02.15.08
How GNU/Linux Gets Contaminated with Software Patents from the Back Door
As history has taught us, Microsoft finds it too risky to attack GNU/Linux directly. It would be too transparent and probably result in backlash from Microsoft’s own customers, many of whom also use and/or stock Free software. Microsoft prefers to use proxies and insiders to do their seemingly-independent jobs that accomplish long-term objectives.
Examples include SCO (via BayStar), Andy Tanenbaum (via a book author) (to avoid misinterpretation here, see this and this. Microsoft tried to use Andy Tanenbaum against Linux, but was not successful because he defended Linus Torvalds), Acacia and its sister ‘patent firms’ which comprise former Microsoft employees, Novell which gently spews out software patent FUD to market itself, and folks from Ximian who plant ‘time bombs’ in the heart of GNU/Linux desktop environments (slowly propagating from one to another). This last element among the whole will be the subject of this one particular post, which may otherwise become too broad.
Microsoft is in serious trouble, but it is fighting. It is not stupid, especially not in the legal department. Most people out there are not aware of Microsoft’s pains simply because Microsoft has done a fantastic job hiding the truth. Again, this won’t be discussed in detail here, especially in order for this post to be concise and focused. These other stories also were covered before.
We received some valuable information from one of our readers and we wish to share it and reach out for some feedback.
Denial and Manipulation
The first issue to draw one’s attention to is manipulation of search engines, news feeds, video sites, social news sites, and the mainstream press. We covered many such examples in the past and these include astroturfing, acquisition of the media, heavy lobbying, acquisition of analysts, political manipulation, malicious intervention, creation of civil wars and at times even bribery, kickbacks and dumping. Of more relevance to the following new bits we have spamming of YouTube with viral videos and search engines manipulation.
Adding to this ‘Hall of Shame’ we have just accumulated some reports about behaviour that was described by a reader in the following way:
Along similar lines, I spotted the other day one method how Microsoft boosters within GNOME are able to affect Ubuntu: They can camp on bug reports and mark them repeatedly ‘invalid’ that way the report never shows up in any RSS feeds or for that matter any normal or advanced searches. One has to specifically search for invalid bugs to find it and at that level of specificity one probably already has the URL and bug number.
My general complaint about Google News falls into the same category. It’s not just a matter of Microsoft gaming the system, pro-ODF or anti-OOXML articles just don’t make it into Google News regardless of the publisher.
[…]
Here’s one from ZDNet:
“Developers warned over OOXML [sw]patent risk”
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/0,1000000121,39292853,00.htm
I bet it won’t show up in Google News. Not that Google News is in and of itself important, but the appearance of tampering, on the other hand, is.
http://news.google.com/news?oe=UTF-8&tab=wn&hl=en&q=ooxml+-site…
http://news.google.com/news?q=opendocument%20-site%3A…
OOXML is not the main issue here, but we will return to it in a moment. In fact, the latter bit turned out to be false just 2 hours ago.
The Real Problem and a Case Study
The same reader talks about the increasingly severe issue which is Mono in GNOME. To give one example of a scenario where Mono dependencies crop up, consider Cheese.
One thing I noticed this week is that the mono group has been able to encumber a growing number of Ubuntu (not Kubuntu) applications with proprietary Microsoft technology. However, the documentation and program descriptions do not warn of this (of course they want to keep it under the radar).
“A risk here is that, especially in regards to media (audio, video, pictures, text, etc.) it will provide a ramp for OOXML, WMA, WMV, HDPhoto, and others along with the prerequiste DRM.”A risk here is that, especially in regards to media (audio, video, pictures, text, etc.) it will provide a ramp for OOXML, WMA, WMV, HDPhoto, and others along with the prerequiste DRM. I would expect that if Micrsooft makes further contracts with Novell or other turncoats, that this will soon start to cover DRM.
In short, mono spreads, becomes integrated into some desktops, then Microsoft formats are rolled out as part of mono.
[…]
Here is not an example of the dependencies, but of more peripheral incursion:
http://www.gnome.org/projects/cheese/
Note the recommendation of f-spot. digikam, flphoto, kphotoalbum and others would do the job without infecting the machine with mono.
I’m thinking that any kind of confrontation should be avoided, these people are well entrenched in some high profile projects. Non-mono projects should be brought to the forefront.
It was then that a more systematic study needed to be carried out.
Packages Named
Further, from the same reader:
I am loading a list of package dependencies right now and will check the current situation for ubuntu:
dapper 159 ?
gutsy 150 ?
hardy 176 ?
To check an individual package, for example ‘boo’
apt-cache depends ^boo$
You can do it without the caret and dollar sign, but that just makes sure that you get exactly that name and nothing else.
