM. We have to rely on the licenses to make sure it can't take over any projects. Same as IBM.
And IBM used to be seriously rapacious.
More to the point:
> Have they really turned "good"?
"Good" and "bad" presume human morality, which groups don't have. Groups view the world as "good for the group" or "bad for the group", or "in line with policy" or "contrary to policy", or on some other axis which is not entirely parallel to the whole "good"/"bad" thing individuals mostly follow.
Point being, Microsoft will do what it always does: Attempt to improve its next quarterly balance sheet. Same as IBM. We have to rely on the licenses to make sure it can't take over any projects. Same as IBM.
You can Uninstall the XBOX app, actually. It takes like five seconds in Powershell.
You should be able to find the method with a quick search, but give me a few hours and I can tell you what I used to do it.
You should be able to find the method with a quick search, but give me a few hours and I can tell you what I used to do it.
sure, you can even turn off xbox service ... using registry editor, because its blocked in service management.
[deleted]
I can't tell. If you remember they became a platinum member of the Linux Foundation last year too.
Woah cool, can you share your scripts? Would love to have something like this.
https://pastebin.com/5kXwZi9C
I added one of the lines for xbox last as this actually seem to work. I have tried many versions before. Anyway, just run this in an elevated powershell instance (after removing lines for apps you want)
I added one of the lines for xbox last as this actually seem to work. I have tried many versions before. Anyway, just run this in an elevated powershell instance (after removing lines for apps you want)
To be accurate, it was not the cancer of "Open Source", it was the cancer of the GPL.
Ballmer meant the GPL, but he literally [0] said "Linux is a cancer".
[0] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_...
[0] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/06/02/ballmer_linux_is_a_...
I do not see the difference since Linux is not synonymous with Open Source but IS synonymous with the GPL.
You have a lot more patience that I do, frankly.
That's the point people keep missing. These a-holes are seizing control over our computing primarily through Windows and while this stuff (described above) continues, it doesn't really matter if they open-source a lot of shit that doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things or throw a few bucks here and there because all in all it's Windows that has become a huge problem.
That's the point people keep missing. These a-holes are seizing control over our computing primarily through Windows and while this stuff (described above) continues, it doesn't really matter if they open-source a lot of shit that doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things or throw a few bucks here and there because all in all it's Windows that has become a huge problem.
The patience is becoming more and more an experiment to see how far they will go to control my usage in the operating system as a thanks for my 1000 NOK purchase of a license.
Just what does it take to actually be able to use a new Windows without getting shafted?
My gaming is almost completely moved to the PS4, Switch and Linux, even though neither Sony nor Nintendo are paragons of virtue in any sense, they are smaller companies that depend on happy customers.
Neither of them are shoving the horrible GAAS (Games as a service), that is loot boxes and other shady tactics, into their games like Microsoft is doing. There is no forced online. You can just pop in a disk/cart and play without registering 1000 accounts on the internet. The experience is much better imho than fighting windows.
Just what does it take to actually be able to use a new Windows without getting shafted?
My gaming is almost completely moved to the PS4, Switch and Linux, even though neither Sony nor Nintendo are paragons of virtue in any sense, they are smaller companies that depend on happy customers.
Neither of them are shoving the horrible GAAS (Games as a service), that is loot boxes and other shady tactics, into their games like Microsoft is doing. There is no forced online. You can just pop in a disk/cart and play without registering 1000 accounts on the internet. The experience is much better imho than fighting windows.
> like Microsoft is doing
I thought it was, you know, game developers and publishers? How many games are actually published by Microsoft, outside of Halo, Minecraft, Age of Empires, and Gears of War?
I thought it was, you know, game developers and publishers? How many games are actually published by Microsoft, outside of Halo, Minecraft, Age of Empires, and Gears of War?
These are the ones I am talking about.
Halo, GoW and Minecraft have been GAASified. We have to see about Forza 7.
Meanwhile, 1st party games like Horizon Zero Dawn from Sony or Mario vs Rabbids from Nintendo are free of such.
In 3rd party games, all bets are off of course (see Destiny 2 for a good example)
Meanwhile, 1st party games like Horizon Zero Dawn from Sony or Mario vs Rabbids from Nintendo are free of such.
In 3rd party games, all bets are off of course (see Destiny 2 for a good example)
I just spent a few minutes this morning trying to figure out how to turn off Cortana on my windows 10 virtual machine. I don't want to have to spend 45 minutes of my morning trying to figure out the ins and outs of elevated power shell to just turn one freaking app off on an operating system that I bought and therefore should have control over. In my view, this is very obviously tailored to deter most people from removing apps. I would say, this is not my idea of "good".
Add to that the clearly missing quality control and it's just eye poke after eye poke for me. I rebuilt my daughter's laptop a couple of weeks back after her MS account got hosed due to an unresolvable billing problem that just threw errors galore and MS support is like talking to Cortana now. It took me 3 hours to get it into a workable, secure and privacy respecting state with a local account. And it's still unreliable with random stupid failures like the start menu not responding to keyboard without a reboot, the wallpaper disappearing etc.
And them I'm greeted with an advert for Cortana as a notification. And when I installed it, at the start, the entire installer uses Cortana now and shouts at you at full volume. And at every step it wants me to sign in to a Microsoft account over and over again or half the OS decides it's not going to work. What the fuck?
It's a mess. A total undeniable crapfest which just needs to walk itself off a cliff.
I'm a recent switcher to macOS after dabbling for a decade on a second machine. There just isn't this shit to deal with on the platform. It mostly just works and is incredibly boring. Which is what I want from a tool. Yes I sign in with an Apple Account but in the decade I've had one, I have had zero problems. MS account ownership is hell from billing problems, xbox live sign in problems, data loss, crazy authentication fragmentation, the lot.
And them I'm greeted with an advert for Cortana as a notification. And when I installed it, at the start, the entire installer uses Cortana now and shouts at you at full volume. And at every step it wants me to sign in to a Microsoft account over and over again or half the OS decides it's not going to work. What the fuck?
It's a mess. A total undeniable crapfest which just needs to walk itself off a cliff.
I'm a recent switcher to macOS after dabbling for a decade on a second machine. There just isn't this shit to deal with on the platform. It mostly just works and is incredibly boring. Which is what I want from a tool. Yes I sign in with an Apple Account but in the decade I've had one, I have had zero problems. MS account ownership is hell from billing problems, xbox live sign in problems, data loss, crazy authentication fragmentation, the lot.
Good thing is, that a the good stuff they do (C#, TypeScript, Visual Studio Code) is not limited to Windows use.
You're right but this puts me off among other things: https://github.com/dotnet/cli/issues/3093
(even though I've been writing C# for 15 years now)
(even though I've been writing C# for 15 years now)
I wonder for past few years about backup language/stack/job for me, because my technical life has been MS only. And quite often discontinued tech (Silverlight, WebForms).
I should get that going I guess. I just can't decide what to learn and it's difficult to find time (nodejs? Go? Python?).
I should get that going I guess. I just can't decide what to learn and it's difficult to find time (nodejs? Go? Python?).
There's the rub.
You didn't buy the operating system. You bought a license to use it. That is not a difference without distinction. Microsoft very much view it as their operating system, even though you've purchased a license to use it.
My solution is to use Linux, which has a more permissive license. I'm not sure if that will work for you, but it's nice not actually being dependent on a single vendor.
By the way, I'm not saying that it is right - just that it is what it is. You didn't buy an OS, you bought a license to use an OS. The distinction is important.
You didn't buy the operating system. You bought a license to use it. That is not a difference without distinction. Microsoft very much view it as their operating system, even though you've purchased a license to use it.
My solution is to use Linux, which has a more permissive license. I'm not sure if that will work for you, but it's nice not actually being dependent on a single vendor.
By the way, I'm not saying that it is right - just that it is what it is. You didn't buy an OS, you bought a license to use an OS. The distinction is important.
To your point about using Linux, unfortunately working with specific tools that only run on Windows, I don't have that option. Windows is forced on me and I don't think that is by accident. Again this leads me to seriously question that they indeed could have turned "good" as the parent comment asks.
Yeah, that was why I mentioned that it may not be a viable option for them.
I'm not sure the answer is in one license over another, nor in one OS over another. I'm not sure it is, realistically, solved by any one company being 'good' or 'evil.'
I think the most realistic hope for the future is open standards being used and people opting to support them. If we get rid of proprietary standards, we can more easily have alternative software to do the same work.
As far as Microsoft goes, I do not really expect them to be good or evil. I expect them to do things that increase their profitability. I recognize that their goals don't always align with my best interests, so I generally avoid them.
At the same time, I'm grateful that they exist as an option. I do use a Windows phone, but that's because it suits my needs better than the alternatives. So, I don't dislike Microsoft, I just avoid them most of the time.
I don't think they are as bad as they used to be. They seem to have come to grips with open source and have made some steps in the right direction. VSCode is pretty nice to work with and they have a Shared Source Initiative program that many don't know about, which is another example.
Anyhow, I think using open standards and enforcing it by demanding support in the products we buy is probably our best chance at changing the industry. Our applications output something. There's no realistic reason, that I can think of, for that something to not conform to open standards. Then, we can select vendors of our choice, licenses of our choice, or create our own, by ourselves or through paying someone.
I will note that it is understandable but sad that more companies aren't willing to write their own software. I see that as related to the problem. They'd prefer to use COTS software. Yeah, it's less expensive and does sometimes make sense, but if they wrote it themselves they could more easily port it to various operating systems and architecture. Ideally, those OSes and architecture would conform to open standards and make it even easier as time progresses.
I'm not sure if we will reach that point, but it'd be nicer - I think.
I'm not sure the answer is in one license over another, nor in one OS over another. I'm not sure it is, realistically, solved by any one company being 'good' or 'evil.'
I think the most realistic hope for the future is open standards being used and people opting to support them. If we get rid of proprietary standards, we can more easily have alternative software to do the same work.
As far as Microsoft goes, I do not really expect them to be good or evil. I expect them to do things that increase their profitability. I recognize that their goals don't always align with my best interests, so I generally avoid them.
At the same time, I'm grateful that they exist as an option. I do use a Windows phone, but that's because it suits my needs better than the alternatives. So, I don't dislike Microsoft, I just avoid them most of the time.
