17 years ago ex-Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer called Linux a cancer. That statement still casts clouds of doubt over the company and a lingering anxiety among Linux and open source enthusiasts. But hey, Ballmer loves Linux now! So does Microsoft!
Whether or not one chooses to believe it, Microsoft continues to bang that drum with both actions and words; most recently at the 2019 Red Hat Forum in Australia.
Microsoft Australia CTO Lee Hickin addressed the attendees with a message about the company’s transformation and its continued commitment to open source.
In attendance was ZDNet, which captured some key quotes: “We’re in an amazing place right now with a leader like Satya who really understands what it means to think about where we need to be for our customers, to really transform the company from being essentially the proprietary software company, to being an open source company,” he said.
“And I say that with my hand on my heart in a very serious way: We are an open source company, we are committed to open source, we’re committed to Red Hat, and we’re committed to continuing our engagement and our support to a broad open source community through a range of technologies, not least of which GitHub is one.” – Microsoft Australia CTO Lee Hickin, via ZDNet
Hickin’s enthusiastic talk also touched on Microsoft’s efforts to democratize access to its technology, data platforms and services, bringing them within reach of both partners and competitors. Of particular note is that statement that Microsoft wants its technology and tools to be “available to everybody.”
I see that look on your face. Where are key Microsoft services and software like Office or OneDrive on Linux, as one of several examples? To its credit, Microsoft’s Christopher Scott has been campaigning for native Linux versions of these and more (including the full-fat Visual Studio), and this recently resulted in a native Linux version of Microsoft Teams being developed.
There’s also Windows Subsystem for Linux, now in its second iteration. Or the 60,000 patents Microsoft made open source as part of the Open Invention Network. It brought .NET Core to Linux in 2015. There’s the open-sourcing of its exFAT file system technology. Or releasing a “ready-made” version of FreeBSD in its Azure Marketplace.
It’s a lengthy list, but is more and more frequently punctuated by its moves in the cloud (which runs on open source) and server spaces, which represent Microsoft’s bread and butter. And I’ve no doubt there is an equally long list of grievances that the open source community has against Microsoft.
I will say this much: if Microsoft is intent on being recognized as an open source company, bring it on, but make sure the actions continue to follow the words.
Time will tell.
And hey, there’s nothing wrong with being a profitable open source company, right? Just ask Canonical or Red Hat.
originally posted on forbes.com by Jason Evangelho
