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Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

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Re: Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

#212
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once again the whole KILL MONO FUD was the actions of the Open Source Community in the last 5 years. I never understood how in the world they got this is a trap from everything that was happening. I don't agree with RMS many times but in this one way he was 100% wrong when he targeted mono.

You honestly don't get it? I really like microsoft products and I use them every day, however the business model is too lock people in to their ecosystem so that you have to purchase licenses for their products. Mono clearly undermines that b/c it allows you to "easily" jump ship to a free platform. Unless I'm somehow completely misunderstanding their business model - killing Mono just makes business sense.

I work at Microsoft, in Azure.

What I hear privately from the people I meet who work on the .Net and Visual Studio side of things is consistent with what the company is now saying publicly.

Basically: "We luvvv Mono" :-)

Re: Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

#213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having followed a fair number of MS bloggers/podcasts currently in and around their web tools (ASP.NET, MVC, etc) teams... I honestly believe they understand the value of open source. Visual Studio and their MVC framework continue to impress me (I mostly work in Ruby today, but have to maintain some .NET stuff) and MS takes inspiration from successful open-source tools and frameworks where needed. Many of their recen…

I think one would be exceedingly foolish not to exercise the very greatest of caution. This is Microsoft we're talking about - they have a track record of profound fuckery. But I do indeed think this is better than not having happened.

Yeah, I think that's totally fair to say.

I wouldn't place bets on any strategy that relied on Microsoft not closing the doors again at some point in the future, on future versions of their development stack.

Like you said, though, this is better than not having happened.

Re: Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

#214
post #143

They also announced as part of this that they are putting a large swatch of their .NET Source code under Apache 2 and accepting pull requests. Folks, this is a very big deal for Microsoft. Who would have imagined this 10 years ago? Here is an image that shows what they are putting into the community https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BkT9oBcCQAAHIAV.jpg:large

Well, here we are then. This now officially the standard play for formerly-dominating computer-platform firms who have fallen on hard times: having before been proudly hard-nosed and proprietary, publicly see the light and present a new image as a new, kinder, gentler company which totally gets it about openness. Former famous examples: IBM under Lou Gerstner (we love Linux and open platforms!), Apple after the NeXT…

> Apple after the NeXT acquisition but before the iPhone (look how expandable our new PowerMacs are; on the software side, we're now an open-systems-loving Unix vendor, and we'll even open-source our kernel!)

Remember that time (well within the iOS era) that Apple claimed that FaceTime would be an open standard for interoperability?

Re: Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

#215
post #143

They also announced as part of this that they are putting a large swatch of their .NET Source code under Apache 2 and accepting pull requests. Folks, this is a very big deal for Microsoft. Who would have imagined this 10 years ago? Here is an image that shows what they are putting into the community https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BkT9oBcCQAAHIAV.jpg:large

Well, here we are then. This now officially the standard play for formerly-dominating computer-platform firms who have fallen on hard times: having before been proudly hard-nosed and proprietary, publicly see the light and present a new image as a new, kinder, gentler company which totally gets it about openness. Former famous examples: IBM under Lou Gerstner (we love Linux and open platforms!), Apple after the NeXT…

I'm sure I'm guilty of some logical fallacy or another here, but isn't responding to customer demand one of the core things espoused by the startup community? A big company does exactly what we're all saying is good for companies to do and everyone is up in arms with "TOO LATE M$" and the like (apologies for paraphrasing, and this is directed at several comments, not just this one). This is the kind of thing we WANT to see from big players, and while it's easy to say "close but nope", they do offer it up as "this is the direction we're going", and not "fine, this will have to do to shut you people up." Top MS dev team members have long been about open sourcing things, and I for one think it's awesome to see the company as a whole listening to it's best people, and the community that enables it.

Re: Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

#216
post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, here we are then. This now officially the standard play for formerly-dominating computer-platform firms who have fallen on hard times: having before been proudly hard-nosed and proprietary, publicly see the light and present a new image as a new, kinder, gentler company which totally gets it about openness. Former famous examples: IBM under Lou Gerstner (we love Linux and open platforms!), Apple after the NeXT…

I don't think it's particularly fair to lump Apple with the rest since 14 years later [1] the core OS is still open source [2], and they're actively working on several high profile open source projects (e.g. Webkit, CUPS, and clang). They're not exactly irrelevant either. [1] http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2000/04/05Apple-Releases-Dar... [2] http://opensource.apple.com/

Yes, although I could pick nits about the significance of each of these (Webkit being open source is somewhat less significant that it appears since web browsers nowadays are de facto somewhat unforkable; the open-sourcing of clang was partly or mainly an attack on the GPL). But while Apple's continued doing many of those things (and done some similar things like GCD), they've also started doing other things they weren't doing back in 1999 or 2003, like breaking new ground in walled-garden application platforms and aggressive use of patents. The iPhone has never been as open to non-native apps as desktop OS X, while even desktop OS X's support for them is declining. (That's especially significant if you take the post-PC-era viewpoint and see phone/tablet devices as displacing or succeeding the PC rather than just supplementing them.) So overall Apple fits the mould pretty well.

Re: Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

#217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hate to burst your bubble, but the only thing apple has going for them is the iPhone, which is arguably a fad. The reason Rolex never goes out of style is because they never change their style, and apple is no Rolex like a lot of people seem to think. People easily forget about all the hype around the iMac g3. Sure, it changed the company, but they still have yet to over take windows. Now Android is out selling the i…

Only thing Apple has going for them is the iPhone. And the iPad, which is kicking the hell out of Android tablets (to my consternation, because I'm primarily an Android user and their tablets are terrible). And the Macbook Pro, which is making pretty major inroads at leading-edge companies. A buddy of mine is working on *nix software at IBM and they asked if he wanted a Thinkpad or an MBP; that blew my mind. They don…

> A buddy of mine is working on *nix software at IBM and they asked if he wanted a Thinkpad or an MBP; that blew my mind.

Except, you know, IBM doesn't have anything to do with Thinkpad anymore, and hasn't for years.

Re: Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

#218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's particularly fair to lump Apple with the rest since 14 years later [1] the core OS is still open source [2], and they're actively working on several high profile open source projects (e.g. Webkit, CUPS, and clang). They're not exactly irrelevant either. [1] http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2000/04/05Apple-Releases-Dar... [2] http://opensource.apple.com/

None of them should be lumped together. There's no evidence that open-sourcing is a "standard play" demonstrative of anything as specific as what leoc claimed or with predictive power. That list of companies seems to demonstrate the opposite, in fact.

> That list of companies seems to demonstrate the opposite, in fact.

How do you reckon that?

Re: Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler

#219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only thing Apple has going for them is the iPhone. And the iPad, which is kicking the hell out of Android tablets (to my consternation, because I'm primarily an Android user and their tablets are terrible). And the Macbook Pro, which is making pretty major inroads at leading-edge companies. A buddy of mine is working on *nix software at IBM and they asked if he wanted a Thinkpad or an MBP; that blew my mind. They don…

> A buddy of mine is working on *nix software at IBM and they asked if he wanted a Thinkpad or an MBP; that blew my mind. Except, you know, IBM doesn't have anything to do with Thinkpad anymore, and hasn't for years.

"Except, you know," that it's a highly conservative company and offering a line developer a Mac is, in my experience, kind of weird.
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