Microsoft dev makes more changes to Linux 3 than anyone.

[ninjaaron]

Interesting slashdot story:

sfcrazy sends this quote from the H: "The 343 changes made by Microsoft developer K. Y. Srinivasan put him at the top of a list, created by LWN.net, of developers who made the most changes in the current development cycle for Linux 3.0. Along with a number of other 'change sets,' Microsoft provided a total of 361 changes, putting it in seventh place on the list of companies and groups that contributed code to the Linux kernel. By comparison, independent developers provided 1,085 change sets to Linux 3.0, while Red Hat provided 1,000 and Intel 839."
http://linux.slashdot.org/story/11/07/16/2316251/Microsoft-Developer-Made-the-Most-Changes-To-Linux-30-Code

Other stories about the same thing:
http://www.dwheeler.com/blog/2011/07/14/#microsoft-linux-author
http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Microsoft-contributes-a-lot-of-changes-to-Linux-kernel-3-0-1280528.html

I see this as a great thing. If MS feels that it has to contribute code to the kernel, we're getting there. Course, the corporate interest in Linux is primarily the server... and mobile OS's now...

[Giant Speck]

A single developer is responsible for 95% of Microsoft's code change contributions to Linux?

[ninjaaron]

looks like it.

[Linux_junkie]

How do you know he's working on Linux in company time? He's probably working on it in his spare time. Can you really see Microsoft paying its staff to work on a rival software?

[YeOK]

He worked on Microsoft's Hyper V driver, they had to clean it up to keep it included. The number of patches isn't all that important, what is included in those patches is what matters.

[ctrlmd]

:rolleyes:

[ninjaaron]

How do you know he's working on Linux in company time? He's probably working on it in his spare time. Can you really see Microsoft paying its staff to work on a rival software?

Well, I have a petty good idea, since he was working almost exclusively on a driver for an MS product.

[mips]

How do you know he's working on Linux in company time?
Can you really see Microsoft paying its staff to work on a rival software?

Microsoft actually does have paid staff working on linux stuff.
Yes.

[handy]

He worked on Microsoft's Hyper V driver, they had to clean it up to keep it included. The number of patches isn't all that important, what is included in those patches is what matters.

It sounds like it needed plenty of cleaning up?

[babakott]

Of all the companies, Microsoft would be my last guess as a Linux contributor. That mini-blows my mind.

[HermanAB]

What blows my mind, is Microsoft fixing their own bugs!

[babakott]

What blows my mind, is Microsoft fixing their own bugs!

Well played sir.

[Spice Weasel]

Microsoft have contributed more upstream than Canonical... Does anyone other than me find that funny? :P

[el_koraco]

Microsoft have contributed more upstream than Canonical... Does anyone other than me find that funny? :P

Canonical is instrumental in bringing competition within Gnome!

[keithpeter]

Hello All

Microsoft want visualisation stuff to work as that is an important market. Many people will use linux as either host or guest.

Customers using linux host with windows guest OSes want things to work properly!

[ninjaaron]

What blows my mind, is Microsoft fixing their own bugs!

booya!

[Bandit]

Hello All

Microsoft want visualisation stuff to work as that is an important market. Many people will use linux as either host or guest.

Customers using linux host with windows guest OSes want things to work properly!

This is true.

[Merk42]

So how many people that refuse to use anything Microsoft touches simply because Microsoft touches it, will now move to BSD?

[wrtpeeps]

How do you know he's working on Linux in company time? He's probably working on it in his spare time. Can you really see Microsoft paying its staff to work on a rival software?

Microsoft have entire departments dedicated to getting their software to work on Mac too.

[ikt]

Microsoft have contributed more upstream than Canonical... Does anyone other than me find that funny? :P

You phrased that badly, Microsoft have contributed more towards a specific driver upstream than Canonical.

If the linux kernel is all you refer to as "upstream" to the exclusion of Gnome, KDE and the hundreds of projects which contribute to the software "universe", why are you here?

[sffvba[e0rt]

As soon as Windows user-land runs from the Linux kernel I will switch /troll


404

PS - Yes, I am bored...

[forrestcupp]

MS planted a trojan in the kernel. :twisted:


Someone had to say it.

[cgroza]

MS planted a trojan in the kernel. :twisted:

Quick, take a look into the source code before something blows up.

[Quadunit404]

Microsoft committed more to Linux 3.0 than anyone else, Red Hat included. Now, how many patches has Canonical submitted?