Methodology:
# freshen data
sudo apt-get update;
# guess at all the packages
for i in a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z;
do apt-cache search -n $i |sed -e “s/ .*$//”;
done | sort | uniq > packages.txt
# find the dependencies
for i in `cat packages.txt`;
do apt-cache depends $i >> dependencies.txt;
echo >> dependencies.txt;
done
# make a spare
cp dependencies.txt x
# then edit x to be one line per package,
# using your favorite editor or sed or awk
# get the package description
for i in `grep libmono x|sed -e ’s/ .*$//’`;
do apt-cache search –names-only ^${i}$;
done > mono-infected-gutsy.txt
Here is the output:
asp.net2-examples - demo pages for ASP.NET 1.1 and 2.0 infrastructure
asp.net-examples - demo pages for ASP.NET 1.1 infrastructure
autopano-sift - Automated control point extraction for panorama generation
banshee - Audio Management and Playback application
beagle - indexing and search tool for your personal data
beagle-backend-evolution - evolution data backend for beagle
blam - an RSS aggregator for GNOME
bless - A full featured hexadecimal editor
boo - a python-like language and compiler for the CLI
cowbell - An easy-to-use tag editor for your music files
dfo - Desktop Flickr Organizer for Gnome
drapes - a desktop wallpaper management application for the GNOME desktop
f-spot - personal photo management application
gbrainy - brain teaser game and trainer to have fun and to keep your brain trained
gfax - GNOME frontend for fax programs
gnome-rdp - Remote Desktop Client for the GNOME Desktop
gnome-sharp2-examples - sample applications for Gnome# 2.16
gnome-subtitles - Subtitles editor for the GNOME Desktop environment
gnunit - frontend for running NUnit 2 test suites
gnunit2 - frontend for running NUnit 2 test suites
graphmonkey - a GTK#-based graphing calculator
gshare - Easy user-level file sharing for GNOME
gtk-sharp2-examples - sample applications for the Gtk# 2.10 toolkit
gtk-sharp2-gapi - C source parser and C# code generator for GObject based APIs
gtwitter - Client for tracking and posting to twitter
hipo - iPod Management Tool
ikvm - Java virtual machine/compiler implemented in .NET (Mono)
ironpython - A Python implementation targeting the .NET and Mono platforms
last-exit - Last.fm audio player
lat - LDAP Administration Tool
libart2.0-cil - CLI binding for libart 2.3
libavahi1.0-cil - CLI bindings for Avahi
libavahi-ui0.0-cil - CLI bindings for Avahi Ui
libevolution3.0-cil - CLI bindings for Evolution
libflickrnet2.1.5-cil - Flickr.Net API Library
libgalago1.0-cil - CLI bindings for libgalago
libgalago-gtk1.0-cil - CLI bindings for libgalago-gtk
libgconf2.0-cil - CLI binding for GConf 2.16
libgecko2.0-cil - CLI binding for the GtkMozEmbed library, unstable version
libglade2.0-cil - CLI binding for the Glade libraries 2.6
libglib2.0-cil - CLI binding for the GLib utility library 2.12
libgmime2.2-cil - CLI binding for the MIME library
libgnome2.0-cil - CLI binding for Gnome 2.16
libgnome-keyring1.0-cil - CLI library to access the GNOME Keyring daemon
libgnome-vfs2.0-cil - CLI binding for GnomeVFS 2.16
libgsf0.0-cil - CLI bindings for libgsf
libgtk2.0-cil - CLI binding for the GTK+ toolkit 2.10
libgtkhtml2.0-cil - CLI binding for GtkHTML 3.8
libgtksourceview2.0-cil - CLI binding for the gtksourceview library
libipod-cil - CLI library for accessing iPods
libipodui-cil - CLI library for accessing iPods (GUI helpers)
libkarma-cil - Rio Karma access library [CLI runtime library]
liblog4net1.2-cil - highly configurable logging API for the .NET runtime
libmono0 - libraries for the Mono JIT
libmono0-dbg - libraries for the Mono JIT, debugging symbols
libmono1.0-cil - Mono libraries (1.0)
libmono2.0-cil - Mono libraries (2.0)
libmono-accessibility1.0-cil - Mono Accessibility library
libmono-accessibility2.0-cil - Mono Accessibility library
libmono-addins0.2-cil - addin framework for extensible CLI applications/libraries
libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil - GTK# frontend library for Mono.Addins
libmono-bytefx0.7.6.1-cil - Mono ByteFX.Data library
libmono-bytefx0.7.6.2-cil - Mono ByteFX.Data library
libmono-c5-1.0-cil - Mono C5 library
libmono-cairo1.0-cil - Mono Cairo library
libmono-cairo2.0-cil - Mono Cairo library
libmono-cecil0.5-cil - library to generate and inspect CIL assemblies
libmono-corlib1.0-cil - Mono core library (1.0)
libmono-corlib2.0-cil - Mono core library (2.0)
libmono-corlib2.1-cil - Mono core library (2.1)
libmono-cscompmgd7.0-cil - Mono cscompmgd library
libmono-cscompmgd8.0-cil - Mono cscompmgd library
libmono-data-tds1.0-cil - Mono Data library
libmono-data-tds2.0-cil - Mono Data Library
libmono-db2-1.0-cil - Mono DB2 library
libmono-dev - libraries for the Mono JIT - Development files
libmono-firebirdsql1.7-cil - Mono FirebirdSql library
libmono-i18n1.0-cil - Mono I18N libraries (1.0)
libmono-i18n2.0-cil - Mono I18N libraries (2.0)
libmono-ldap1.0-cil - Mono LDAP library
libmono-ldap2.0-cil - Mono LDAP library
libmono-microsoft7.0-cil - Mono Microsoft libraries
libmono-microsoft8.0-cil - Mono Microsoft libraries
libmono-microsoft-build2.0-cil - Mono Microsoft.Build libraries
libmono-mozilla0.1-cil - Mono Mozilla library
libmono-npgsql1.0-cil - Mono Npgsql library
libmono-npgsql2.0-cil - Mono Npgsql library
libmono-oracle1.0-cil - Mono Oracle library
libmono-oracle2.0-cil - Mono Oracle library
libmono-peapi1.0-cil - Mono PEAPI library
libmono-peapi2.0-cil - Mono PEAPI library
libmono-relaxng1.0-cil - Mono Relaxng library
libmono-relaxng2.0-cil - Mono Relaxng library
libmono-security1.0-cil - Mono Security library
libmono-security2.0-cil - Mono Security library
libmono-sharpzip0.6-cil - Mono SharpZipLib library
libmono-sharpzip0.84-cil - Mono SharpZipLib library
libmono-sharpzip2.6-cil - Mono SharpZipLib library
libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil - Mono SharpZipLib library
libmono-sqlite1.0-cil - Mono Sqlite library
libmono-sqlite2.0-cil - Mono Sqlite library
libmono-system1.0-cil - Mono System libraries (1.0)
libmono-system2.0-cil - Mono System libraries (2.0)
libmono-system2.1-cil - Mono System libraries (2.1)
libmono-system-data1.0-cil - Mono System.Data library
libmono-system-data2.0-cil - Mono System.Data Library
libmono-system-ldap1.0-cil - Mono System.DirectoryServices library
libmono-system-ldap2.0-cil - Mono System.DirectoryServices library
libmono-system-messaging1.0-cil - Mono System.Messaging library
libmono-system-messaging2.0-cil - Mono System.Messaging Library
libmono-system-runtime1.0-cil - Mono System.Runtime library
libmono-system-runtime2.0-cil - Mono System.Runtime Library
libmono-system-web1.0-cil - Mono System.Web library
libmono-system-web2.0-cil - Mono System.Web Library
libmono-winforms1.0-cil - Mono System.Windows.Forms library
libmono-winforms2.0-cil - Mono System.Windows.Forms library
libmono-zeroconf1.0-cil - CLI library for multicast DNS service discovery
libmysql5.0-cil - MySQL database connector for CLI