I don't think they are as bad as they used to be. They seem to have come to grips with open source and have made some steps in the right direction. VSCode is pretty nice to work with and they have a Shared Source Initiative program that many don't know about, which is another example.
Anyhow, I think using open standards and enforcing it by demanding support in the products we buy is probably our best chance at changing the industry. Our applications output something. There's no realistic reason, that I can think of, for that something to not conform to open standards. Then, we can select vendors of our choice, licenses of our choice, or create our own, by ourselves or through paying someone.
I will note that it is understandable but sad that more companies aren't willing to write their own software. I see that as related to the problem. They'd prefer to use COTS software. Yeah, it's less expensive and does sometimes make sense, but if they wrote it themselves they could more easily port it to various operating systems and architecture. Ideally, those OSes and architecture would conform to open standards and make it even easier as time progresses.
I'm not sure if we will reach that point, but it'd be nicer - I think.
> an operating system that I bought and therefore should have control over.
Price has nothing to do with control. The only way you have control over a piece of software, is if it is free software, no matter if you paid for it or not.
Price has nothing to do with control. The only way you have control over a piece of software, is if it is free software, no matter if you paid for it or not.
Also Microsoft has been threatening Android companies with patents, engaging in racketeering, milking more money out of Android than they made with their Windows phones.
As they say, if you can't innovate, litigate, Microsoft having the potential to become the biggest patents troll ever.
And I expect replies to this comment saying that this is how the game works, that others are also doing it, bla, bla. Stop trying to normalize the usage of patents for non-defensive purposes folks. These companies are playing the system, earning money on the hard work of others by using abusive monopolies granted by the government.
As they say, if you can't innovate, litigate, Microsoft having the potential to become the biggest patents troll ever.
And I expect replies to this comment saying that this is how the game works, that others are also doing it, bla, bla. Stop trying to normalize the usage of patents for non-defensive purposes folks. These companies are playing the system, earning money on the hard work of others by using abusive monopolies granted by the government.
Their new strategy might be to join open source communities and kill them from the inside. Although they probably just mean well and everything bad is just coincidence of incompetence.
Btw, you can play a lot of games on Linux!
Btw, you can play a lot of games on Linux!
Btw, you can play a lot of games on Linux!
Depends on what your tastes are. If you have a soft spot for SkiFree or bland, cookie-cutter shooters then maybe gaming on GNU/Linux is enough for you. But most of the games available for GNU/Linux are candy, games for games sake, and don't have much intellectual value. Wine helps a bit but a lot of things still break especially with modern titles.
My solution is running Windows 7 in KVM with GPU passthrough to an external monitor. Best of both worlds.
Depends on what your tastes are. If you have a soft spot for SkiFree or bland, cookie-cutter shooters then maybe gaming on GNU/Linux is enough for you. But most of the games available for GNU/Linux are candy, games for games sake, and don't have much intellectual value. Wine helps a bit but a lot of things still break especially with modern titles.
My solution is running Windows 7 in KVM with GPU passthrough to an external monitor. Best of both worlds.
Several of the Borderlands titles work on Linux. Civ 5 (not sure about 6) works on Linux. It's not as bleak as it used to be. :)
Don't agree with that at all. I have over 300 Linux games on Steam, and there's a wide variety of games. Sure, it's lacking the big AAA releases that make the headlines, but in my opinion, those are the 'cookie-cutter' type games that don't have much intellectual value. There are many indie and small developers creating interesting games, and with Unity and other big engines supporting Linux now, it's a relatively small hurdle for them to release their games on Linux, and there are many of them.
I also had a GPU passthrough VM setup, but the only time I used it in the last year was to play Overwatch - a cookie-cutter shooter. I play the occasional game in Wine, but there's no shortage of engaging native Linux games.
I also had a GPU passthrough VM setup, but the only time I used it in the last year was to play Overwatch - a cookie-cutter shooter. I play the occasional game in Wine, but there's no shortage of engaging native Linux games.
But if you're going to spend a bunch of money on a gaming rig, because you're that kind of gamer as opposed to someone who just casually sometimes plays some games when they work, then it seems incredibly silly to jump through the hoops of wine and VMs with GPU passthrough and still not be able to play everything.
It really is amazing: Microsoft have fixed so many long-standing problems in Windows 10 and made something that is very close to offering a wonderful, refined user experience. However, they have also doubled down on undisableable focus-stealing and sound-making popups and forced interactions with their latest HCI "innovations" with the net result being that Windows 10 manages to feel as user-hostile as any version of Windows ever has...
They also haven't figured out how to tell a laptop is a laptop and there are times when it should NOT be installing the latest patches.
They haven't changed a bit. Open Source is merely a marketing tag for them to gain credibility. They are not very good in the open source community; most of their github OSS releases other than a few high profile ones are unmaintained crap with zero response. If you want to fire up Linux in SCVMM for example, the tooling is open source now, but full of bugs and no way to ship it with working tools. Nothing is ever responded to, PRs, defects or anything. But it's OSS, look we're OSS! It's a joke.
Then when you do raise something on a high profile project like .Net Core which actively has buggy untested tracking enabled in the command line build tools, which violates security policies of a lot of their clients, you get told in nearly as few words to fuck off when you want it turned off by default.
On top of that They still don't listen to customers, preferring to shout loudly over them on endless blogs and marketing whilst crapping on them with increasing costs, decreasing quality, less privacy, ruinous products and more fragmentation.
They're the Omni-Consumer-Products software company now.
Then when you do raise something on a high profile project like .Net Core which actively has buggy untested tracking enabled in the command line build tools, which violates security policies of a lot of their clients, you get told in nearly as few words to fuck off when you want it turned off by default.
On top of that They still don't listen to customers, preferring to shout loudly over them on endless blogs and marketing whilst crapping on them with increasing costs, decreasing quality, less privacy, ruinous products and more fragmentation.
They're the Omni-Consumer-Products software company now.
> They haven't changed a bit.
o_0. I remember when I had to use tools to disassemble their precious source that they kept withheld and locked up. Now they post their new tech to github and I can view all the source easily. Now they try to make their tech work on Linux.
I'm all for fair criticism but your prose is not that, its dogma. If you think they're still the same company I can only imagine that you left your eyes behind in the 90's. The culture has shifted a lot towards the engineers and you need to appreciate the good things that happen in life otherwise all you'll see is gloom. They're by no means perfect but they are _different_.
o_0. I remember when I had to use tools to disassemble their precious source that they kept withheld and locked up. Now they post their new tech to github and I can view all the source easily. Now they try to make their tech work on Linux.
I'm all for fair criticism but your prose is not that, its dogma. If you think they're still the same company I can only imagine that you left your eyes behind in the 90's. The culture has shifted a lot towards the engineers and you need to appreciate the good things that happen in life otherwise all you'll see is gloom. They're by no means perfect but they are _different_.
They're not really different though.
People's memory is short. I've had access to MSFT source code before under shared source apart from the CSPs suspiciously, I've had symbol server around for years and been able to pop into framework code, then there's stuff like this: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc749640.aspx - not even counting the amount of source coming from MSR etc.
My criticism is not dogma, it's the regression in all the other areas that's the big problem. I appreciate not having to wade through treacle to get my job done. This has got considerably worse in the last 3-4 years as the platform sort of falls to pieces on a regular basis.
Do you remember when server, dev tools, OS and platform all dropped at the same time? That was peak quality. What we have now is the diametric opposite. We have no direction with .Net Core other than all over the place, unmaintained crap falling out everywhere. It's hell. It's really difficult to build and manage a medium to large sized project when someone is smashing all the pieces off the board once a month. And also when you have to raise a defect with one of their products it is closed, ignored or via partner support "here's a registry fix you have to deploy to 2000 disparate companies to fix our product because we removed a UI option" type outcomes.
The good things in life are where I start a project and run it to completion and the tools and frameworks perform as intended. That's not there any more. Things like python, golang and even Java offer better proposition. Even the tooling quality, such as Visual Studio 2017, we have to unconfigure a lot of features to make it stable (like CodeLens for example).
I wouldn't even consider picking it as a platform to build a new project on now because of the time, rewrite and cost risk.
What you see is marketing and front. What I see and oversee is a large team of people fighting this every day.
People's memory is short. I've had access to MSFT source code before under shared source apart from the CSPs suspiciously, I've had symbol server around for years and been able to pop into framework code, then there's stuff like this: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc749640.aspx - not even counting the amount of source coming from MSR etc.
My criticism is not dogma, it's the regression in all the other areas that's the big problem. I appreciate not having to wade through treacle to get my job done. This has got considerably worse in the last 3-4 years as the platform sort of falls to pieces on a regular basis.
Do you remember when server, dev tools, OS and platform all dropped at the same time? That was peak quality. What we have now is the diametric opposite. We have no direction with .Net Core other than all over the place, unmaintained crap falling out everywhere. It's hell. It's really difficult to build and manage a medium to large sized project when someone is smashing all the pieces off the board once a month. And also when you have to raise a defect with one of their products it is closed, ignored or via partner support "here's a registry fix you have to deploy to 2000 disparate companies to fix our product because we removed a UI option" type outcomes.
The good things in life are where I start a project and run it to completion and the tools and frameworks perform as intended. That's not there any more. Things like python, golang and even Java offer better proposition. Even the tooling quality, such as Visual Studio 2017, we have to unconfigure a lot of features to make it stable (like CodeLens for example).
I wouldn't even consider picking it as a platform to build a new project on now because of the time, rewrite and cost risk.
What you see is marketing and front. What I see and oversee is a large team of people fighting this every day.
and yet they also have things like this:
https://github.com/dotnet/core/blob/master/LICENSE.TXT
https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/blob/master/LICENSE.txt
Can't really say nothing's changed if a lot has. I personally believe they need to refine their OS department, clearly that side of the company needs serious change. I say this after having heard of all the oddities from Windows 10 (their latest and current OS) and how awful it is to remove software from Windows 10.
https://github.com/dotnet/core/blob/master/LICENSE.TXT
https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/blob/master/LICENSE.txt
Can't really say nothing's changed if a lot has. I personally believe they need to refine their OS department, clearly that side of the company needs serious change. I say this after having heard of all the oddities from Windows 10 (their latest and current OS) and how awful it is to remove software from Windows 10.
