IBM, Google quietly supporting OOXML?, Jan 22, 2008

In spite of their public opposition to Microsoft’s attempt to get the ISO standardization nod for its Office Open XML (OOXML) document format, IBM and Google quietly are supporting OOXML.

It was a long time in coming. But Microsoft has finally acknowledged that its anti-Linux site had gone past the point of usefulness.

Are Microsoft’s patent lawyers playing possum? Or are they really as clueless about what makes open-source software tick as they seem?

eWEEK posted a story a few hours ago entitled “Microsoft Gives Xandros Linux Users Patent Protection.” The story is now gone from the Web site.

The same week that Microsoft issued a press release providing further details about some of the technological advances that will result from the November 2006 technology agreement between Novell and Microsoft, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer told Wall Street what he really thinks the deal means to Microsoft.

Microsoft seemingly has backed off from trumpeting its “Get the Facts” studies, as of late. But that doesn’t mean the company has ceased commissioning research outfits to perform its anti-Linux dirty work.

If Microsoft really wants credit and credibility in the open source world, it needs to stop the squeamishness and show good faith. Why not let bygones be bygones and just let the whole Halloween documents issue drop? And why not submit a couple of Shared Source licenses for OSI approval, just to see what happens?

Microsoft could have and should have done its own version of Linux. It could have bought a Linux distro vendor or just christened some branch of Windows (with some Unix-compatibility add-ons) as Microsoft Linux. By doing this, Microsoft could have thrown a real monkey wrench into Linux companies' plans.

Microsoft is set to launch a new software-marketing campaign aimed at persuading Linux and Unix users to migrate to Windows.

Ward Cunningham, one of Microsoft's high-profile hires, is leaving the Redmond software company to join the open-source tool group, The Eclipse Foundation.

The often-hostile relations between Microsoft and the open-source community are thawing, and new dialogues appear to be opening between senior officials in both camps.

Hilf said he spends a lot of time "making Linux more transparent to Microsoft managers," doing a lot of educating around the open-source development, testing, deployment and licensing models.

Can a cheap, stripped-down version of Windows derail the momentum of open-source software? Microsoft Corp. is hoping it can.

Microsoft made a minority investment Monday in Unix/Linux management vendor Vintela.

Microsoft's war on Linux isn't about to let up.

The Redmond software vendor plans to step up its "Get the Facts" anti-open-source campaign in the coming year by adding more evidence, in the form of customer case studies and analyst reports, to its arsenal.

That's what Kevin Johnson, Microsoft's group vice president of worldwide sales, marketing and services, told about 300 analysts and members of the media attending Microsoft's annual financial analyst meeting here Thursday.

The open-source development community is looking to head off Microsoft Longhorn before it escapes the Redmond corral.

Some key members of the community recently met to discuss ways the open-source movement can prepare for Longhorn, the next major version of Windows that is expected to debut on the desktop in 2006.

The vice chairman and open-source backer offers his two cents on the Ximian deal, Novell's future relationship with Microsoft and the latest SCO skirmish.

Microsoft also is dissecting what makes Linux tick in its own Enterprise Engineering Center (EEC). The EEC is focused primarily on helping Microsoft customers with deployments of new Microsoft software. But Microsoft also has built a simulated Linux environment at the EEC, Taylor says, where Microsoft developers can experiment with open-source operating systems, firewalls, scripting environments and the like.

"It was a great learning experience for us," Taylor says. And the lab is helping Microsoft analyze areas where open source is weak and where Microsoft should redouble its efforts—such as in single-sign-on technology, Taylor says.

"We ... see Linux being heavily used in the academic environment and increasingly being evaluated by government, particularly overseas," acknowledged Microsoft chief financial officer John Connors in an investment conference speech in June. "In certain geographies of the world there is a notion — we think misguided — that you build a software industry on things that are free. That's not likely to happen in our view from an economic perspective, but that is a view in certain geographies that we're working hard to get the story out about how the commercial software industry works.