libndesk-dbus1.0-cil - CLI implementation of D-Bus
libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil - CLI implementation of D-Bus (GLib mainloop integration)
libndoc-cil - Code documentation generator for .NET
libnemerle0.9-cil - Class Libraries for Nemerle
libnini1.1-cil - CLI library for managing configuration files
libnjb-cil - CLI binding for libnjb
libnunit2.2.6-cil - Unit test framework for .NET
libnunit2.2-cil - Unit test framework for .NET
libqyoto4.3-cil - CLI bindings for the Qt 4 toolkit
librsvg2.0-cil - CLI binding for RSVG 2.0
libtaglib2.0-cil - CLI library for accessing audio and video files metadata
libtapioca-cil - tapioca bindings for c#
libtelepathy0.13-cil - CLI library for Telepathy
libtelepathy-cil - CLI library for Telepathy
libuno-cil - CLI binding for OpenOffice.org
libvte2.0-cil - CLI binding for VTE 0.16
libzeroc-ice-3.2-cil - Ice for C# libraries
mono-1.0-devel - Mono development tools for CLI 1.0
mono-1.0-service - Mono service manager for CLI 1.0
mono-2.0-devel - Mono development tools for CLI 2.0
mono-2.0-service - Mono service manager for CLI 2.0
mono-apache-server - backend for mod_mono Apache module
mono-apache-server2 - backend for mod_mono2 Apache module
mono-dbg - Mono debugging symbols
mono-debugger - Debugger for Mono
monodevelop - C/C++/C#/Boo/Java/Nemerle/ILasm/ASP.NET Development Environment
monodevelop-nunit - NUnit plugin for MonoDevelop
monodevelop-versioncontrol - VersionControl plugin for MonoDevelop
monodoc-base - shared MonoDoc binaries
monodoc-browser - MonoDoc GTK+ based viewer
mono-gac - Mono GAC tool
mono-gmcs - Mono C# 2.0 and C# 3.0 compiler for CLI 2.0
mono-mcs - Mono C# compiler for CLI 1.1
mono-mjs - Mono JScript compiler
mono-smcs - Mono C# 3.0 compiler for CLI 2.1 (Moonlight / Silverlight)
mono-tools-devel - Various development tools for mono
mono-tools-gui - Various GUI tools for mono
mono-utils - Mono utilities
mono-xbuild - Mono xbuild
mono-xsp - simple web server to run ASP.NET applications
mono-xsp2 - simple web server to run ASP.NET applications
mono-xsp2-base - base libraries for XSP 2.0
mono-xsp-base - base libraries for XSP 1.1
muine - Simple playlist based music player
muine-plugin-audioscrobbler - Audioscrobbler plugin for Muine music player
muine-plugin-inotify - INotify Plugin for the Muine music player
muine-plugin-trayicon - TrayIcon Plugin for the Muine music player
mzclient - CLI library for multicast DNS service discovery (commandline tool)
nant - .NET build tool similar to Ant
ndoc-console - Code documentation generator for .NET
nemerle - Nemerle Compiler
nunit-console - Unit test framework for .NET
podsleuth - Tool to discover detailed information about Apple iPods
prj2make-sharp - Convert VS.NET solution files to Makefiles
stetic - GNOME and GTK+ GUI designer
sysinfo - Simple GTK program that shows some UNIX/Linux system information
tomboy - desktop note taking program using Wiki style links
youtranslate - Web translator
“Here is the new /etc/apt/preferences. Nuke’m from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure,” our reader adds. He wishes to remain anonymous, but there are no conflicting interests at all, just genuine concern about things which are conveniently overlooked by many.
These ‘Monopendencies’ could soon turn GNOME into MONOME, making it virtually impossible in due time to use basic applications without Mono somewhere in the dependecies tree. Moonlight is a good example of such dangers.
These dependency checks are reminiscent of the one which other people have obtained (and published) for Fedora [1, 2].
Miguel de Icaza and Jeff Waugh get vocal about this when the issue comes up. They seem to be sensitive to this issue which they are certainly aware of. Denial, promises or mitigation ensue.
Ways Forward
At least two bloggers other than ourselves occasionally criticise this direction which is increasingly chosen and then taken with little or no consultation. We need more information about the problem to be made available out there. Only yesterday, one of those fairly prolific bloggers described GNOME’s direction quite realistically:
I don’t consider XFCE as the best desktop environment, however it’s still lighter than GNOME, it’s still not under the contamination attack from the Mono guys, and it’s increasingly tempting in recent times, since GNOME seems to be a captive of Novell…
We were advised and told that contacting Fedora’s new leader might help. We was in touch with Shuttleworth on some occasions in the past, so that might help also. About Red Hat, our reader says:
Red Hat gained a lot of positive publicity way back when they gave a common theme to KDE. I think that was ground breaking in that now, people expect the theme more from the distro than from the developers of the desktop environment.
Red Hat has KDE support already, but I’m still wondering the best way to present the situation. I’m guessing that all the recent news about KDE, and the development, would be a good excuse to re-evaluate the two desktops. KDE has always been ahead in development, Gnome on the eye candy and promotion.
Besides, much of the jubilation about Ubuntu gutsy and hardy is about the window manager and that is a layer below, and independent from, the desktop environment. So if people find out that it’s not GNOME but Compiz Fusion, then they might be more likely to try other desktop environments.
One thing that we don’t have to mention explicitly is that since the formation of the KDE Free Qt Foundation, the original purpose of GNOME has been made moot. (Let people figure that out.) However, stepping around that (at least for a while) the KDE Free Qt Foundation should be mentioned and leveraged.
http://www.kde.org/whatiskde/kdefreeqtfoundation.php
Xfce is out there and gaining interest, since it’s good for low power machines that get a second life with Linux. Fluxbox is also out there and hit 1.0
Gnome has a fair amount of good things, but the direction of many projects and the positions of the leaders (e.g. Jeff and Miguel) is duplicitous at best…
[…]
The holy grail here would be to get Mark Shuttleworth and other key ubuntu people to go for KDE by default. Same for Fedora / CentOS.
If we get into a situation where function is provided only by mono-based apps, then they pave the way for Microsoft incursion. GTK+ hopefully can remain clean. That is all the more important now that Nokia’s competitors are dropping Qt / Qtopia.
[…]
I’m thinking the way to deal with this is to avoid confrontation, or at least high-profile confrontation and instead to promote the heck out of the tools Microsofters are copying. Anything that brings attention to them is free marketing, even it if is ‘bad’. The idea is to steer mindshare and thus developer interest towards the good tools.
Perhaps if we talk about how FOSS could be subverted without mentioning names, or bring up the benefits of GPLv3 and some of the discussion (against lgpl) that went on with the creation of the LGPL.