That's only there because they know no one can fork and commit to maintain a codebase that size. Same reason no one forked Linux. They still have 100% control over it.
https://github.com/flagello/Essence
That's one fork of VS Code. Not sure how to find projects implementing .NET Core I do know Mono is implementing code from .NET Core though see:
http://www.mono-project.com/docs/about-mono/dotnet-integrati...
That's one fork of VS Code. Not sure how to find projects implementing .NET Core I do know Mono is implementing code from .NET Core though see:
http://www.mono-project.com/docs/about-mono/dotnet-integrati...
That Essence repo hasn't received any new commits in months. Maybe not a good example of a successful fork?
.NET Core also made me doubt their efforts. It looked good at the start but it has turned into a very confusing experience. There seems to be no direction.
Quarrelsome(2)
I’m sorry but you are incredibly ignorant. There’s a huge focus on customer feedback and “customer obsession” in the company now. And that’s coming from Satya himself. I’m sure what are talking about was true in the past (and it seems like you experienced a lot) but things really have changed - not completely of course, Microsoft is so huge that it’ll take a while.
You should just ask some people who work there;)
You should just ask some people who work there;)
Given the loud backlash against Microsoft's telemetry practices and MS's doubling down, I couldn't agree less.
The ad hominem was uncalled for.
The ad hominem was uncalled for.
Why does no one listen to customers then?
Ignored on privacy.
Ignored on bugs.
Ignored on product direction.
That's not feedback or customer obsession, that's lip service. And we pay for the software so we can only vote with our feet and on the way help other people to avoid the same pitfalls.
Ignored on privacy.
Ignored on bugs.
Ignored on product direction.
That's not feedback or customer obsession, that's lip service. And we pay for the software so we can only vote with our feet and on the way help other people to avoid the same pitfalls.
> most of their github OSS releases other than a few high profile ones are unmaintained crap with zero response.
I find this a very entitled and weird attitude. I also find the opposite side of this attitude weird, that if you release source suddenly you have new obligations. That opposite side is even worse because it makes people scared of releasing code.
Being open source or free software isn't some kind of contract to provide support and "community" or whatever. Slap a license on the code, toss it over the fence and be done with it. If you want to offer support and accept patches great, if not, also great. If you're doing it for fun or advantage good, if you're doing it out of respect for your users to let them fix it themselves, even better, because the alternative is to give them no recourse but to go around begging for you and only you to fix it.
The free software that MSFT has releases is free software (and open source), period. They don't have to do anything further to deserve that appellation.
I find this a very entitled and weird attitude. I also find the opposite side of this attitude weird, that if you release source suddenly you have new obligations. That opposite side is even worse because it makes people scared of releasing code.
Being open source or free software isn't some kind of contract to provide support and "community" or whatever. Slap a license on the code, toss it over the fence and be done with it. If you want to offer support and accept patches great, if not, also great. If you're doing it for fun or advantage good, if you're doing it out of respect for your users to let them fix it themselves, even better, because the alternative is to give them no recourse but to go around begging for you and only you to fix it.
The free software that MSFT has releases is free software (and open source), period. They don't have to do anything further to deserve that appellation.
I've patched and raised PRs to contribute and they are ignored. I am helping them fix their product.
Nothing.
So I phone up support and PAY to have something fixed.
Nothing.
I try playing nice. I try paying nice. I get nothing. I vote with my feet. Nice or not, that's also an aspect here; choice.
Nothing.
So I phone up support and PAY to have something fixed.
Nothing.
I try playing nice. I try paying nice. I get nothing. I vote with my feet. Nice or not, that's also an aspect here; choice.
> I am helping them fix their product.
Then stop. You don't have to make anything better for them. Fix it for yourself. If you're not having a good time trying to help others, then stop doing it. You have no obligation and neither do they (except, of course, if there were explicit contracts involved).
I have some Xchat patches. I tried getting them into Hexchat, but they didn't want them. Well, looks like I'm now permanently running a personal Xchat fork.
Then stop. You don't have to make anything better for them. Fix it for yourself. If you're not having a good time trying to help others, then stop doing it. You have no obligation and neither do they (except, of course, if there were explicit contracts involved).
I have some Xchat patches. I tried getting them into Hexchat, but they didn't want them. Well, looks like I'm now permanently running a personal Xchat fork.
We have a support contract and I have support credits with MSDN. That accounts for nothing though apparently.
If Microsoft dies or abandons maintainership of some code they've released, then the free stuff is great, because we can pick up where they left off. If they just throw it over the wall and you have no hope of getting your fixes into the tree, then you have to maintain a fork of it alongside theirs, merge changes, hope they don't change anything that would cause problems for you, etc.
Source is better than no source, but I can see why people would complain about the way they're handling things right now.
Source is better than no source, but I can see why people would complain about the way they're handling things right now.
type "Get-AppxPackage Microsoft.XboxApp | Remove-AppxPackage" into powershell to remove the Xbox
> All money and support to free software is most likely good.
Open source is not the same thing as Free Software. From the website itself, in the history section:
> The conferees believed the pragmatic, business-case grounds that had motivated Netscape to release their code illustrated a valuable way to engage with potential software users and developers, and convince them to create and improve source code by participating in an engaged community. The conferees also believed that it would be useful to have a single label that identified this approach and distinguished it from the philosophically- and politically-focused label "free software." Brainstorming for this new label eventually converged on the term "open source", originally suggested by Christine Peterson.
Open-source is used broadly to define a way of developing software, but it says nothing about the rights it gives users. In practice there are several projects called "open sources" that are not using licenses that empower users, hence the valid distinction with Free Software where the end goal is user freedom.
Open source is not the same thing as Free Software. From the website itself, in the history section:
> The conferees believed the pragmatic, business-case grounds that had motivated Netscape to release their code illustrated a valuable way to engage with potential software users and developers, and convince them to create and improve source code by participating in an engaged community. The conferees also believed that it would be useful to have a single label that identified this approach and distinguished it from the philosophically- and politically-focused label "free software." Brainstorming for this new label eventually converged on the term "open source", originally suggested by Christine Peterson.
Open-source is used broadly to define a way of developing software, but it says nothing about the rights it gives users. In practice there are several projects called "open sources" that are not using licenses that empower users, hence the valid distinction with Free Software where the end goal is user freedom.
> Open-source is used broadly to define a way of developing software, but it says nothing about the rights it gives users.
That is totally wrong and a myth spread by people who like to call their products "Open Source" while they aren't. The Open Source Definition is very clear: https://opensource.org/osd
Practically there is no difference between Open Source licenses and Free Software licenses. The difference is merely a philosophical one - whether you emphasis the "freedom" aspect or the "openness of the code" aspect. Bruce Perens just wrote something about it: https://perens.com/blog/2017/09/26/on-usage-of-the-phrase-op...
That is totally wrong and a myth spread by people who like to call their products "Open Source" while they aren't. The Open Source Definition is very clear: https://opensource.org/osd
Practically there is no difference between Open Source licenses and Free Software licenses. The difference is merely a philosophical one - whether you emphasis the "freedom" aspect or the "openness of the code" aspect. Bruce Perens just wrote something about it: https://perens.com/blog/2017/09/26/on-usage-of-the-phrase-op...
> The difference is merely a philosophical one
NO. They can be very different practically.
For example, your Android phone/router contains open source software pieces (and very likely have GPLv2 licensed code). You get the source code of those, but you may not be able to change them. So yes, they are open source, but not free software.
Open source means the code is open, and you can do anything with the code (licensing restrictions implied). Free software extends that further to have freedom to run modified code on the same device[0] (See freedom 1 and its explanation: The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish). This is a very important distinction between free software and open source software.
This was one of the primary reasons why GNU GPLv3 was introduced.
So in many occasions, open source != free software.
[0]https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html
NO. They can be very different practically.
For example, your Android phone/router contains open source software pieces (and very likely have GPLv2 licensed code). You get the source code of those, but you may not be able to change them. So yes, they are open source, but not free software.
Open source means the code is open, and you can do anything with the code (licensing restrictions implied). Free software extends that further to have freedom to run modified code on the same device[0] (See freedom 1 and its explanation: The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish). This is a very important distinction between free software and open source software.
This was one of the primary reasons why GNU GPLv3 was introduced.
So in many occasions, open source != free software.
[0]https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html
> Free software extends that further to have freedom to run modified code on the same device[0]
That is not true. You're talking of GPL version 3, but that does not extend to all Free Software licenses and is not included in the Free Software definition.
For example GPLv2 does NOT require devices to allow you to run modified code, having no anti-tivoization clause. Are you saying that GPLv2, which was created by the FSF and is used by such prominent projects as the Linux kernel, is not Free Software?
Stop speaking nonsense.
That is not true. You're talking of GPL version 3, but that does not extend to all Free Software licenses and is not included in the Free Software definition.
For example GPLv2 does NOT require devices to allow you to run modified code, having no anti-tivoization clause. Are you saying that GPLv2, which was created by the FSF and is used by such prominent projects as the Linux kernel, is not Free Software?
Stop speaking nonsense.
> Are you saying that GPLv2, which was created by the FSF and is used by such prominent projects as the Linux kernel, is not Free Software?
No. I have quoted that in a comment below. That is, a software can be both open source and free software or open source only based on where the code is run. GNU GPLv3 simply enforces this freedom irrespective of where the code is run. That doesn't mean some other license is non-free.
> Stop speaking nonsense.
We learn from mistakes. And from the mistakes we made, we learn and improve. GNU GPLv2 wasn't a mistake. It was a really good License (still is). But time proved its weakness. And FSF released GPL v3 License that addressed many issues that weren't addressed by GPL v2.
FSF now recommends GNU [LA]GPLv3 for most of the software pieces. So yeah, a binary of a code written in GNU GPLv2 may become non-free (but still open source), but GNU GPLv3 code and binary will always be free software (until time proves otherwise).
Edit: clarify that the binary made with GNU GPLv2 code (not to be confused with the source code itself) may be non-free.
