Microsoft . . . complained in its annual report that it was facing increasing pressure from open source companies. It claims they are stealing its ideas and benefiting from its intellectual property.
"A number of commercial firms compete with us using an open source business model by modifying and then distributing open source software to end users at nominal cost and earning revenue on complementary services and products." Also see analysis at Microsoft Watch.
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Member since:2006-02-25
I don't agree with them. A lion's share of MS software was based on copying or purchasing others (UI, spreadsheets, wordprocessors, Servers, DB, and the list goes on).
Note that I'm not saying it's wrong or bad, that's natural. But complaining about what got you here in the 1st place ?
In Hebrew we have a saying: "הפוסל במומו פוסל", which translates (according to wikipedia) to: "The disqualifier disqualifies based on his own fault".
Member since:2006-10-10
Did you forget to attach your resume to that last post? That was all "Mr. Company-man like".
Yeah, Microsoft is _really_ hurting for software engineers and capital, aren't they. Well, maybe they are.....but it's Google's fault that it's apparently a much better company to work for.
Let me tell you what's good with having open source.....it forces you software engineers to get off your ass, leave your comfort zone, and do something innovative. Case in point, if there was no Firefox, we'd still be stuck on that POS IE6 because MS was in no way throwing any resources towards that 'product' (and I use the term loosely).
I like to think of OSS as the Punk Rock to proprietary software's Top 40 Radio. Creamy, polished, and bloated Top 40 gets old and stale, after so many years, and it takes Punk to come back and bite it in the ass and make music interesting again. Everything is cyclical.
Member since:2006-02-05
The trends in commercial software are moving more and more to user driven development, and not compromising on quality. Where I work we have a 1 month release cycle, where every month we ask our users (we call them product owners internally to try and keep from falling into holier then thou programmer attitudes) what the features they need the most are, and let that drive the features of the release. We have two testers to every developer, and these are trained people who give very good bug reports and methodically test the software, not just random people on the interweb. We aim for 3 lines of test code to every 1 line of production code, and most of the team practices test driven development. Every code check in needs to be reviewed by another programmer before it goes to the testers, and our build server automatically runs through integration tests on every check in to the source tree. And every iteration has time set aside for regression testing, deployment testing, and performance testing to be absolutely sure we ship quality.
Now, we are ahead of the curve on this, and Scrum is one of the more hardcore of the Agile processes, but this is direction the industry is moving in. The software industry has traditionally had an abysmal standard of quality, and has been driven by cowboy coders who dont give a crap about the people they are actually writing the code for. In anything even resembling what would be considered a modern process, we are now taking a more holistic approach, and learning how to stop wasting everybodies time and money building things that are un tested and features that are misunderstood, or just plain un needed.
By contrast, open source embraces that mentality. Unit testing is rarely, if ever used. The commercial software world is bringing the developer and the user closer together, while the open source world pushes them further apart. Users are something to be taken care of by downstream, and heaven forbid if any of them try to break that barrier and ask a developer directly for help, which they only do in desperation when a distro doesn't have a good working relationship with upstream. What I would consider good developers (i.e. people who care about the big picture) either do not stick around long (like con kolivas) or become completely disillusioned and just stop doing anything that effects the end user anymore (havoc, miguel)
Sorry for the huge rant, but that comment is exactly the reason that I post the things that I do in places like this. There is this massive misconception that open source is inherently better for the users, and it really isn't, except in a very abstract way that has little to no real value. You say that open source is like punk rock and commercial software is like top 40, fine. I say open source is like communism, fantastic ideas, very idealistic, inherently flawed in its inability to deliver meaningful innovation or an acceptable level of quality without doing so on the back of a more practical system.
And seriously dude, apple is punk rock. They are hip, revolutionary, and mean to the bone ;-)
And just so you know, this is coming from someone who has used linux for about 6 years now on and off (currently on, I am running hardy), has participated in a great deal of open source projects, and doesn't any more due to a serious disillusionment with the whole system.
Member since:2007-02-17
Member since:2007-04-28
Member since:2006-01-03
I'm a software engineer too, and I couldn't disagree with you more.
Knock offs are a reality in any industry. I mean for Cheerios, there is Cereal O's. Yet people still buy the brand name. Sadly for MS, their business is software. There is no cost to the open source companies to sell their product.
I mean, even for Cereal O's, they still need to build the factory, buy raw ingredients...
This is a terrible analogy or at the very least very incomplete. Open source software hasn't stolen Microsoft's code and re sold it, they haven't stolen any top secret, amazingly innovative concepts that only Microsoft has implemented. And there most certainly is a cost to developing software whether it is closed or open source, just ask IBM, Redhat, Sun or Novell.
Open source software also needed to be built, tested and debugged. Developers and support people need to learn the ins and outs just as Microsoft employees have to. The difference is that open source developers have decided that sharing code and utilizing multiple sources of developers regardless of their commercial affiliation can create top shelf software at a lower total cost per man hour than competing closed source software. They've chosen to compete based on other criteria rather than just a piece of software.
Imagine if General Mills decided they wanted to sell each box of Cheerios for $30 a box. Likely they would go out of business. A lot of people by brand names, companies like Nike, Reebok, Gucci, Coke, Pepsi etc make millions off of their name brand. Microsoft will and can do the same.