[Spice Weasel]

Microsoft committed more to Linux 3.0 than anyone else, Red Hat included. Now, how many patches has Canonical submitted?

I can't find the article now, but as I remember Canonical have contributed 0.2% of code to the kernel.

[sffvba[e0rt]

The lines of code submitted by MS is low... and a lot of it is on the HyperV driver which is in the staging area because the quality isn't good enough to be added to the kernel yet...


404

PS - Like has been mentioned before, there is much more to Linux than the kernel and this shouldn't be used as a measure of how much anyone has contributed to Linux... (I should add GNU/ to make it make more sense but I am not going too :p)

[ikt]

Microsoft committed more to Linux 3.0 than anyone else, Red Hat included. Now, how many patches has Canonical submitted?

http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=11057085&postcount=20

To quote someone else:


You would think that all Linux users would take a united stance. This concept that a distro is only "valid" if it actively contributes to all software (including the kernel) is a bit silly to me.

http://forums.overclockers.com.au/showpost.php?p=10618943&postcount=8

As I sit with a broken desktop in 11.10 alpha 2 I really couldn't care about the kernel at all, I just want a working desktop.

[zekopeko]

Microsoft have contributed more upstream than Canonical... Does anyone other than me find that funny? :P

Do you have some numbers to back this up? Canonical is the official maintainer of AppArmor kernel module.

[Spice Weasel]

Do you have some numbers to back this up? Canonical is the official maintainer of AppArmor kernel module.

http://martinezjavier.blogspot.com/2011/03/canonical-contributions-to-linux-kernel.html

[forrestcupp]

Microsoft committed more to Linux 3.0 than anyone else, Red Hat included. Now, how many patches has Canonical submitted?

How much code has Red Hat or Linus contributed to Unity, Bazaar, Storm, Upstart, Quickly, Ubuntu Software Center, or Launchpad?

Even though Canonical has contributed to the code, there is a lot more going on in an OS than just the kernel.

[zekopeko]

http://martinezjavier.blogspot.com/2011/03/canonical-contributions-to-linux-kernel.html

Lets see. From your link:


Top lines changed by employer:

65. Canonical 24043 0.2%

From the h-online article (http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Microsoft-contributes-a-lot-of-changes-to-Linux-kernel-3-0-1280528.html):


In LWN.net's evaluation of the number of lines of code changed, Srinivasan and Microsoft are therefore nearer the bottom of the list. LWN.net found that Microsoft developers changed 11,564 lines of code (1.3 per cent)

I guess you were wrong.

[3Miro]

How much code has Red Hat or Linus contributed to Unity, Bazaar, Storm, Upstart, Quickly, Ubuntu Software Center, or Launchpad?

Even though Canonical has contributed to the code, there is a lot more going on in an OS than just the kernel.

+1. Canonical does very little with the kernel, their work is higher on the DE and applications.

[alphacrucis2]

How much code has Red Hat or Linus contributed to Unity, Bazaar, Storm, Upstart, Quickly, Ubuntu Software Center, or Launchpad?

Even though Canonical has contributed to the code, there is a lot more going on in an OS than just the kernel.

Does anyone use those apart from ubuntu & derivatives?

[ikt]

Does anyone use those apart from ubuntu & derivatives?

How many ubuntu users are using the Microsoft Hyper-V driver?

The point is that there is more to the software universe than just the kernel.

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/supported_features.png
http://xkcd.com/619/

;)

[Dustin2128]

That xkcd always irked me- thought the author would have realized that was flash's fault, not linux's. Ah well.

[ikt]

That xkcd always irked me- thought the author would have realized that was flash's fault, not linux's. Ah well.

It's not really about smooth flash playback as by the time that comic came out we had smooth flash playback, but it serves as a reminder that the kernel is only one part of the entire software universe.


I guess the short answer is that "contributions" come in many shapes and forms. Code is just one. There's testing and bug reporting, marketing and evangelism, organisation and administration and many more. Measuring lines of code or number of patches per company is fine, but using those measurements as some sort of overall "hierarchy of worthiness" to the FOSS community as a whole is dangerous. Dangerous because it causes friction between groups of people who should be working together, and dangerous because it doesn't acknowledge that the free software community needs more than just code.

And lets face it, the reason that certain other software development companies have more market share has nothing to do with quality or volume of code.

http://forums.overclockers.com.au/showpost.php?p=10619925&postcount=10

[vehemoth]

Does anyone use those apart from ubuntu & derivatives?

I think the software centre went upstream to debian.

[ninjaaron]

As I sit with a broken desktop in 11.10 alpha 2 I really couldn't care about the kernel at all, I just want a working desktop.