No. I have quoted that in a comment below. That is, a software can be both open source and free software or open source only based on where the code is run. GNU GPLv3 simply enforces this freedom irrespective of where the code is run. That doesn't mean some other license is non-free.
> Stop speaking nonsense.
We learn from mistakes. And from the mistakes we made, we learn and improve. GNU GPLv2 wasn't a mistake. It was a really good License (still is). But time proved its weakness. And FSF released GPL v3 License that addressed many issues that weren't addressed by GPL v2.
FSF now recommends GNU [LA]GPLv3 for most of the software pieces. So yeah, a binary of a code written in GNU GPLv2 may become non-free (but still open source), but GNU GPLv3 code and binary will always be free software (until time proves otherwise).
Edit: clarify that the binary made with GNU GPLv2 code (not to be confused with the source code itself) may be non-free.
Well, if we are going to talk of mistakes, we can argue that GPL v3 and AGPL in general are in violation of Freedom 0 and that AGPL is definitely discriminating against fields of endeavour (OSI's rule 6).
For libraries in particular, or for the Linux kernel, it's the software developers themselves that are the users. Compare this:
- What GPL v2 says is simply "you can use this source code, but you have to give your changes back when distributing them".
- What GPL v3 says is "if you use this source code, you can't use it on your device unless you follow my rules" and Linus Tolvards thinks the same [1]
- With AGPL this is much worse, because AGPL is effectively an EULA and not just a copyright license, as AGPL redefines what redistribution means and severely restricts usage on people's own servers
In my opinion AGPL should have never been approved as either a Free Software or an Open Source license, being effectively a modern freeware, non-commercial license that escaped the scrutiny of Free Software advocates simply because it appeals to emotions whenever "freedom" gets mentioned, being like when the church asks for funding from the local government, requests which can't be easily refused, since it would position government officials to be against God.
To measure the truthiness of this claim, you only need to witness that AGPL gets used in dual licensing schemes, where the AGPL option is simply offered because it's useless for anything else than for demo purposes and good marketing.
But for the sake of argument, if you think there should be a distinction between users and developers, consider that modifying the software for your needs is simply usage and that this artificial distinction is what got Richard Stallman pissed enough to create the GPL and start the GNU alternatives in the first place.
> a code written in GNU GPLv2 may become non-free
By FSF's own admission, that is not true. Code released under GPLv2 can never be non-free.
In terms of copyright, that code will always be redistributable under GPLv2 (i.e. once released, you can't take it back). In terms of patents, it comes with an implicit grant. Oh you're speaking of binaries installed on devices? But then we are not talking about source code or the project itself, but about actual usage.
And going back to Free Software vs Open Source, you simply can't redefine what Free Software means depending on whims or speculation. And if this is the trend, then the Free Software community is positioning themselves to be against the spirit of Free Software.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaKIZ7gJlRU
For libraries in particular, or for the Linux kernel, it's the software developers themselves that are the users. Compare this:
- What GPL v2 says is simply "you can use this source code, but you have to give your changes back when distributing them".
- What GPL v3 says is "if you use this source code, you can't use it on your device unless you follow my rules" and Linus Tolvards thinks the same [1]
- With AGPL this is much worse, because AGPL is effectively an EULA and not just a copyright license, as AGPL redefines what redistribution means and severely restricts usage on people's own servers
In my opinion AGPL should have never been approved as either a Free Software or an Open Source license, being effectively a modern freeware, non-commercial license that escaped the scrutiny of Free Software advocates simply because it appeals to emotions whenever "freedom" gets mentioned, being like when the church asks for funding from the local government, requests which can't be easily refused, since it would position government officials to be against God.
To measure the truthiness of this claim, you only need to witness that AGPL gets used in dual licensing schemes, where the AGPL option is simply offered because it's useless for anything else than for demo purposes and good marketing.
But for the sake of argument, if you think there should be a distinction between users and developers, consider that modifying the software for your needs is simply usage and that this artificial distinction is what got Richard Stallman pissed enough to create the GPL and start the GNU alternatives in the first place.
> a code written in GNU GPLv2 may become non-free
By FSF's own admission, that is not true. Code released under GPLv2 can never be non-free.
In terms of copyright, that code will always be redistributable under GPLv2 (i.e. once released, you can't take it back). In terms of patents, it comes with an implicit grant. Oh you're speaking of binaries installed on devices? But then we are not talking about source code or the project itself, but about actual usage.
And going back to Free Software vs Open Source, you simply can't redefine what Free Software means depending on whims or speculation. And if this is the trend, then the Free Software community is positioning themselves to be against the spirit of Free Software.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaKIZ7gJlRU
You can change the free parts of Android. That's why everyone and their brother can release Android phones, not just Google, and why F-Droid and Replicant can exist.
However, I think you may be correct that some or perhaps most Android hardware is tivoised to not allow you to install derivative Androids. If so, that's a case of what good is a phone call, Mr Anderson, if you cannot speak.
However, I think you may be correct that some or perhaps most Android hardware is tivoised to not allow you to install derivative Androids. If so, that's a case of what good is a phone call, Mr Anderson, if you cannot speak.
> You get the source code of those, but you may not be able to change them.
Yes you can. See https://opensource.org/osd-annotated :
> 3. Derived Works
> The license must allow modifications and derived works, and must allow them to be distributed under the same terms as the license of the original software.
Yes you can. See https://opensource.org/osd-annotated :
> 3. Derived Works
> The license must allow modifications and derived works, and must allow them to be distributed under the same terms as the license of the original software.
>> You get the source code of those, but you may not be able to change them.
> Yes you can. See https://opensource.org/osd-annotated
Well. I have explained about that in the above comment. I'm not saying that you can't modify the source. But open source software don't require the user to be able to run the modified versions on the same device, free software do.
So the same software can be both free software and open source or open source only based on where the code is run.
> Yes you can. See https://opensource.org/osd-annotated
Well. I have explained about that in the above comment. I'm not saying that you can't modify the source. But open source software don't require the user to be able to run the modified versions on the same device, free software do.
So the same software can be both free software and open source or open source only based on where the code is run.
Where in The Free Software Definition https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html does it require the user to be able to run the modified versions on the same device?
> Where in The Free Software Definition https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html does it require the user to be able to run the modified versions on the same device?
Quoting from the above link:
Freedom 1 includes the freedom to use your changed version in place of the original. If the program is delivered in a product designed to run someone else's modified versions but refuse to run yours — a practice known as “tivoization” or “lockdown”, or (in its practitioners' perverse terminology) as “secure boot” — freedom 1 becomes an empty pretense rather than a practical reality. These binaries are not free software even if the source code they are compiled from is free.
Quoting from the above link:
Freedom 1 includes the freedom to use your changed version in place of the original. If the program is delivered in a product designed to run someone else's modified versions but refuse to run yours — a practice known as “tivoization” or “lockdown”, or (in its practitioners' perverse terminology) as “secure boot” — freedom 1 becomes an empty pretense rather than a practical reality. These binaries are not free software even if the source code they are compiled from is free.
Yes, you can have non-free binaries, but from that same quote: the source code to build them is still considered free.
They are different. I have open source contributions and I am cool giving away code free (and use others code of course). E.g. open source as Apache license.
I disagree with free software peoples opinions often and don't want much contact with that community (prefer less ideological communities and less my-way-is-the-only-way and if-you-want-something-different-then-me-you-are-stupid communities).
I disagree with free software peoples opinions often and don't want much contact with that community (prefer less ideological communities and less my-way-is-the-only-way and if-you-want-something-different-then-me-you-are-stupid communities).
That's the philosophical difference I was talking about.
Doesn't change the fact that all code you release under an Apache license is free software in the sense of the four freedoms as defined by the FSF. Whether you like their ways or not.
Doesn't change the fact that all code you release under an Apache license is free software in the sense of the four freedoms as defined by the FSF. Whether you like their ways or not.
That is somewhat debatable I suppose. The freedom (if you want to quote RMS) absolutely includes the so called viral provisions of licenses such as the GPL. RMS is quoted as saying proprietary software should be illegal.
As a software engineer myself, I find that sort of demagoguery a bit tiring, and consider a license with less mandatory stipulations as more "free" (admittedly under a different definition than the FSF) than one that has required stipulations. As a result of this, there are many people like the parent, and myself, who could really care less about Free Software but find open source development as one of the most effective software development methodologies. Is all OSS I release also Free Software? Sure! Can someone relicense something I publish with a MIT/Apache license as proprietary software without releasing the code? Sure! My definition is more free = less restrictions, and more restrictions = less free. By that definition, the GPL is a less free (as in freedom for the users / consumers) than the MIT / Apache / BSD.
As a software engineer myself, I find that sort of demagoguery a bit tiring, and consider a license with less mandatory stipulations as more "free" (admittedly under a different definition than the FSF) than one that has required stipulations. As a result of this, there are many people like the parent, and myself, who could really care less about Free Software but find open source development as one of the most effective software development methodologies. Is all OSS I release also Free Software? Sure! Can someone relicense something I publish with a MIT/Apache license as proprietary software without releasing the code? Sure! My definition is more free = less restrictions, and more restrictions = less free. By that definition, the GPL is a less free (as in freedom for the users / consumers) than the MIT / Apache / BSD.
There's nothing in the Free Software definition that requires copy-left licensing and RMS, along with the other FSF members have validated most OSI approved licenses as being Free Software, including BSD, MIT, MPL and Apache 2.0.
RMS has said a lot over the years, including that the dual licensing business model (e.g. GPL + proprietary) is a valid business model (i.e. whatever it takes to keep development of the GPL version going). And his opinions don't necessarily reflect the official position of the FSF.
RMS has said a lot over the years, including that the dual licensing business model (e.g. GPL + proprietary) is a valid business model (i.e. whatever it takes to keep development of the GPL version going). And his opinions don't necessarily reflect the official position of the FSF.
He's also said that proprietary software should be illegal due to it stripping freedoms away from users.
He also said that he downloads websites by sending an order by email [1].
That's still irrelevant to the discussion here, which is about what Free Software is and how it compares with Open Source.
[1] https://stallman.org/stallman-computing.html
That's still irrelevant to the discussion here, which is about what Free Software is and how it compares with Open Source.