Take it as you will, dear readers. Facts are being accumulated and hope is that these will lead to responsible action; it’s not intended to achieve hostility, insults and confrontation. OOXML translators, which Novell tries to fool us with, remain Mono-dependent. It would be naive to assume that Microsoft is not aware of this. But if it spoke out, it would scare people away from the bait. █
Rasta said,
February 15, 2008 at 5:09 pm
Here’s one-liner for that messy “scripting” of yours:
(depends on “dctrl-tools” package !)
grep-available -F Depends -ri ‘.*libmono.*’ -nds Package | awk ‘{l1=$0;getline;l2=$0;getline; print l1,” - “, l2}’ | sort
BTW, nice aricle
Rev. Spaminator said,
February 15, 2008 at 6:45 pm
Isn’t this the kind of stuff Stallman has been warning about for years? Any effective movement that undermines corporate control becomes the target. FOSS was safe as long as it stayed on the fringe. Now it is mainstream, so by any means necessary, this freedom thing must be stopped. (It could, after all, affect profits.)
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 15, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Richard Stallman posted the following message to the GNOME Foundation’s mailing list.
GNOME is based on a philosophy, but it is not just a philosophy. It is a project to develop and maintain a desktop environment.
”The sort of favoritism that would be improper is to make a decision for the sake of profit (rather than the success of GNOME and the triumph of freedom).“A technical project has to make specific technical decisions. It can’t favor all the options that fit the philosophy; often it has to choose an avenue and follow it. Whatever the choices, some might call them “favoritism”, but that’s tough. Choosing can’t be avoided.
GNOME is a desktop environment, but it is not just a desktop environment. It is also based on a philosophy of free software and freedom. That philosophy sometimes yields specific ethical reasons for making specific technical choices. To someone who thinks only in terms of technology, these might seem like “favoritism”, but favoring the ethical (or what leads to it) over the unethical is right and proper.
The sort of favoritism that would be improper is to make a decision for the sake of profit (rather than the success of GNOME and the triumph of freedom).
Slated said,
February 15, 2008 at 8:23 pm
That’s a shocking amount of Mono dependants on Ubuntu!
Here the equivalent under Fedora (requires yum-utils):
packages=$(repoquery –repoid=fedora -a); for package in $packages; do repoquery –repoid=fedora –requires –resolve $package | grep -qi mono-core; if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then echo $package - $(repoquery –qf “%{summary}\n” $package); fi; done
I’ll let you know the results from Fedora 8 later.
Patrick Lindsey said,
February 16, 2008 at 6:46 am
1. I use Gnome and Fedora. So after reading the article (via LXer), I checked what YUM had to say about it. I then simply removed MONO and all its dependencies. The only thing I lost was Tomboy.
2. In question 4 above, why is “Sum” capitalized?
Dean Pannell said,
February 16, 2008 at 9:16 am
Ummm…
Did Google News search for ‘ooxml’.
The article you said wouldn’t show on Google News was the fifth article listed.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 16, 2008 at 9:57 am
Dean,
Yes, it’s not me who said that and I rechecked this before posting, then added a correction when I wrote “In fact, the latter bit turned out to be false just 2 hours ago.”
Alanbe said,
February 16, 2008 at 11:35 am
Andy Tanenbaum is no enemy of Linux.
Read his posts about how the author twisted things.
http://www.cs.vu.nl/~ast/brown/
Dean Pannell said,
February 16, 2008 at 12:55 pm
>Yes, it’s not me who said that
My bad, then.
Sorry.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 16, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Andy Tanenbaum is by no means an enemy of anybody. Microsoft tried to make him one, without success. It’s Microsoft’s attempt that counted. I ought to have linked that part of the text to the actual story for clarification.
Great said,
February 17, 2008 at 4:44 am
Its just not possible to remove mono from ubuntu.
I just tried to uninstall mono-common from ubuntu using synaptic and it ask to remove even core gnome libraries. libglade, libglib, libgnome… WTF !!!!!
This is really bad for gnome since i am gnome user.
WTF WTF WTF
Victor said,
February 17, 2008 at 6:06 pm
true, I have been following this issue for some time now… I was a GNOME fan for a lot of time, but I have been thinking of leaving to KDE because of KDE 4 and Icaza’s influence over GNOME… (and gnumeric and abiword, and others)
it’s also true that you should have explained the Andrew Tannenbaum issue with minix and linux… and how it all was a trap when he said he had no trouble with linux
JanC said,
February 17, 2008 at 6:21 pm
You can easily remove Mono using Synaptic, and it will only remove Mono-bindings for the libraries you mention. A lot of people seem to panic a bit too fast…
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 17, 2008 at 6:30 pm
From what I have heard, it is still possible to remove Mono from Ubuntu. The concern, however, is that few people will bother to do so. Instead, they will become Mono dependent and their data can be locked in, to to speak, to Mono-based applications.
There’s a large audit of Fedora 8 on its way.
justpassingby said,
February 17, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Your poor, sorry sods. You really do have too much time on your hands, don’t you? Get you fingers out of your asses and do some coding!
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 17, 2008 at 9:30 pm
I’m a programmer myself, but as a (part-time) user of GNOME I’m just concerned that it gradually ceases to be Free software.
Vadim P. said,
February 17, 2008 at 11:30 pm
Give me something better than Cheese, F-Spot, and Tomboy, and I’ll use them. Until then, I care about programs that _work_, not “clean” programs that _don’t_.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 18, 2008 at 12:12 am
Moonlight and OOXML translators for OOo are based on Mono. They are developed by Novell and its ilk (companies that signed a ‘protection’ deal with Microsoft). Some people will reluctantly (or not) adopt them. Therein lies the problem and the source for concern.
On the face of it, Mono is being phased in one gentle step at a time and there’s hope that resistance will have vanished by the time it’s too late.
Randy Anderson said,
February 19, 2008 at 11:11 pm
If Microsoft is leveraging Mono to try to take over Gnome, or even if there is a great fear of this, then maybe Gnome and all other Gnome projects should be forked and recoded without Mono.
As far as I can see, this would be the only way to fight the fear or actual take over of Gnome by Microsoft. There would be Gnome with Mono and a second Gnome (renamed of course) without Mono. If the fears of a take over come true, then people would be able to switch if they so desired.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 20, 2008 at 4:33 am
If a fork like this ever became a reality, the challenge would be to convince companies like Red Hat and Canonical to actually adopt it and pass it on to users. It’s not just the vendors that Microsoft goes after with threats; it tries to scare customers too and force them to pay.
Mark Fink said,
February 20, 2008 at 10:55 am
I’m not a programmer or I would fork it.
Roy, how hard would it actually be to convince Canonical and Red Hat to make the switch? I would have thought it would have been easy. Red Hat (at least) is pro-Java and seems to be anti-Mono, so I would suspect they’d be quick to make the switch. I’m not sure about Canonical, though. I’m sure Sun would be another easy one to switch. I would think that if you got Sun and Red Hat on board, getting Canonical to switch would be easy because I would imagine Canonical’s biggest barrier to entry would be rate of adoption.