I get the point, but I think you would care if the kernel wasn't there... just sayin'...

Also, if you really want a working desktop... ah... nevermind... you know...

[forrestcupp]

Does anyone use those apart from ubuntu & derivatives?

I know that at least Fedora and Debian are working on packaging Unity. They won't use it as a default, but they are making it available.

[christopher.wortman]

What I really hate is how people think Linux is Microsoft's competitor. If Windows were to suddenly die off and Linux became the defacto, Microsoft would pretty much not care. They are a licensing company, and they make the applications people use. Chances are, they would license out other stuff like Office 365, which I will be paying to use. Office with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint on Linux makes me a very happy camper. I left Windows because it was trash not because I hated Microsoft. They would find another way to make money, and chances are, they might even kill Windows. I don't think anyone realizes how little Windows actually matters in this day and age to power users. Microsoft is like going to make a very dumbed down version of itself, to appease the idiot sheeple, and to usward, we will get Linux, or OSX. We are at a turning point. The desktop actually quit mattering all that much, everyone is pushing cloud BS.

What I really find interesting, is how little Microsoft actually cares about Windows. They never cared about it, just getting everyone to use it. Their goal was to never make a decent product, because that would ruin the market. It was inevitable and they knew it would end eventually. If they can say "we own x% of the kernel now pay us licensing fees" then they won. You and I will probably be able to download Linux for free until the end of time, however, companies will still have to pay Microsoft. For them they already won. Get it?

[ninjaaron]

It sounds like you're exaggerating the situation a little. While MS would survive the death of Windows, I doubt the process leading to that point would not be characterised by apathy on MS's part.

[reyfer]

If they can say "we own x% of the kernel now pay us licensing fees" then they won.
And since when contributing code to the kernel means ownership?

[forrestcupp]

The thing about all of this is that Linux 3.0 is still very early in the cycle. People will start contributing a lot more code, and Microsoft will fall way behind. Just because they got a quick start doesn't mean they are going to be one of the top developers of Linux 3.

[jhonan]

I don't see what the fuss is about - 11,564 lines isn't really *that* much code (in any language).

[Spice Weasel]

The 3bil M$ is going to steal our codez and charge licensing fees! Also M$ contributing code to Linux will cause the apocalypse. MOVE TO BSD! http://th23.photobucket.com/albums/b372/loogielv/th_tinfoilhat.gif

Have you ever considered that they might do something not to sabotage an OS but instead for their own benefit because it is something a few of their customers want? This Microsoft paranoia/hatred is pathetic.


I don't see what the fuss is about - 11,564 lines isn't really *that* much code (in any language).

Microsoft have contributed much more than 11,564 in the past.

http://channel9.msdn.com/blogs/nicfill/microsoft-contributes-code-to-the-linux-kernel

[Roasted]

"Linux is a cancer! But, ahh, yeah let's devote an entire paid staff to work on it."

Nice.

[wrtpeeps]

This Microsoft paranoia/hatred is pathetic.


Welcome to ubuntu forums. :D

[chegarty]

It's no surprise that Microsoft is contributing to L3; I gather that it's mostly Hyper-V, VM type things.

In a broad sense, I suppose Microsoft is still the largest outside threat to Linux as a whole, but it's not 1998 and Linux thrives.

If Microsoft's contributions to Linux make Linux better, then it appears as though everyone wins.


What blows my mind, is Microsoft fixing their own bugs!


:D Well-played, sir.

[ikt]

I get the point, but I think you would care if the kernel wasn't there... just sayin'...

I think you would also care if there were no window managers or programs to go with your kernel. just sayin' :P

btw went back to 11.04 and seems to be stable like a really stable thing!

[Snowboi]

Its a planned attack, expect linux 3.0 to come with Blue Screens.

[smellyman]

The thing about all of this is that Linux 3.0 is still very early in the cycle. People will start contributing a lot more code, and Microsoft will fall way behind. Just because they got a quick start doesn't mean they are going to be one of the top developers of Linux 3.

isn't it about 2 weeks away?

[ikt]

isn't it about 2 weeks away?

As I understand it the cycle hasn't changed at all, the original article is typical 'click bait' designed to get your attention for a quick bs article that is completely pointless.

[DigOfTheStump]

The 3bil M$ is going to steal our codez and charge licensing fees! Also M$ contributing code to Linux will cause the apocalypse. MOVE TO BSD! http://th23.photobucket.com/albums/b372/loogielv/th_tinfoilhat.gif

Have you ever considered that they might do something not to sabotage an OS but instead for their own benefit because it is something a few of their customers want? This Microsoft paranoia/hatred is pathetic.