[1] https://stallman.org/stallman-computing.html
> absolutely includes the so called viral provisions of licenses such as the GPL.
No, no it does not and rms has very specifically said that free software doesn't need to be copyleft. They even have a diagram which explicitly includes permissive licenses in the free category:
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.en.html
Your definition of freedom isn't different than the FSF's. You perhaps just disagree on what is necessary to safeguard that freedom and you disagree that proprietary software is unethical.
No, no it does not and rms has very specifically said that free software doesn't need to be copyleft. They even have a diagram which explicitly includes permissive licenses in the free category:
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.en.html
Your definition of freedom isn't different than the FSF's. You perhaps just disagree on what is necessary to safeguard that freedom and you disagree that proprietary software is unethical.
Yepp, it's a trade off between the rights of the developer and the rights of the consumer / user, you fundamentally can't have both (simplification). RMS goes all on the latter side, essentially.
I am not sure RMS makes such a distinction. To him all users are potential developers (or programmers more likely).
Frankly he is more concerned with who actually control the computing hardware and software being in use on a daily basis.
Keep in mind that one of the issues that got him on his quest was the loss of the ability to modify a printer driver to message those with a print job in the queue that the printer was out of paper.
It may seem frivolous, but it made life that much nicer at MIT. Because once the printer down the hall was out, any number of people may converge on it to fix it once they got the message. Without it, any number of print jobs may be sitting in wait because nobody had checked if there were still paper ready before adding another job to the queue.
Frankly he is more concerned with who actually control the computing hardware and software being in use on a daily basis.
Keep in mind that one of the issues that got him on his quest was the loss of the ability to modify a printer driver to message those with a print job in the queue that the printer was out of paper.
It may seem frivolous, but it made life that much nicer at MIT. Because once the printer down the hall was out, any number of people may converge on it to fix it once they got the message. Without it, any number of print jobs may be sitting in wait because nobody had checked if there were still paper ready before adding another job to the queue.
I'd argue that he quite clearly does actually make that distinction, though perhaps with different words. (I'm also under the impression that he elaborates quite a bit on the core concept, though I'm unable to easily find a reference). But, e.g. from the GNU Manifesto, 1985:
> GNU is not in the public domain. Everyone will be permitted to modify and redistribute GNU, but no distributor will be allowed to restrict its further redistribution.
The phrasing is a bit different (it's from a point of view of freedom of distribution), but essentially he's pointing out the copyleft idea; that the code can never go back to a model that doesn't provide the same guarantees.
So, there's the freedom of distribution, versus the freedom of someone to restrict the distribution. Both cannot exist at the same time. He's quite clear that the benefits of freedom of distribution outweigh (any potential) benefits of restriction, so he's happy to deny others that "freedom". It gets phrased in many ways, but right or wrong, that's what it is. In that sense, I agree with the poster I responded to; to the person doing the coding themselves, an MIT license leaves more doors open, and hence feels more free.
> GNU is not in the public domain. Everyone will be permitted to modify and redistribute GNU, but no distributor will be allowed to restrict its further redistribution.
The phrasing is a bit different (it's from a point of view of freedom of distribution), but essentially he's pointing out the copyleft idea; that the code can never go back to a model that doesn't provide the same guarantees.
So, there's the freedom of distribution, versus the freedom of someone to restrict the distribution. Both cannot exist at the same time. He's quite clear that the benefits of freedom of distribution outweigh (any potential) benefits of restriction, so he's happy to deny others that "freedom". It gets phrased in many ways, but right or wrong, that's what it is. In that sense, I agree with the poster I responded to; to the person doing the coding themselves, an MIT license leaves more doors open, and hence feels more free.
Like with most of RMSs terminology, I disagree with the dichotomy of developer vs user.
Freedom 1 and 3 apply specifically to users who are or will become developers. I believe what we actually want to talk about is publisher vs user/consumer instead of developer vs user.
The FSF people really like their ambiguous terminology, unfortunately.
Freedom 1 and 3 apply specifically to users who are or will become developers. I believe what we actually want to talk about is publisher vs user/consumer instead of developer vs user.
The FSF people really like their ambiguous terminology, unfortunately.
I an honestly not sure RMS would make such a distinction.
It seems more like one that has grown in into being in more recent years, particularly with the rise of mobile and web.
It seems more like one that has grown in into being in more recent years, particularly with the rise of mobile and web.
It's an important distinction IMO. Roughly 99% of the GPL is irrelevant to the end user if they don't have all of the knowledge, desire, and time to crack open the code and modify it.
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"RMS is quoted as saying proprietary software should be illegal."
Yep, this is pretty much what I referred to. It is not just about code being given away, it is about making closed code illegal which is something I disagree with.
I also disagree with less strong but still demagoguery claims about closed code being somehow unethical. Or chest thumping with no data to confirm it about how all open source programmers are the most skilled programmers in the world, how open source is by definition all clean and well done and closed source programmers are all totally incapable. (Tho, people usually stop to drum this one the moment they find first job. Which tends to be closed source.) Or chest thumping about how all open source communities are totally awesome meritocratic places with no bullshit politics going on ever and how all companies are surely political hell holes.
I mean sure, old Microsoft claims about how open source is all amateurs doing bad quality work is equal bullshit, but that does not cancel out sheer ego and overstatements so often coming out of free/open ideologues. RMS totally did the work of 11 people alone, back then, right?
Case in point, overwhelming majority of open source, especially big projects, is written by employed people, which is imo, actually cool. That includes linux and that data is easily googleable. But the free software ideologists will still run about hobbyist magically developing large projects in their spare time (while they are also working overtime in companies they are employed in no less, cause they are passionate and because who would ever add two numbers together).
Another case in point, RMS boasted about there surely being more women in open source, cause it is so much better environment, until data came out and turned out women are more likely to work on close source. (The difference does not say anything wrong nor good about either group imo, just that the claim was confident bullshit based on ego thinking alone. There are enough differences that have nothing to do with how good either environment is.)
Yep, this is pretty much what I referred to. It is not just about code being given away, it is about making closed code illegal which is something I disagree with.
I also disagree with less strong but still demagoguery claims about closed code being somehow unethical. Or chest thumping with no data to confirm it about how all open source programmers are the most skilled programmers in the world, how open source is by definition all clean and well done and closed source programmers are all totally incapable. (Tho, people usually stop to drum this one the moment they find first job. Which tends to be closed source.) Or chest thumping about how all open source communities are totally awesome meritocratic places with no bullshit politics going on ever and how all companies are surely political hell holes.
I mean sure, old Microsoft claims about how open source is all amateurs doing bad quality work is equal bullshit, but that does not cancel out sheer ego and overstatements so often coming out of free/open ideologues. RMS totally did the work of 11 people alone, back then, right?
Case in point, overwhelming majority of open source, especially big projects, is written by employed people, which is imo, actually cool. That includes linux and that data is easily googleable. But the free software ideologists will still run about hobbyist magically developing large projects in their spare time (while they are also working overtime in companies they are employed in no less, cause they are passionate and because who would ever add two numbers together).
Another case in point, RMS boasted about there surely being more women in open source, cause it is so much better environment, until data came out and turned out women are more likely to work on close source. (The difference does not say anything wrong nor good about either group imo, just that the claim was confident bullshit based on ego thinking alone. There are enough differences that have nothing to do with how good either environment is.)
Ironically, I see the attitude you describe in the open-source community quite often, specifically the BSD community is quite vocal about being more 'level headed' than the GPL community and more 'mature'.
As someone who has zero contact with anyone BSD and have no idea about their community, I have no idea.
As far as I am concerned, there is no open source community as single entity. There are comunities around concrete projects, some better then others. Anyone pretending to represent whole open source is usually doing it for politics and ego.
As far as I am concerned, there is no open source community as single entity. There are comunities around concrete projects, some better then others. Anyone pretending to represent whole open source is usually doing it for politics and ego.
>Anyone pretending to represent whole open source is usually doing it for politics and ego.
Please don't judge the whole open source community by ESR.
Please don't judge the whole open source community by ESR.
> less ideological communities and less my-way-is-the-only-way and if-you-want-something-different-then-me-you-are-stupid
You mean like rewriting entire projects, just because they have the wrong open source defined license? Tell me, which operative systems welcome all software that the Open source initiative define as open source, and which operative systems do only allow a very narrow list of licenses that match a specific ideology?
You mean like rewriting entire projects, just because they have the wrong open source defined license? Tell me, which operative systems welcome all software that the Open source initiative define as open source, and which operative systems do only allow a very narrow list of licenses that match a specific ideology?
Not sure what you ask? If the license they use is incompatible with projects license, then of course it is ok to rewrite it? And of course it is also ok to rewrite project for arbitrary reasons like that you don't like the maintainer.
Rewriting software just because it do not perfectly match a communities opinion about licenses is the least pragmatic way to go about software. It is the my-way-is-the-only-way approach, rather than working together and work with a mix of licenses and focus on the code.
Diversity in licenses is a sign of cooperation.
Diversity in licenses is a sign of cooperation.
What is the alternative, break the license or change your own? If I want to allow my library in closed code, I cant import GPL. Hence, I have to rewrite it. Rewriting Apache into GPL makes little sense, but is little work. You can just import it and slap GPL on top.
You cant just mix licenses, because licenses disallow/allow activities.
You cant just mix licenses, because licenses disallow/allow activities.
Take a operative system like debian. It has a huge number of packages in every combination and mix of open source defined and free software defined license. It does not limit itself to only use code that closed code can use. The community embrace license diversity, and thus has very little "my-way-is-the-only-way". As a practice, if they can avoid writing their own stuff they do so, always look around them and see if someone else has already written what they need. They use the "if-you-want-something-different-then-me-you-might-be-right" attitude to code, happy abandoning anything home brewed.
You can't have both a no-ideological community and "no gpl welcome". Either you welcome everyone and focus on getting code to work, or you exclude based on licenses and reinvent the wheel. The question you need to ask is what is important for you. If the most important thing for the project is the license choice, then be upfront about the ideological choice that such goal is. If the goal is to get working code that will use any software you can legally use, then a more pragmatic approach is more suitable.