Maybe Randy’s suggestion isn’t so bad after all.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 20, 2008 at 11:30 am
Sun has been using GNOME indeed, but its stance on software patents might be different. Fedora/Red Hat didn’t keep its (semi-)promise to stay away from Mono, so it’s worth raising the issue with the new leader of the Fedora project. A friend of mine is auditing Fedora for the seriousness of what he calls Mono infestation and he will have some results shortly.
The principal and principle problem is that there will always be some few vocal people who object to removal of Mono (just see some of Jeff Waugh’s postings here) and change of development direction.
As for Mark Shuttleworth, someone whom I know proposed removing Mono from Gobuntu, but he left some time later after a dispute over Firefox (Shuttleworth sort of insisted on keeping Firefox, which is not Free software).
Miles said,
February 21, 2008 at 2:30 pm
If you guys rewrote F-Spot and Tomboy (and Banshee?) in C++ or whatever GNOME uses, I’m sure it’d be a LOT easier for you to push a Mono-free GNOME desktop to Red Hat and Canonical. And… best of all, if you did that, then if the GNOME board refuses to accept those replacements over the current Mono programs, then you could be sure that the GNOME board members are dirty wrt Microsoft’s influence.
AFAIK, Canonical and Red Hat only ship F-Spot, Tomboy (and Banshee?) because they are the best programs in those spaces.
IIRC, John Palmieri (from Red Hat) proposed this very solution on Beranger’s blog a while back, but instead of taking his suggestion, he went ballistic and started verbally attacking John Palmieri instead.
Read the comments here
sud said,
February 21, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Yes, strangely enough there is a pattern that MONO-critics usually aren’t programmers. It seems that whoever knows what he/she is talking about digs the technical quality of the language? Or, the other way round, the critics are too lazy to actually do any work?
Vadim P. said,
February 21, 2008 at 3:37 pm
Exactly. Give replacements, then complain. Otherwise, nobody is going to cut themselves here for the purity (because we need to do -work-, not argue all day long).
Miles said,
February 21, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Btw, Roy:
Heh, F-Spot is written in C# on top of Mono.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 21, 2008 at 5:38 pm
Miles,
What is your role in Mono? It always turns out that the only ones defending this are those who cause and lead to the concerns raised herein.
sud,
I’m a programmer and so is ‘Beranger’.
Yes, I know. Someone else (a reader) was quoted there.
Miles said,
February 21, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Why do you always accuse those who aren’t anti-Mono of having some alterior motive?
Not everyone is anti-Mono, and as far as I can tell - only a a handful of people actually are. There are certainly a lot more people happy with Mono than are against it, otherwise you wouldn’t be trying to convince people to see things your way.
I’m a happy user of F-Spot and Banshee (I don’t have a use for Tomboy atm), but if someone were to write better alternatives in C, I’d use those instead. I didn’t choose to use F-Spot or Banshee because they use Mono, I chose them in spite of them using it because they are the best tool for the job and they are free software.
It helps that I’ve personally met Larry Ewing (the maintainer of F-Spot, and, coincidentally, the guy that created the Linux penguin logo that you use everywhere on your website) in person and have on numerous occasions talked with him and other F-Spot devs on IRC to get bugs fixed and have been very pleased with the timely manner in which they fix them.
You and Beranger may be programmers, but I have yet to see any significant contributions to any free software projects by either of you - the only thing either of you does is bash and insult free software developers and/or their projects. Beranger especially - he’s got a mouth on him that needs a good rinsing with soap.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 21, 2008 at 6:11 pm
Judging based on some experience, they often do have some ulterior motives. I see the same names in other blogs too, so the defense appears to sometimes come from core developers with vested interest in Mono.
Read this news:
http://blogs.the451group.com/opensource/2008/02/21/what-microsofts-open-apis-mean-for-open-source/
Be sure, Microsoft will want to collect its share of ‘precious’ fees for things like Mono.
You can find projects of mine in my personal Web site. I’ve always published my code under the terms of the GPL.
Miles said,
February 21, 2008 at 6:12 pm
Oh, also note that my original post wasn’t defending anything. All I said was that if you want things to go your way, you might consider re-implementing F-Spot, Banshee, and Tomboy in C or C++ for GNOME so as to provide Red Hat and Canonical with an easy choice to make.
Obviously if there are equivalent or better alternatives to F-Spot, Banshee and Tomboy for GNOME that Red Hat and Canonical can choose, they will. Currently there are no such alternatives. For example, gThumb is not a viable alternative to F-Spot. There is nothing even close to Tomboy, either. There are a few programs that could probably replace Banshee, but I think they are behind in functionality as well - just not sure by how much.
My post was not rocket science, nor was it in any way defending Mono - it was simply stating the obvious.
If anything, you could even say my post was helping you defeat Mono.
Certainly encouraging you and Beranger to get off your butts and write better alternatives to F-Spot, Banshee, and Tomboy is not helping Mono to “win” (unless, of course, you guys are incapable of writing quality software…?).
Miles said,
February 21, 2008 at 6:15 pm
Yes, I’ve seen your collection of small little utility scripts, but they aren’t widely useful free software projects.
Do any distributions even ship them?
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 21, 2008 at 6:21 pm
I apologise if I sounded impolite. Such things are never intended.
I’ve worked much larger programs like KMD and Othello Master, among many others.
http://othellomaster.com/
http://schestowitz.com/Projects/kmdupdate.html
You seem to be trying to make my contributions seem minuscule, but be aware that the writings here are intended to defend the Free desktop so that you, Miles, will continue to have it. i sometimes need to ask myself if other people simply fail to see some key facts and I strive to make it clear why Novell’s deed was horrendous. See:
http://blogs.cnet.com/8301-13505_1-9876061-16.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=TheOpenRoad
Miles said,
February 21, 2008 at 6:37 pm
So have the developers you criticize relentlessly on this website.
The difference is that their software is actually useful, yours is typical “university student utility programs” stuff.
Every CS student in the world has probably written an Othello program (I, myself, wrote one in High School for an early version of DOS) and many are available on the web - either under the GPL or public domain. Those that aren’t available aren’t necessarily unavailable because the author chose to protect his “IP”, but rather because he didn’t bother to release it somewhere figuring his software was useless (and, quite honestly, most probably are).
As far as KMD is concerned, seems to me you didn’t write it. Someone else did, you just contributed a few bugfix / typo patches.
Sorry to “belittle” your contributions, but if you’re going to be throwing stones - maybe you shouldn’t be living in a glass house?