And there are plenty of Microsoft evangelists that turn rabid at the mere mention of the word "Linux", but that fact has to be understated or ignored completely. Honestly, I don't know why being critical of Microsoft has become taboo on these forums. You can be sure that the Redmond fundies don't hold back on what they think about Linux. Is it some sort of obligation to be a Microsoft sycophant to be a member here or something?

[forrestcupp]

I don't know why being critical of Microsoft has become taboo on these forums. You can be sure that the Redmond fundies don't hold back on what they think about Linux. Is it some sort of obligation to be a Microsoft sycophant to be a member here or something?How do you know it has "become" taboo on these forums if you've only just joined this month?

[Quadunit404]

This Microsoft paranoia/hatred is pathetic.


Since Microsoft has touched the kernel again I suppose that IWontTouchItBecauseMicrosoftTouchedIt™ will soon take place among the Linux evangelists.

[DigOfTheStump]

How do you know it has "become" taboo on these forums if you've only just joined this month?

The amazing thing about the internet is that it has forums such as this one. What is even more amazing is that they are free and open to the public. I know, it was a revelation to me as well. You could spend years reading them without actively participating as a member, just passing through so to speak. This epiphany has changed my life and I now find myself on the threshold of true enlightenment.

Does this answer your question?

[Spice Weasel]

And there are plenty of Microsoft evangelists that turn rabid at the mere mention of the word "Linux"

Where?

Here? (http://windows7sins.com) How about here? (http://techrights.org)

[wrtpeeps]

The amazing thing about the internet is that it has forums such as this one. What is even more amazing is that they are free and open to the public. I know, it was a revelation to me as well. You could spend years reading them without actively participating as a member, just passing through so to speak. This epiphany has changed my life and I now find myself on the threshold of true enlightenment.

Does this answer your question?

Of course you did. :rolleyes:

Anyway, in answer to your earlier question the reason it has become taboo is because the anti-microsoft rants tend to be along the lines of "M$ INSTALLED DA BLOATWARE CALLED ******* ON MY SYSTEM N I STOLEZ BY PIRATIN CUZ IM L33T BUT DEY CAUGHT ME N I DUN THINK U SHUD HAV 2 PAY 4 SOFTWARE. LINUX ROX LOL LMAO ROFL WTFFFSBBQ!!!!11111ONEone" (i.e. highly uneducated factually incorrect rants that are more annoying than interesting).

[forrestcupp]

The amazing thing about the internet is that it has forums such as this one. What is even more amazing is that they are free and open to the public. I know, it was a revelation to me as well. You could spend years reading them without actively participating as a member, just passing through so to speak. This epiphany has changed my life and I now find myself on the threshold of true enlightenment.

Does this answer your question?

Well, I'm glad you finally decided to become a member. Welcome.

[Quadunit404]

Its a planned attack, expect linux 3.0 to come with Blue Screens.

Oh please. I have not experienced a single BSOD on Windows 7 and I've used it since the day it came out.

Unless of course you're describing Windows Me, then the part about Blue Screens would be 100% correct.............. <mindless blather about how much I hate Windows Me goes here>

[3rdalbum]

It sounds like that developer was "committing" their changes back to Git instead of "saving" them to his/her local hard disk. :-)

[DigOfTheStump]

Of course you did. :rolleyes:

Anyway, in answer to your earlier question the reason it has become taboo is because the anti-microsoft rants tend to be along the lines of "M$ INSTALLED DA BLOATWARE CALLED ******* ON MY SYSTEM N I STOLEZ BY PIRATIN CUZ IM L33T BUT DEY CAUGHT ME N I DUN THINK U SHUD HAV 2 PAY 4 SOFTWARE. LINUX ROX LOL LMAO ROFL WTFFFSBBQ!!!!11111ONEone"(i.e. highly uneducated factually incorrect rants that are more annoying than interesting).

That is quite a mouthful, but I'm sure you are used to it.



Well, I'm glad you finally decided to become a member. Welcome.

I thank you.

[DigOfTheStump]

Where?

Here? (http://windows7sins.com) How about here? (http://techrights.org)

Do you know how many times I have seen the local Microsoft fundies provide these two examples as proof positive that Linux has far worse fanboys than Microsoft. I will give you a hint, I hear it almost every time one of them stops me in the street to talk about their latest hardware acquisition and how many fps they have achieved in Crysis. Not that it matters to you it would seem. After all a Microsoft zealot has far more credibility than one of the Linux variety. Around here any way.