I personally don't run operative system which focus more on the license rather than getting things done. My work also don't pay me for license choices, but they do for code that works and create value for the customers. I could put agpl code on the servers and you know what, no one would object.
You can't have both a no-ideological community and "no gpl welcome". Either you welcome everyone and focus on getting code to work, or you exclude based on licenses and reinvent the wheel. The question you need to ask is what is important for you. If the most important thing for the project is the license choice, then be upfront about the ideological choice that such goal is. If the goal is to get working code that will use any software you can legally use, then a more pragmatic approach is more suitable.
I personally don't run operative system which focus more on the license rather than getting things done. My work also don't pay me for license choices, but they do for code that works and create value for the customers. I could put agpl code on the servers and you know what, no one would object.
If you are writing a library, the moment you include GPL, you can't be Apache nor MIT nor BSD anymore. You yourself have to change the license so that your close source users are excluded (or forced to give put code). It is right there in GPL license. Only ideology is related to following copyright law. And maybe also respect toward GPL software creators who don't wish their code to be used.
You can legaly include apache in GPL software.
Following your theory, one would either have to break GPL and risk legal problems or exclude close source users of his work.
You can legaly include apache in GPL software.
Following your theory, one would either have to break GPL and risk legal problems or exclude close source users of his work.
If the goal of the library is to be used in closed source, you will be limited to reusing code to only those that has compatible license with the closed source. That is a choice you make that has nothing to do with writing software to fix problems that people have in their lives. In some cases this make a economical sense, where you do not just want to solve problems for customers but where the primary goal is to generate property for which the company can own. For other companies, solving problems for customer is how they get paid and the faster they solve one problem the fast they can go to the next.
But I digress. There is a clear bright line between writing code to solve a problem, and rewriting code because the license don't let you create property in the form of closed code. One is about pragmatic problem solving, and one is about ideology. One allows for code reuse, one is limited to my-way-is-the-only-way.
If you live in an ideology that demand that everything you do must be made into property owned by the company and only secondary solves problem for a customer, you will be slower than a companies which more pragmatically focused on fixing problems for customers. Don't blame others if you are self-imposing such restrictions on yourself.
But I digress. There is a clear bright line between writing code to solve a problem, and rewriting code because the license don't let you create property in the form of closed code. One is about pragmatic problem solving, and one is about ideology. One allows for code reuse, one is limited to my-way-is-the-only-way.
If you live in an ideology that demand that everything you do must be made into property owned by the company and only secondary solves problem for a customer, you will be slower than a companies which more pragmatically focused on fixing problems for customers. Don't blame others if you are self-imposing such restrictions on yourself.
"If the goal of the library is to be used in closed source, you will be limited to reusing code to only those that has compatible license with the closed source. That is a choice you make that has nothing to do with writing software to fix problems that people have in their lives."
It absolutely does. It fixes problem of people who work on close source or otherwise something incompatible is gpl. You either dont count them as people or as problems and neither makes sense. I used open source inside closed source. So yep, if I am going to five away, I will give to the same pool. Generous people gave me something, so I am giving back.
A library that I can not use does not solve any problem. That is not pragmatic, just something with limited use. Which is fine, if you feel strongly about your work use being restricted to some people only. I don't.
The moment when your logic twists gpl into literally "the only pragmatic license" is the moment when I wonder whether you are even honest in your arguments.
It absolutely does. It fixes problem of people who work on close source or otherwise something incompatible is gpl. You either dont count them as people or as problems and neither makes sense. I used open source inside closed source. So yep, if I am going to five away, I will give to the same pool. Generous people gave me something, so I am giving back.
A library that I can not use does not solve any problem. That is not pragmatic, just something with limited use. Which is fine, if you feel strongly about your work use being restricted to some people only. I don't.
The moment when your logic twists gpl into literally "the only pragmatic license" is the moment when I wonder whether you are even honest in your arguments.
They are different, and that's fine. Personally I lean more towards the BSD/MIT style of licensing than GPL; I feel the former is "more free" from the developer's side because it doesn't tell her what she can't do with her code. The GPL forces the developer's hand (though in a way that benefits society as a whole), whereas BSD says "it's your code, do what you will".
All of that said, the GPL is perhaps one of the most important parts of the modern software ecosystem; without it we wouldn't have Linux, and FOSS as we know it wouldn't exist. The world is a better place because of the GPL.
All of that said, the GPL is perhaps one of the most important parts of the modern software ecosystem; without it we wouldn't have Linux, and FOSS as we know it wouldn't exist. The world is a better place because of the GPL.
The BSD/GPL question is independent of the free software / open source term.
Both the OSI and the FSF accept GPL and BSD-style licenses. So both GPL and BSD code is free software and open source software.
Both the OSI and the FSF accept GPL and BSD-style licenses. So both GPL and BSD code is free software and open source software.
Are you sure about that? gnu.org has a huge beef with BSD, they are actively campaigning for any developer considering BSD to use GPL instead[1]. Basically, anything that is not 100% copyleft is considered non-Free by GNU and FSF.
Again, that doesn't bother me; to each their own. I'm not a developer so you might say I have no skin in this issue. However, I stand by my assertion that BSD gives the lone developer more freedom at the expense of social needs, whereas the GPL takes freedom away from the lone developer but puts necessary power in the hands of society as a whole (the so-called "viral" aspect of GPL).
Neither is "right" or "wrong", and I'm happy we have a choice at all.
[1] https://www.gnu.org/licenses/bsd.en.html
Again, that doesn't bother me; to each their own. I'm not a developer so you might say I have no skin in this issue. However, I stand by my assertion that BSD gives the lone developer more freedom at the expense of social needs, whereas the GPL takes freedom away from the lone developer but puts necessary power in the hands of society as a whole (the so-called "viral" aspect of GPL).
Neither is "right" or "wrong", and I'm happy we have a choice at all.
[1] https://www.gnu.org/licenses/bsd.en.html
> gnu.org has a huge beef with BSD, they are actively campaigning for any developer considering BSD to use GPL instead[1]. Basically, anything that is not 100% copyleft is considered non-Free by GNU and FSF.
Not true. Just look here: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html
Plenty of BSD-ish licenses that are in the free software categories.
The FSF's and GNU proejct's position is that they prefer GPL over BSD, but nowhere do they say BSDish licensed code is not free software.
Not true. Just look here: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html
Plenty of BSD-ish licenses that are in the free software categories.
The FSF's and GNU proejct's position is that they prefer GPL over BSD, but nowhere do they say BSDish licensed code is not free software.
That's not a campaign against BSD-style licenses. It's a campaign against the advertising clause that was present in the "old" 4-clause BSD license. (And the page you link to couldn't really be clearer.)
It's also worth pointing out that the "campaign" originated 20 years ago and was more or less successful—Berkeley themselves agreed with the campaign and dropped the advertising clause. FreeBSD stripped the license down further to 2 clauses. Nowadays, the 2- and 3-clause BSD licenses are the most popularly adopted versions for anyone choosing BSD—if you hear anyone talking about the BSD license, they're almost definitely referring to one of these two—and this campaign is the reason why.
So, no, that's not a link to an historical campaign against BSD. If anything, it was a campaign that strengthened BSD by making it a more attractive license choice.
EDIT:
I just reread your comment, and it makes me sad and wonder how people get away with convincing themselves it's okay to outright lie about things or pretend to know more about something than they do.
> Basically, anything that is not 100% copyleft is considered non-Free by GNU and FSF.
This is unequivocally false. Not only is this not the FSF's position (e.g., that you might be able to infer based on what they don't say and trying to read between the lines), but there's a wealth of information that the FSF and GNU have published that directly contradicts this. I get the terrible feeling that you've never actually read any of FSF or GNU's firsthand opinion pieces; that you instead respond to the distorted phantom arguments that appear in message board conversations after RMS and Co's position has been filtered through n retellings in the comments. Worse still, you're helping to propagate this to other people.
Please don't contribute to the problem. Please stop doing this.
It's also worth pointing out that the "campaign" originated 20 years ago and was more or less successful—Berkeley themselves agreed with the campaign and dropped the advertising clause. FreeBSD stripped the license down further to 2 clauses. Nowadays, the 2- and 3-clause BSD licenses are the most popularly adopted versions for anyone choosing BSD—if you hear anyone talking about the BSD license, they're almost definitely referring to one of these two—and this campaign is the reason why.
So, no, that's not a link to an historical campaign against BSD. If anything, it was a campaign that strengthened BSD by making it a more attractive license choice.
EDIT:
I just reread your comment, and it makes me sad and wonder how people get away with convincing themselves it's okay to outright lie about things or pretend to know more about something than they do.
> Basically, anything that is not 100% copyleft is considered non-Free by GNU and FSF.
This is unequivocally false. Not only is this not the FSF's position (e.g., that you might be able to infer based on what they don't say and trying to read between the lines), but there's a wealth of information that the FSF and GNU have published that directly contradicts this. I get the terrible feeling that you've never actually read any of FSF or GNU's firsthand opinion pieces; that you instead respond to the distorted phantom arguments that appear in message board conversations after RMS and Co's position has been filtered through n retellings in the comments. Worse still, you're helping to propagate this to other people.
Please don't contribute to the problem. Please stop doing this.
From the link I posted (emphasis mine):
There are many variants of simple non-copyleft free software licenses, such as the Expat license, FreeBSD license, X10 license, the X11 license, and the two BSD (Berkeley Software Distribution) licenses.
They outright say BSD is not copyleft, which means it is not Free Software by the FSF definition, though it is Open Source.
Anyway, all I was trying to say is that GPL and BSD are both sensible licenses, the main difference being that the GPL restricts developer freedoms in order to provide user freedoms, while BSD does not restrict either. That doesn't make GPL bad or BSD better, it's simply two different philosophies and I for one am grateful to both. If you are intent on calling me a liar for that, so be it, though you should know that ad hominem attacks are not welcome here.
There are many variants of simple non-copyleft free software licenses, such as the Expat license, FreeBSD license, X10 license, the X11 license, and the two BSD (Berkeley Software Distribution) licenses.
They outright say BSD is not copyleft, which means it is not Free Software by the FSF definition, though it is Open Source.