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 21, 2008 at 6:46 pm
By name? I suspect not, but raising the name of a project might sometimes be a case of criticising someone’s pet project or ‘baby’.
The intention here is to make users aware of implications of use.
I won’t address many of your incorrect statements with regard to projects. You go very far trying to belittle projects, calling them ‘bugfixes’ and ‘typos’.
Mark Fink said,
February 21, 2008 at 7:31 pm
I’ve had enough of this fucking bullshit!
I’m gonna start a fucking tomboy replacement tonight on sourceforge. We’ll see who laughs last Miles. I’m gonna flush you and and your stupid MONO shit software down the toilet.
Who wants to help me?
Mark Fink said,
February 21, 2008 at 9:13 pm
Apparently GNOME already has a sticky notes program. WHY THE FUCK AREN’T THEY USING IT THEN!?
I think we’ve safely concluded that GNOMEies are trying to sabotage their own software to make it infringe on M$patents to fuck their users. It’s the only logic conclusion.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 21, 2008 at 9:18 pm
Mark, there are some pages you probably want to explore. Here is a good starting point:
http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=mozclient&num=50&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&q=site:boycottnovell.com+waugh+tomboy
Vadim P. said,
February 21, 2008 at 11:31 pm
Sticky notes suck compared to Tomboy.
That’s a good place to start though people.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 21, 2008 at 11:43 pm
How long before they decide to stick Glipper in the core in order to compete with Klipper, I wonder…
The issue here is a chicken-and-egg one. Many people use Tomboy, so a lot of development rigor will go into Tomboy and not into a lesser known project that is used by fewer people. That’s why the leadership of GNOME needs to take action and reroute focus away from development in C#.
When Stallman raised the issue in the mailing list, I think it was Shaw who said that he would ask Novell to do this, or at least be aware of the issue. A month ot two go by and we find out about dbus pulling a Mono. Where will this end? Mono expands rather than be sidelined. In fact, it’s in Novell interest to spread the Mono — so to speak — for only Novell has the ‘protection’ for its use. One might say that Novell contaminates GNOME to promote its own selfish agenda. Microsoft watches over Novell’s shoulder gleefully (mind yesterday’s ‘big announcement’, aka “the extend phase”).
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 21, 2008 at 11:44 pm
Links about the announcement, for future reference and ‘historical record’:
http://boycottnovell.com/2008/02/21/analysis-of-a-decoy/
http://boycottnovell.com/2008/02/21/taxoperability-strategy/
Scott said,
February 22, 2008 at 3:08 pm
And I thought I had too much free time….
soot said,
February 22, 2008 at 3:59 pm
It really seems that the less reason there is to be worried they more panicky the guys here get. And they sound more and more crazed because their worries become more and more far-fetched.
Mark Fink said,
February 22, 2008 at 5:15 pm
soot: How much is Microvell paying you? Yea, thought so.
Go back to your hole and crawl back in.
Vadim P. said,
February 22, 2008 at 5:23 pm
I’d pay for a program that’s equivalent to Tomboy (resorted to Picasa instead of F-Spot). Bu equivalent I mean it has the same functions I use, not “designed to” do the same thing and do a bad job of it.
Is there one?
Mark Fink said,
February 22, 2008 at 5:48 pm
Just use the GNOME sticky notes program, or maybe XFCE has a notes program you could use. If XFCE has one, it’s probably a lot better than anything those incompetent GNOME programmers could ever write.
Vadim P. said,
February 22, 2008 at 5:59 pm
I did try Gnome sticky notes. The window is tiny and somehow escapes my AWN dock, so I can’t manage the notes easily. It also offers zero formatting, and no linking support.
(that’s the problem I’m talking about. Lack of features I need)
Vadim P. said,
February 22, 2008 at 5:59 pm
Where can I find the XFCE one?
Mike said,
February 22, 2008 at 7:20 pm
Well, come up with a replacement, then: a demonstrably unencumbered safe and efficient programming language with a working implementation, native Linux bindings, and a good C interface.
Java certainly isn’t it: it has serious performance problems, a lousy C interface, and is patent-riddled. Python isn’t it either. And neither is C++.
Right now, I don’t see much of a problem with Mono: if you don’t use .NET (and Linux desktop apps don’t), there is no obvious patents that present a problem. And there is no credible alternative around that I can see. Despite all your flaming, you don’t offer one.
And a switch to KDE is a non-starter because its core GUI library is GPL. I develop some big open source projects under the Apache2 license, and there is no way I’m going to link with Qt. Commercial developers are in an even worse situation with respect to Qt. That’s in addition to the fact that developing GUI apps in C++ is a bloody nuisance.
So, the ball in in your court: come up with another alternative.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 22, 2008 at 8:06 pm
What’s with the Qt/KDE FUD? Unless it goes BSD, Qt is possibly going GPL without m/any such conditions. I’ll write about this over the weekend.
Alan McGovern said,
February 22, 2008 at 8:38 pm
Do you know what the funniest thing about all this is? Mark Fink doesn’t even exist. He’s some guys psuedo name created entirely to bash mono on just two places.
1) This site
2) The gnome devel mailing list
He exists in a mere 3 links in google, two for here, one for the mailing list.
@’Mark Fink’:
Whenever you make a *real* contribution to *anything* open source, then feel free to make comments on what’s the ‘right’ choice. Until then, quite simply, suck it up and shut up. The only thing poisoning gnome is you.
Hret said,
February 23, 2008 at 8:45 am
Mark Fink seems to be the biggest arse on this site (which is already full of idiots!).
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 9:06 am
Thanks you, Hret, for your very sophisticated contributions and insights (ad hominem attacks).
Hret said,
February 23, 2008 at 9:21 am
@Roy Schestowitz:
I’d be interested to know, what’s your motivation for this hatred-filled website? Got no girlfriend? The most people concentrating on hating others have major personal problems - maybe you feel suppressed or others have more sex or more money than you. But people who are satisfied with their lives don’t create sick websites like you.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 9:38 am
First of all, there is no hatred in this Web site. Show me signs of anger or hatred. Go ahead. The site strives to deliver objective analysis of a deal (followed by subsequent ones), which was fuelled by selfish desires of conjoined parties. Sadly enough, those who are abused by the seclusive (and sometimes malicious) arrangements are not competing businesses but volunteers, including myself, who comprised a lot to make software which respect one’s freedom and help people adopt it. They wanted to give something to those whom they cared about whereas Novell, as proven more recently, is stuck in its past roots with an entirely different mindset.