Sorry it took so long to get back to you, I was busy.

[forrestcupp]

Do you know how many times I have seen the local Microsoft fundies provide these two examples as proof positive that Linux has far worse fanboys than Microsoft. I will give you a hint, I hear it almost every time one of them stops me in the street to talk about their latest hardware acquisition and how many fps they have achieved in Crysis. Not that it matters to you it would seem. After all a Microsoft zealot has far more credibility than one of the Linux variety. Around here any way.
Do you really have people stopping you on the street to trash Linux and promote MS? :confused:

Honestly there aren't that many Microsoft fanboys around here. What you're seeing is a lot of people who are fed up with all of the extreme anti-Microsoft rhetoric responding to balance that out. If the people here didn't like Linux, they probably wouldn't be here. The truth is that Microsoft is not the savior of the world. But they're also not the evil, immoral ***** of Babylon trying to take over the world and make us into their mindless slaves.

[Quadunit404]

Ignorance is bliss. (http://lxer.com/module/forums/t/32001/)

[beew]

So now MS is a FOSS supporter? If I understand correctly its contribution is only useful if you are using Windows with Linux running in VM. That means it is basically for the benefit of primarily Windows users who for some reasons need Linux and those who run Linux natively can do without.

I would be more impressed if they contribute to WINE.

I have no problem if they do make some genuine contributions, as long as they follow the same rules as everyone else.

[beew]

Honestly there aren't that many Microsoft fanboys around here. What you're seeing is a lot of people who are fed up with all of the extreme anti-Microsoft rhetoric responding to balance that out.

That may be true. But the COC actually says you can't make 'derogatory comments' against the likes of MS and Apple and their products apparently for fear that their feelings may get hurt (I have never seen anything like that in any tech forum, or any forum for that matter) It is really surreal when mods actually correct people's "spelling mistakes" for Windows and MS. I think the balance is already quite tilted to one side.

[KiwiNZ]

That may be true. But the COC actually says you can't make 'derogatory comments' against the likes of MS and Apple and their products apparently for fear that their feelings may get hurt (I have never seen anything like that in any tech forum, or any forum for that matter) I think the balance is already quite tilted to one side.

The rule is designed to stop the flame wars regarding OS's

[disabledaccount]

Linux 3 is just a number (and I think that major change in versioning was completely unneccessary, baseless, and stinks of low quality marketing). Maybe in next version which will stay for 1 week (eg. something like 3.00001rc1-alpha0.001) I will become the greatest code contributor by adding 100 lines to existing 13 milions (SLOC).

But the primary is reason why MS contributed the code:

In July 2009 Microsoft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft) submitted Hyper-V (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyper-V) drivers to the kernel, which improve the performance of virtual Linux guest systems in a Windows (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Windows) hosted environment. Microsoft was forced to submit the code when it was discovered that Microsoft had incorporated a Hyper-V network driver with GPL-licensed components statically linked to closed-source binaries.

In other words: No, MS doesn't like Linux - nothing has changed don't be naive.

[Spice Weasel]

Microsoft have made a reply to all of this "Microsoft hates Linux" stuff... and here it is: http://video.linux.com/video/2127

:P

[santaslittlehelper]

Honestly there aren't that many Microsoft fanboys around here. What you're seeing is a lot of people who are fed up with all of the extreme anti-Microsoft rhetoric responding to balance that out.

By that standard those that might feel the Pro-Microsoft and Anti-Free Software rhetoric that roam here is extreme should make up arguments for balance. Even if it is just a few people throwing themselves upon any thread that mentions Microsoft or Free Software the rhetoric used seems to me just as derogatory as anything and by that standard the CoC should serve just as equal otherwise it looses it's credibility in my opinion.

If Microsoft contributes then that's great and if they do it purely for self-serving reasons then that's just fine but I don't understand the need to blow it out of proportion.

The voices in my head - Linux 3.0. (http://groups.google.com/group/linux.kernel/browse_thread/thread/1a1f9139b0dbe550?pli=1) :p

[graabein]

We all know which is the superior OS...