Anyway, all I was trying to say is that GPL and BSD are both sensible licenses, the main difference being that the GPL restricts developer freedoms in order to provide user freedoms, while BSD does not restrict either. That doesn't make GPL bad or BSD better, it's simply two different philosophies and I for one am grateful to both. If you are intent on calling me a liar for that, so be it, though you should know that ad hominem attacks are not welcome here.
> They outright say BSD is not copyleft
Do you think this contradicts something I wrote above? Are you intentionally trying to use misdirection here? No one would dispute that BSD is a non-copyleft license. You're using a really underhanded style of argumentation, where you make some statement X that is controversial and untrue, and when pressed about X, defend some obviously true statement Y. This can come off looking like a "win" for you, but only if nobody is paying attention.
> Anyway, all I was trying to say is
This is the written word, so it's easy to see what you said--and it's easy to see if you're attempting to rewrite it, too. Here's what you did say (and consequently, what you should be defending, not whether or not BSD is not a copyleft license):
> they are actively campaigning for any developer considering BSD to use GPL instead[1]. Basically, anything that is not 100% copyleft is considered non-Free by GNU and FSF.
> If you are intent on calling me a liar for that, so be it, though you should know that ad hominem attacks are not welcome here.
I know what's permissable, thanks. And Person B making some claim that Person A lied is not an example of ad hominem, by the way. This form of misdirection is something else that only works if no one is paying attention.
EDIT:
> [Not copyleft] means it is not Free Software by the FSF definition
Sorry, you're not going to be able to get away with saying so many untrue things—especially when they are verifiably[1][2] untrue. It is not the position of the FSF (or GNU or RMS or...) that licenses must be copyleft to be considered free. Stop propagating falsehoods. Please spend 15 minutes reviewing the actual positions of the people you're trying to comment on. Otherwise, what's the point of saying anything at all?
1. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#OriginalBS...
2. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#ModifiedBS...
Do you think this contradicts something I wrote above? Are you intentionally trying to use misdirection here? No one would dispute that BSD is a non-copyleft license. You're using a really underhanded style of argumentation, where you make some statement X that is controversial and untrue, and when pressed about X, defend some obviously true statement Y. This can come off looking like a "win" for you, but only if nobody is paying attention.
> Anyway, all I was trying to say is
This is the written word, so it's easy to see what you said--and it's easy to see if you're attempting to rewrite it, too. Here's what you did say (and consequently, what you should be defending, not whether or not BSD is not a copyleft license):
> they are actively campaigning for any developer considering BSD to use GPL instead[1]. Basically, anything that is not 100% copyleft is considered non-Free by GNU and FSF.
> If you are intent on calling me a liar for that, so be it, though you should know that ad hominem attacks are not welcome here.
I know what's permissable, thanks. And Person B making some claim that Person A lied is not an example of ad hominem, by the way. This form of misdirection is something else that only works if no one is paying attention.
EDIT:
> [Not copyleft] means it is not Free Software by the FSF definition
Sorry, you're not going to be able to get away with saying so many untrue things—especially when they are verifiably[1][2] untrue. It is not the position of the FSF (or GNU or RMS or...) that licenses must be copyleft to be considered free. Stop propagating falsehoods. Please spend 15 minutes reviewing the actual positions of the people you're trying to comment on. Otherwise, what's the point of saying anything at all?
1. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#OriginalBS...
2. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#ModifiedBS...
Err, this is the myth that keeps spreading mysteriously. There are absolutely massive differences between open source and free software. Why would you want to be open but not free unless you wanted to restrict the use of the code you “opened”.
Not mysteriously at all. There is big money to be made by muddying this water.
So, there _is_ a difference. But it's _not_ true that open source (as defined by OSI) says "nothing" about the rights it gives users. It says something. "free software" says something else/more (which may or may not be a good thing, that's a value judgement). "free software" is indeed an (intentionally) confusing name meant to discredit "open source".
> "free software" is indeed an (intentionally) confusing name meant to discredit "open source".
That's factually wrong. The word "free software" was invented before.
That's factually wrong. The word "free software" was invented before.
You've got the directions of the arrow of time and cause and effect backwards.
"Free Software" and "Copyleft" came WAY first. "Open Software" came later, and was meant to intentionally and personally discredit RMS, "free software" and "Copyleft".
"Free Software" and "Copyleft" came WAY first. "Open Software" came later, and was meant to intentionally and personally discredit RMS, "free software" and "Copyleft".
[deleted]
OK, thanks for the correction.
I still think it's important to note that a) they are NOT "the same" (as some people in the thread are saying), and b) "open source" as defined by OSI does NOT "say nothing about the rights it gives users" (as other people in the thread are saying). Neither are true.
I still think it's important to note that a) they are NOT "the same" (as some people in the thread are saying), and b) "open source" as defined by OSI does NOT "say nothing about the rights it gives users" (as other people in the thread are saying). Neither are true.
Yes which is why I specifically wrote free software in two of my paragraphs, I should probably have clarified.
I do not necessarily think supporting non-free open source software is good, and hope some of this goes to supporting actual free software.
I do not necessarily think supporting non-free open source software is good, and hope some of this goes to supporting actual free software.
Perhaps the person you're responding to is referring to Microsofts old business practices that involved trying to segment open source projects with the intent of making them inferior to Microsoft products?
Open source, free software, call it what you want. In either case I don't think it's a good thing if Microsofts (or any other company) is trying to hurt the quality of software that is already available to everyone (with or without permissive licenses).
Open source, free software, call it what you want. In either case I don't think it's a good thing if Microsofts (or any other company) is trying to hurt the quality of software that is already available to everyone (with or without permissive licenses).
Devil's advocate: You're supporting `n` billion devices around the world running your product, and the users are typically non-technical (from "I know how to open Word" to "Where's the 'Any' key?")
You need to battle against your competitor's product that "just work" because they can target one specific hardware profile and you can't, so you put in telemetry to improve compatibility. Makes sense.
It enrages us, the technically-minded and privacy conscious, but only serves to make Windows better for the non-techies and help MS stop haemorrhaging users to iOS.
You need to battle against your competitor's product that "just work" because they can target one specific hardware profile and you can't, so you put in telemetry to improve compatibility. Makes sense.
It enrages us, the technically-minded and privacy conscious, but only serves to make Windows better for the non-techies and help MS stop haemorrhaging users to iOS.
If they used the collected data only for compatibility improvements and discarded it when done.
If they allowed me to opt-in and I could shut off _all_ other telemetry.
If I trusted Microsoft.
Then we could talk :)
If they allowed me to opt-in and I could shut off _all_ other telemetry.
If I trusted Microsoft.
Then we could talk :)
They actually have incredibly strict policies about user privacy. Everyone in the company recently had to watch a short movie (with actual actors and realistic scenarios) about appropriate data usage and permissions.
So put a big red scary "PRESS THIS BUTTON AND YOU'LL GET HACKED IN TEN MINUTES UNLESS YOUR COMPUTER DOES NOT CRASH BEFORE THAT" that turns telemetry off and let me press it.
Ever worked the help desk? My users would push that button twice then call me in 5 minutes to tell me their computer has been hacked (just after it crashed of course).
I hate the telematics and the "anti-user" stubbornness of Windows in general, but at the same time, I know all too well who they're targeting and why. More and more of my less technical users are requesting Macs, which are a PITA to admin but at the same time generate fewer tickets because they're really hard to fuck up. I don't like seeing Windows move this direction, but I get it.
I hate the telematics and the "anti-user" stubbornness of Windows in general, but at the same time, I know all too well who they're targeting and why. More and more of my less technical users are requesting Macs, which are a PITA to admin but at the same time generate fewer tickets because they're really hard to fuck up. I don't like seeing Windows move this direction, but I get it.
> and the users are typically non-technical (from "I know how to open Word" to "Where's the 'Any' key?")
This isn't nearly as true as it used to be, because those people are on phones and tablets now. People who actually use desktops fall into one of 3 categories: content creators, office workers, and gamers.
Microsoft has ruined Windows by trying to make it into a webapp with a tablet UI in a vain effort to recapture that audience.
Meanwhile, the Linux Desktop has sacrificed any chance it once had of being decent by constantly sacrificing transparency of operation on the alter of "just works".
So here we are, stuck in a world where a really shitty version of Windows is still just barely the least-worst choice.
This isn't nearly as true as it used to be, because those people are on phones and tablets now. People who actually use desktops fall into one of 3 categories: content creators, office workers, and gamers.
Microsoft has ruined Windows by trying to make it into a webapp with a tablet UI in a vain effort to recapture that audience.
Meanwhile, the Linux Desktop has sacrificed any chance it once had of being decent by constantly sacrificing transparency of operation on the alter of "just works".
So here we are, stuck in a world where a really shitty version of Windows is still just barely the least-worst choice.
You had me until the Linux part. I've been using GNU+Linux and BSD as an OS since the late 90s. I've supported windows and osx as a sysadmins as well.
Windows is not the least worst choice, and gnu/Linux has made huge strides in the past few years towards just works. That said though,one of my issues is this concept that everyone should be able to use a computer without learning how.
Comp uters are inherently technical, its not that hard to learn. Its like what I started telling all the old people who kept saying, at the workplace, "I don't know computers..." Or some variation.
My response, well you better learn or you aren't going to have a job much longer...
I just don't get the want for a chimpanzee usable OS.
Windows is not the least worst choice, and gnu/Linux has made huge strides in the past few years towards just works. That said though,one of my issues is this concept that everyone should be able to use a computer without learning how.
Comp uters are inherently technical, its not that hard to learn. Its like what I started telling all the old people who kept saying, at the workplace, "I don't know computers..." Or some variation.
My response, well you better learn or you aren't going to have a job much longer...
I just don't get the want for a chimpanzee usable OS.
> Linux has made huge strides in the past few years towards just works
This is precisely my point. "Just works" is great, until something doesn't "just work", then you have to untangle a pile of complex and opaque interactions, often with poor and outdated documentation, to make something work.
In the past, Windows at least had relatively straight-forward mechanisms of operation that were all well documented and, importantly, didn't ever change all that much. That's starting to change now because MS has moved to the web-developer model of making breaking changes, and not documenting them, in rolling releases. But, it still has significant advantages in all 3 of the use cases I mentioned, so it manages to be slightly better.