Customers never truly required ‘protection’ (ask more senior people who are familiar with this) and neither did Novell suppliers — programmer whose chosen license Novell conspired to work around.
Free software relies on trust and on goodwill. That is a mixture of things the which drive development, which give passion. When people put a (patent) price on your head, you are distracted, you cease to work effectively. Just watch what happened 9 months ago when kernel developers saw their work threatened.
Backlash is inevitable and I knew this from the start. But if we don’t stand up and speak up, then Free software could be held hostage by a fierce competitor whose rigid software increasingly tips over the edge of what’s known as “digital slavery” (watch one of Gutmann’s recent papers).
The most aggressive of measures are taken when one feels threatened and sees survival at stake. Watch how far Microsoft is willing to go to acquire Yahoo and render (X)HTML moot. It’s now a proxy fight (bullying). In the same vein — only /to an extent/ I’ll admit — a set of proxies are used to subvert a natural evolutionary trajectory of Free software. This happens to include Mono. If you permit Microsoft to put what it perceives as its own property in the hands of all Linux users, it will try to pry it off our hands. Not yet. First it needs it to spread a little and people to get ‘addicted’ to it (Gates’ terminology). Beware the Greek bearing gifts.
Alan McGovern said,
February 23, 2008 at 9:46 am
“If you permit Microsoft to put what it perceives as its own property in the hands of all Linux users, it will try to pry it off our hands.”
Ah, that happens to be the single fatal flaw in your argument, that (luckily for us) negates your entire argument.
Microsoft do not *own* the CLR. They do not *own* exclusive IP rights to every .NET JIT implementation. They do not *own* exclusive IP rights to the C# language. They do not *own* any of this.
It is a fully open and *free* (free as in completely free) platform for anyone to innovate with. Anyone can implement a .NET JIT, anyone can implement a compiler for the C# language. It’s all there in the specification. It’s an ECMA standard. Microsoft has no more claims to C# itself than it does to the CD-ROM filesystem (now known as ISO 9660), which is also an ECMA standard.
Next time, research before you spout gibberish.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 10:02 am
Alan,
A phrase that immediately comes to mind here is “the first one’s free”, but first allow me to explain why. I think of this as a trial version, or even a dual-licensed open source project with support caveats and all sorts of restrictions and gotchas which only emerge as you scale up. Think about Oracle’s interpretation of free, for starters.
Going back to Mono/.NET/C#, I am aware of ECMA role in all of this, but I am also aware of the so-called ‘premiums’ that accompany a whole framework where cross-platform compatibility plays a vital role (Mainsoft and WebSphere come to mind here). Mono has already been divided into three portions, which I find scary in this context (think “Mono for the poor” and “Mono for the rich”).
As Mono becomes a more mature and more widely used component in the Free (now just ‘free’ desktop), temptation among the Large Vendors will crop up, urging them to take advantage of more ‘restricted’ features that leave the ‘community’ component of Linux out in the cold. Moreover, as .NET continues to improves and Microsoft gets more worried about looming threats, licenses will be set and reset accordingly. You are letting Microsoft control your destiny, call shots, and make most rules. You are playing their game. They game you. For similar reasons, trying to play catchup with OOXML has always been an awful idea.
Microsoft /loves/ to control the standard. It said so only weeks ago. It wants you to be dependent on their de facto standards, hence the existence of Mono.
Alan McGovern said,
February 23, 2008 at 10:28 am
“support caveats and all sorts of restrictions and gotchas which only emerge as you scale up. Think about Oracle’s interpretation of free, for starters”
Irrelevant - this isn’t oracle. There is no comparison here. You’re perfectly right though, there are restrictions and gotchas. The biggest one is that you have to follow the standard if you want to implement ‘C#’. Of course, i don’t think anyone will actually complain about that restriction/gotcha.
” ‘premiums’ that accompany a whole framework where cross-platform compatibility plays a vital role (Mainsoft and WebSphere come to mind here)”
I don’t understand what you mean by this. Could you explain in clearer terms what you mean by ‘premiums’. Also, what do Mainsoft and WebSphere have to do with anything? You’re dragging in completely unrelated things into this discussion.
“Mono has already been divided into three portions, which I find scary in this context (think “Mono for the poor” and “Mono for the rich”).”
Once again, explain *exactly* what you mean here. What are the three portions which scare you so much?
“Moreover, as .NET continues to improves and Microsoft gets more worried about looming threats, licenses will be set and reset accordingly.”
Once again, this is a non-argument. It’s impossible. It’s pure FUD. Once something has been standardised with the EMCA, you can’t take it back. What is standardised now will *always* be standardised. Microsoft cannot ever undo what they’ve done. I’ll be kind and just say that your worries are completely unfounded, others would describe them as FUD and you as a troll.
“Microsoft /loves/ to control the standard. It said so only weeks ago.”
Everyone likes to control their baby. If you ever wrote free software, you’d know exactly how they feel. You’d hate for some nobody to decide that component X is a great idea and then forcibly pollute your code with ill thought out ideas and badly created API’s.
But once again, the future of the standard *in no way* affects what we have now. Should Microsoft decide to create C# 10.0 and not make it a standard spec, then so what. We still have *everything* up til then as free to use as the air we breath.
I still don’t see one credible argument against mono in any of your posts.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 10:53 am
See the explanation below, which refers to a similar question covering the same concerns.
The division to portions were announced around December if I recall correctly. Miguel presented this at the beginning of the month, maybe even at a Microsoft conference (I am not sure if it’s Mary Jo Foley or Paula Rooney who reported this, but a quick search would bring up the answers). There is the promise — however meaningless (non-binding contract) it may be — not to take any legal actions (IANAL, so let’s not discuss the RAND and other related things). Either way, the takeaway appeared to be that you can embrace particular bits that are seen as ‘unsafe’ and Friday’s articles (shortly after Thursday’s announcement) about ‘patents being freely available’ seem to apply here. Think about ‘free’ parts of Mono and ‘not so free’ parts of it (as in “be very afraid” because Microsoft might come knocking on your door).
Will it be implemented as documented in ECMA? Will there be deviation? Extension? To use an overlapping and timely example, are you aware of the fact that ECMA-OOXML was never implemented and never will? In fact, OOXML is a moving target. Microsoft has explicitly stated that it should devise the method of extending protocols in order to deny the entry of FOSS into the market.
By then, you are dependent. Just moments ago I spotted the following two comments that echo the very same concerns.
See: http://www.linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2008-02-23-003-26-OS-DB-LL-0000
Shamar - Subject: Mono+Ubuntu = bye, bye Ubuntu. ( Feb 23, 2008, 11:43:03 )
While I’m a GNOME fan, Mono makes me sick.