Microsoft is bitching about an inevitable change in the software landscape. Complaining about it doesn't mean that it's wrong.
How is it robbing Software engineers of jobs. Given, it's taking jobs from engineers who write the same old thing over and over again. But if you're actually good at what you do. If you can write innovative and cutting edge software there is possibilities to make money regardless of whether it's open source. Do you really think that developers like Linus Torvalds, Andrew Morton, and Aaron Siego are working for free. They aren't, they likely make more money than you ever will.
First off .NET (besides ADO.NET and ASP.NET) have been accepted as ECMA standards. So implementing them is not only possible but expected and completely legal. Second .NET while a nice framework is built upon the concepts and ideas of thousands of other people. It's essentially the same concept as Java with some (arguably) nicer syntax and features. The design patterns used in it are all common knowledge and described in dozens of textbooks used in any half decent CS program. Every concept in .NET has at one point been implemented in another language. They just took the conepts their engineers thought were useful and wrapped it into their own nice package. So while .NET is one of the things I do actually like about MS it's hardly a new and innovative product.
Have you ever heard Sun complain about GNU classpath, Kaffe, IBM's Java implementation. No, because they realize that cross platform, compatible implementations just ensure that more platforms can run Java software. In fact they've even gone as far as GPL'ing Java to ensure it remains the standard and can be used and improved by everyone with as few restrictions as possible.
If Windows was 50 dollars, most people wouldn't even think twice about installing it. I mean if the option was 50 dollars for Windows or 25 dollar for Novell Linux... meh... the cost for windows is nothing. But as someone who recently built a small HTPC... when windows is 1/3 or 1/4 the price of the whole system... something is amiss.
I apologize, I actually do agree with your above assertion. Windows needs to start competing on price and service. They need to pull their collective heads out of they're asses and start writing quality top notch software that is well supported, extensible and documented. They have the most brand presence of any other software company except maybe IBM, all they need to do is keep feature and service parity with the competition and they will have a leg up on 90% of their competition.
Personally I have no problem paying for Excel and MS SQL Server because they are top quality products that have mountains of documentation and some very good extensibility points. See, put out a good product and people will buy it.
Other companies like Sun and IBM have faced similiar crisis in the past and have managed without stepping on everyones toes. If Microsoft thinks they need to start wielding they're Patent portfolio like a sword I suspect that soon enough thiongs like prior art and obvious implementations will very quickly show that the majority of Microsoft's patent portfolio is nothing to be feared.
I'd be willing to bet dollars to donuts that the reason that Microsoft never released any particulars about the 200+ patents that Linux violates in the whole Novell deal was because they know that if the community gets hold of that list it will very quickly be wittled down to very few issues and those that do remain would very quickly be re implemented.
Microsoft the RIAA and MPAA can cry all they want but inevitability a broken business model will eventually fail. Someday the money will run out, the facts will become household knowledge and unless they get their act together they're gonna be left standing in the middle of an empty street with their pants down.
Member since:2005-08-18
Yes, everyone at Red Hat and Canonical works for free and there's no cost in keeping offices for them either. Also, you apparently also get ad space for free. Or maybe you just don't know what you're talking about.
Gee, that sounds a lot like the old "immigrants are robbing us of jobs" or "outsourcing is robbing us of jobs". In the words of Maddox, if they "take" your job it's because they work harder and better than you do.
I dont see how this makes interop sketchy. Unless of course .Net isn't properly specified to begin with.
Edited 2008-08-06 05:32 UTC
Member since:2005-07-06
Hilariously stupid. A software engineer tied to a single platform and/or a single language is not a software engineer, it's an unusable asset whose work no company should pay a dime for. A changing software landscape does not eliminate jobs, it just reallocates them, one has to be flexible enough to find one's new place in the new setup. Whining about a srhinking demand a particular software area won't help, adapting to the new requirements and demans will. Everything else is just meaningless chit-chat.
Member since:2006-04-07
Member since:
2006-01-10
Sadly, I agree with MS on this one.
Knock offs are a reality in any industry. I mean for Cheerios, there is Cereal O's. Yet people still buy the brand name. Sadly for MS, their business is software. There is no cost to the open source companies to sell their product.
I mean, even for Cereal O's, they still need to build the factory, buy raw ingredients...
With open source, that's not the case. Yes, it does rob us software engineers of good jobs. Even interop items are sketchy. I mean who developed MS .NET. It's a great infrastructure that took some very smart people. Now, there is an open source clone of it.
I think MS really needs to start undercutting their competition if they want to stay in business.
If Windows was 50 dollars, most people wouldn't even think twice about installing it. I mean if the option was 50 dollars for Windows or 25 dollar for Novell Linux... meh... the cost for windows is nothing. But as someone who recently built a small HTPC... when windows is 1/3 or 1/4 the price of the whole system... something is amiss.
MS doesn't really sell hardware the way Apple does, so it can't just offer users a box. Lord could only imagine the outcry of monopoly if they suddenly started doing that.
It's a tough problem for MS to solve. I think for them to be successful in the future, they're going to have to step on a lot of toes (of previous allies, 3rd party vendors... ).