What both desktops need to return to, in my idiot-on-the-internet opinion, is simplicity of operation of the underlying mechanisms. The OS doesn't have to be understandable by a chimpanzee, but it should be relatively intuitive and understandable for the average person who's willing to dig in to how things work.
This is precisely my point. "Just works" is great, until something doesn't "just work", then you have to untangle a pile of complex and opaque interactions, often with poor and outdated documentation, to make something work.
In the past, Windows at least had relatively straight-forward mechanisms of operation that were all well documented and, importantly, didn't ever change all that much. That's starting to change now because MS has moved to the web-developer model of making breaking changes, and not documenting them, in rolling releases. But, it still has significant advantages in all 3 of the use cases I mentioned, so it manages to be slightly better.
What both desktops need to return to, in my idiot-on-the-internet opinion, is simplicity of operation of the underlying mechanisms. The OS doesn't have to be understandable by a chimpanzee, but it should be relatively intuitive and understandable for the average person who's willing to dig in to how things work.
>then you have to untangle a pile of complex and opaque interactions, often with poor and outdated documentation, to make something work.
As if windows doesn't do this but worse? At least on linux I can see the source code of whatever is breaking and fix it. MS's official documentation is crap compared to gnu/linux documentation, not to mention linux has a very helpful community on places like irc. Have you ever taken a visit over to MS's "help" website? Worst outsourced-scripted-answerfest I've ever seen. I've been supporting Windows for many years as a senior sysadmin, years of licensing issues and bugs and ms shadyness, and windows 10 was the straw that broke the camels back for me. I switched to gnu+linux only and haven't looked back.
All I can say is this. If you put off linux a few years ago, you owe it to yourself to at least spin up a new just works distro like manjaro at least in a vm. I think you might be surprised just how far gnu+linux has come, and personally, I think that as vulkan solidifies and suddenly we have more AAA gaming titles on Linux, the cards show Linux poised to make a surge in the desktop market. Also, as much as I have vocally had issues with systemd, it has allowed many of the past init bugs to be done away with so the focus in dev has turned much more to the userspace and it's showing.
GNU+Linux is the computing choice of the future imho, and it's not dying or dead, it's thriving. It already runs most of our key infrastructure, supercomputers, etc. It just needs some tweaks for lay-user-compatability.
This is why MS is pushing the OSS angle so much. They recognize that gnu+linux and foss (as opposed to oss) in general is a real and credible threat!
It's also worth remember the nut-to-butt relationship MS has with NSA.
As if windows doesn't do this but worse? At least on linux I can see the source code of whatever is breaking and fix it. MS's official documentation is crap compared to gnu/linux documentation, not to mention linux has a very helpful community on places like irc. Have you ever taken a visit over to MS's "help" website? Worst outsourced-scripted-answerfest I've ever seen. I've been supporting Windows for many years as a senior sysadmin, years of licensing issues and bugs and ms shadyness, and windows 10 was the straw that broke the camels back for me. I switched to gnu+linux only and haven't looked back.
All I can say is this. If you put off linux a few years ago, you owe it to yourself to at least spin up a new just works distro like manjaro at least in a vm. I think you might be surprised just how far gnu+linux has come, and personally, I think that as vulkan solidifies and suddenly we have more AAA gaming titles on Linux, the cards show Linux poised to make a surge in the desktop market. Also, as much as I have vocally had issues with systemd, it has allowed many of the past init bugs to be done away with so the focus in dev has turned much more to the userspace and it's showing.
GNU+Linux is the computing choice of the future imho, and it's not dying or dead, it's thriving. It already runs most of our key infrastructure, supercomputers, etc. It just needs some tweaks for lay-user-compatability.
This is why MS is pushing the OSS angle so much. They recognize that gnu+linux and foss (as opposed to oss) in general is a real and credible threat!
It's also worth remember the nut-to-butt relationship MS has with NSA.
The source doesn't help you untangle the interactions of complex systems to find the root cause now does it? Even then, it is often easier to simply work around the problem than go through the trouble of rebuilding from source, with all the headache that comes with that. That you even consider this a viable answer is evidence of the deeply rooted problems with the mindset of the Linux Desktop community.
Windows has a lot of the same problems now, that's what I'm saying. That's where MS is screwing up. My opinion is that they still haven't screwed up as badly as the Linux Desktop has, and more importantly the advantages Windows Desktop brings to the table are greater than those of the Linux Desktop. This is why I said it was "barely the least-worst" instead of "the best".
I could spend hours writing about all the problems I have with the Linux Desktop, but it would fall on deaf ears because you'd just point at Windows and say "but they suck too!", which has basically been the Linux Desktop Evangelist strategy since 1990. Unsurprisingly, this hasn't spurred mass adoption.
It's great that the Linux Desktop fits your needs well enough that you can use it as your primary OS. Apparently there are about 4% of Desktop users for whom that can be said and "works fine for me!" is not going to win any of the other 96% over.
Windows has a lot of the same problems now, that's what I'm saying. That's where MS is screwing up. My opinion is that they still haven't screwed up as badly as the Linux Desktop has, and more importantly the advantages Windows Desktop brings to the table are greater than those of the Linux Desktop. This is why I said it was "barely the least-worst" instead of "the best".
I could spend hours writing about all the problems I have with the Linux Desktop, but it would fall on deaf ears because you'd just point at Windows and say "but they suck too!", which has basically been the Linux Desktop Evangelist strategy since 1990. Unsurprisingly, this hasn't spurred mass adoption.
It's great that the Linux Desktop fits your needs well enough that you can use it as your primary OS. Apparently there are about 4% of Desktop users for whom that can be said and "works fine for me!" is not going to win any of the other 96% over.
Embrace, Extend, Extinguish
I am under no illusions that they have changed at all. They have an agenda, and it won't be for the benefit of open-source.
I am under no illusions that they have changed at all. They have an agenda, and it won't be for the benefit of open-source.
> Why fight the user to this level? Have they really turned "good"?
Most of MS revenue comes from Azure so it makes perfect sense for them to invest in open source that is used on Azure servers.
Most of MS revenue comes from Azure so it makes perfect sense for them to invest in open source that is used on Azure servers.
Roughly 1/3 comes from Intelligent Cloud (i.e. Azure and friends)... although revenues increased 93% in FYQ3. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/Investor/earnings/FY-2017-Q3...
[edit: fix Intelligent Cloud vs Azure specifically]
[edit: fix Intelligent Cloud vs Azure specifically]
open source currently aligns with MS's business plan, they haven't turned good or bad they just see where developers want to go and think it's a good thing to go with them.
it doesn't change any of their other business plans but currently it's great for open source software and luckily if they change direction again we have permissively licensed software out of it.
they can't scoop that code back out of the pool so i don't really see a downside, except maybe having to fork projects and maintain them without the MS cash if they do change direction
it doesn't change any of their other business plans but currently it's great for open source software and luckily if they change direction again we have permissively licensed software out of it.
they can't scoop that code back out of the pool so i don't really see a downside, except maybe having to fork projects and maintain them without the MS cash if they do change direction
The obvious advantage for Microsoft is that they can now influence OSI. Even if they don't get voting rights immediately (which I would expect them to push hard for) there will now be the everlasting threat of pulling the funding to keep OSI in line. Organisations sponsored mostly by companies can't be expected to be bold about upholding users' rights and keeping the moral high ground, because most organisations are willing to compromise to keep themselves alive. Now it remains to be seen if this is a dark day for FOSS or just for OSI.
I do mind the perception that OSI is some pristine and error-less patron of open source. They're not, they are a business and they will do anything to get more donations.
OSI has been known to accept money from anyone. They took money from the company that's known to abuse open source. It’s a kind of “indulgence”, where you pay the church of open source to wash away your sins. OSI certainly doesn't care about anything other than publicity.
OSI has been known to accept money from anyone. They took money from the company that's known to abuse open source. It’s a kind of “indulgence”, where you pay the church of open source to wash away your sins. OSI certainly doesn't care about anything other than publicity.
From the press-release: "Microsoft's history with the OSI dates back to 2005 with the submission of the Microsoft Community License"
Well, that is not exactly true. For those who have forgotten the history, or weren't around at the time, this leaked internal document from Microsoft was the proximate cause of OSI taking off: http://catb.org/~esr/halloween/halloween1.html
TLDR: Microsoft's loud opposition to, and deep fear of, open source software provided a catalyst and a point of unification for those who supported it.
Well, that is not exactly true. For those who have forgotten the history, or weren't around at the time, this leaked internal document from Microsoft was the proximate cause of OSI taking off: http://catb.org/~esr/halloween/halloween1.html
TLDR: Microsoft's loud opposition to, and deep fear of, open source software provided a catalyst and a point of unification for those who supported it.
If I had a crystal ball back in the 90's that would have predicted this, I would simply had thrown it away thinking it was broken. Simply astounding. MS went from the 'monopoly' everyone loved to hate to this.
Bravo!
I would have preferred to see this money go to FSF instead of OSI, but of course sponsoring any of these organizations is better than not sponsoring.
So I hear it's been rather chilly in Hell as of lately, some report below-freezing temperatures.
That being said, Embrace, Extend, Extinguish and all that. Besides, there's a market for free software now they've become a cloud computing company too. Fits perfectly into their long-term plans.
That being said, Embrace, Extend, Extinguish and all that. Besides, there's a market for free software now they've become a cloud computing company too. Fits perfectly into their long-term plans.
Don't large companies sponsor or become members of such initiatives or organizations just so they can have a say on its future?
Does anyone know what Microsoft's objectives are here?
rmrfrmrf(2)
Here's the thing - if we see Microsoft making tangible changes to their behavior, and we reward that with more derision and distrust, then we aren't exactly incentivizing them - or anyone wathcing - to do more. I personally applaud Microsoft on their dramatically increased involvement in open source in the past couple of years and I encourage them to keep it up and explore other ways they can improve. Yes, Windows still sucks, and is getting worse. Keep putting their feet to the fire for it. But that doesn't mean we have to demean the legitimately good work they're doing - let them enjoy the success from that so they can apply it across the rest of the org!