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Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

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Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#21

Post by quigonjinn7 »

voltooid wrote: post #4
tyfon wrote: post #2

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…

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 rem…

> 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.

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#22

Post by hannob »

ekianjo wrote: post #11
tyfon wrote: post #2

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…

> 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 partici…

> 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...

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#23

Post by Quarrelsome »

cjsuk wrote: post #9
tyfon wrote: post #2

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…

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 re…

> 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_.

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#24

Post by watwut »

hannob wrote: post #22
ekianjo wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 partici…

> 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 mer…

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).

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#25

Post by kakarot »

z3t4 wrote: post #7
tyfon wrote: post #2

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…

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!

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.

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#26

Post by hah-muh-rabbi »

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.

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#27

Post by romanovcode »

tyfon wrote: post #2

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…

> 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.

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#28

Post by twelvedogs »

tyfon wrote: post #2

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…

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

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#29

Post by hannob »

watwut wrote: post #24
hannob wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 mer…

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).

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.

Re: Microsoft Becomes Sponsor of Open Source Initiative

#30

Post by cjsuk »

Quarrelsome wrote: post #23
cjsuk wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 re…

> 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 ey…

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.

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