[forrestcupp]

By that standard those that might feel the Pro-Microsoft and Anti-Free Software rhetoric that roam here is extreme should make up arguments for balance. Even if it is just a few people throwing themselves upon any thread that mentions Microsoft or Free Software the rhetoric used seems to me just as derogatory as anything and by that standard the CoC should serve just as equal otherwise it looses it's credibility in my opinion.
No, the big difference is that the people who are viewed as Pro-Microsoft fanboys are just giving credit to Microsoft; they're not trashing Linux. The anti-Microsoft people are actually trashing Windows/MS. I've seen a lot of support for MS on here, but I've never seen anyone trash Linux, except Linux users themselves, who continuously argue about how they think that one thing sucks while their thing is better.

[santaslittlehelper]

We all know which is the superior OS...
Haha :) Well if measured in terms of freedom and openness it's not even close if measured in terms of Ubuntu competing with Windows about marked-share then not so much if measured in terms of usability then in my opinion it's at least on par.


No, the big difference is that the people who are viewed as Pro-Microsoft fanboys are just giving credit to Microsoft; they're not trashing Linux. The anti-Microsoft people are actually trashing Windows/MS. I've seen a lot of support for MS on here, but I've never seen anyone trash Linux, except Linux users themselves, who continuously argue about how they think that one thing sucks while their thing is better.
I don't believe it's always as simple as that but it's a really hard point to mute how could I ever prove your observations wrong neither do I want to try. :p

[ninjaaron]

Microsoft have made a reply to all of this "Microsoft hates Linux" stuff... and here it is: http://video.linux.com/video/2127

:P

I just saw that today via my slashdot feed. I wonder what the angle is. I don't hate MS or anything, but there is no way this video is without strategic intent.

Best possible scenario: MS starts using the Linux kernel for it's OS's, becomes a major upstream contributor, plus all of our driver problems and some of our software problems are solved from now until eternity. MS augments it's own strength with power of the open source development model (like android) and begins shipping an OS that is truly competitive with Apple in terms of stability, performance, innovation, and polish. Not to mention how great it would be if we had MS lawyers and patent portfolios going to bat for us when litigation time roles around.

Worst possible scenario: MS becomes a major player in the Open Source movement, gets it's hands deep in the kernel, and uses it's influence to tear the movement apart from inside, not through malicious code, but through influencing long-term decisions that will ultimately weaken the platform and polluting interpersonal relationships, and finally creating factions among devs that will tear the movement apart while MS watches, hands apparently clean.


I'm sure whatever actually happens, it will be much less interesting than either of the scenarios I have envisioned.

[3Miro]

Worst possible scenario: MS becomes a major player in the Open Source movement, gets it's hands deep in the kernel, and uses it's influence to tear the movement apart from inside, not through malicious code, but through influencing long-term decisions that will ultimately weaken the platform and polluting interpersonal relationships, and finally creating factions among devs that will tear the movement apart while MS watches, hands apparently clean.


I am not sure about your first scenario, but this cannot happen. The FOSS community is already as fractured as it can be and this internal competition is what make Linux powerful. If MS starts providing large amounts of GPL code, then this can only help.

The only worry would be if MS finds a way to circumvent GPL (as they have tried in the past).

[ninjaaron]

I am not sure about your first scenario, but this cannot happen. The FOSS community is already as fractured as it can be and this internal competition is what make Linux powerful. If MS starts providing large amounts of GPL code, then this can only help.

I hope you are right, and I think you are.

[el_koraco]

Best possible scenario: MS starts using the Linux kernel for it's OS's, becomes a major upstream contributor, plus all of our driver problems and some of our software problems are solved from now until eternity.

Worst possible scenario: MS becomes a major player in the Open Source movement, gets it's hands deep in the kernel, and uses it's influence to tear the movement apart from inside

:confused:

Windows transitioned from a monolithic to a hybrid kernel in 2000, and bulit a whole OS model around it - which has become a principal driver development model anywhere. Why would they want to go back?

[ninjaaron]

:confused:

Windows transitioned from a monolithic to a hybrid kernel in 2000, and bulit a whole OS model around it - which has become a principal driver development model anywhere. Why would they want to go back?

I didn't say these scenarios were likely, just best and worst (as far as Linux is concerned).

[sydbat]

We all know which is the superior OS...Amiga?

[Spice Weasel]

Amiga?

OS/2, $hill.

[Canis familiaris]

amiga?
ms-dos > all.

EDIT: Double post. Sorry mods.

[Canis familiaris]

What blows my mind, is Microsoft fixing their own bugs!

Quality.

[forrestcupp]

Amiga?

Geos

[sffvba[e0rt]

Microsoft have made a reply to all of this "Microsoft hates Linux" stuff... and here it is: http://video.linux.com/video/2127

:P


The cake is a lie!


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