There is no reason to make Mono apps while we have open-source cross-platforms frameworks that work much better (aka, Python or even Java right now) and with an excelent “CV” of successfull applications running on it.
It’s just makes sense to promoto Mono if all we want is to help Microsoft marketing campaign.
All those that help, support, justify or promote Mono (including Miguel De Icaza, GNOME founder) deserve just one adjective: “hypocrites”
There’s a longer one also:
http://www.linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2008-02-23-003-26-OS-DB-LL-0001
paul - Subject: NET again?? ( Feb 23, 2008, 12:25:05 )
Please, put this beast to bed!!
While I understand the desire of MONO, I question why in the world we would actually want to to tie ourselves to a MS controlled platform (I mean the NET specs and future iterations, not MONO project itself).
The world would be a much better place if we all just said “NO” to MS and MS based technologies.
I am amazed why anyone would choose NET to start with. Why do we need a MS based Java anyway? If you want to use a Java like language and runtime, why not just use Java?
There are so many better alternatives to NET I cannot for the life of me wonder why anyone would want to go down that road! I am not saying NET is inherently bad, I am just asking why not Java, PHP, Python, Ruby, etc?
Java has a smaller runtime, is Open Source, and has more power and presense than NET. Net is based on the flawed Networking concepts inherent in COM, via COM+.
Java uses the concept based in Corba.
If I want better more scalable performance, Java is my choice. If I want quicker Web Development Ruby/JRuby or PHP. Fast native apps C/C++.
The only reason NET exists was/is that MS was seeing far too many of the Windows developers entertaining using Java, which would mean, that they would no longer be tied to MS.
Enough said really. These are exactly the same type of concern being rephrased. You become enslaved to someone else’s rules. If it were Sun, I’d be less concerned. I know far too well what Microsoft strives to achieve if the patent deals (contract) are something to go by. I’m not alone and this assessment is becoming more prevalent than you’d feel comfortable with.
CoolGuy said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:07 am
We need to give Roy credit for this. He is not getting any money but he is spending his time to further a cause.
Although mono doesnt seem to be that important right now, but the way it is infiltrating FOSS is really worrying. It will be much easier to stop it at this stage rather than later when lot of things start depending on it.
M$ will keep quite now. Once they know that Gnome is heavily dependent on their stuff they will start their sabootaging and threatening games. They have always done this. Nothing new. The way they killed OS/2.
“Stitch in time saves nine”
This is not a hate site, but the harsh reality.
If novell is not stopped they will really cause a lot of issues in the FOSS. They already did when they signed the death pact with M$ and sold out the FOSS community.
M$ is very good at playing the legal game. Bill Gate$ father, William H. Gates II, is a Seattle attorney - he is a well seasoned player in the legal games. He has been doing this since he was a kid.
Lot of people are now aware of the novell dirty tricks because of this site and be on gaurd. If not for this site, novell would have been free to rape gnome.
Atleast someone among the FOSS community is standing up to this.
Alan McGovern said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:14 am
Then yes, i know exactly the division you’re talking about. Funnily enough, that division was only created to keep people like you happy. Turns out, the very division that you were clamouring to get, and was granted to you, you are now using as some kind of weapon against mono.
What the hell? That makes no sense. People complained that winforms weren’t explicitly covered in the ECMA spec, so eventually packagers split mono into subsections.
1) The parts explicitly covered by the ECMA
2) The parts which have nothing to do with Mono or MS.NET such as GTK# and all that
3) The parts which are in MS.NET but not explicitly covered in ECMA.
Section 3 is what people were worried about, however bear in mind that the implementation of items in section 3 is in no way patent infringing. It has never proven to be so, and should it ever be shown that some portions of code do infringe a patent, it will just be rewritten so as to not infringe on said patent. So this is a non-issue. This procedure is clearly documented.
“Will it be implemented as documented in ECMA? Will there be deviation? Extension?”
So what? Once again, this does not affect you if you are a gnome developer. This is no reason whatsoever against using mono in Gnome. You are taking a hypothetical situation which has no relation to mono on gnome and trying to make it relevant, but it isn’t. What MS does with the framework does not stop Mono being a good choice in Gnome. Mono is more than just C#, in fact, mono != C#. You can use the Mono runtime with over a dozen different languages.
So, you need to more clearly define your objection. Do you object to the standardised and documented IL format and the standardised and documented JIT which can not and will not ever change? Or do you object to the C# language itself, bearing in mind that existing specifications can not and will not ever change?
Besides , if microsoft decides to break compatibility with the spec, it’ll be destroying backwards compatibility with hundreds of thousands of existing applications and libraries.
“To use an overlapping and timely example, are you aware of the fact that ECMA-OOXML was never implemented and never will”
Once again, don’t drag in unrelated arguments. OOXML has nothing to do with mono, it has nothing to do with C#, it has nothing to do with the .NET framework. I couldn’t care less about it. It is not even an ECMA specification, C# and the JIT are. They couldn’t be more different.
“There is no reason to make Mono apps while we have open-source cross-platforms frameworks that work much better (aka, Python or even Java right now) and with an excelent “CV” of successfull applications running on it.”
How are they ‘better’. Define ‘better’. Less CPU usage? less memory usage? More productive languages? Remember, everyone is entitled to a personal opinion, but it doesn’t make that opinion right.
Running python on the .NET framework using IronPython can result in significantly faster execution with less memory usage. Wouldn’t that make python + mono a better choice then?
“Java has a smaller runtime, is Open Source, and has more power and presense than NET. Net is based on the flawed Networking concepts inherent in COM, via COM+.”
Once again, Java is NOT fully open source. .NET is. Don’t spread lies. .NET is not based on COM. Those are two unrelated concepts. .NET has COM interoperability though, which for some people is very important as they have to communicate with legacy applications. If anything, this is a plus, not a negative.
CoolGuy said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:27 am
What can a gnome user do to stop this ? Our voices have been silenced. We are dependent on gnome developers for this (and M$ has been funding them)
I dont even trust Nokia with QT, it might have been a proxy buyout that might have been done by M$. Bill Gates has a lot of influence and contacts. $100 millions is just change for them.
Lately he seem to have left the technical side and has devoted himself to full time political assult on Linux/FOSS (although media paints this as some kind of charity show).
After reading the EVANGELISM is WAR document - I think M$ will go down to ANY level of disgusting activity to stop FOSS. See the political buyout at the BRM - its a disgusting mokery of ISO at the best.
It seems to have been setup by Bill Gates. He kind of has lot of time lately and devoted him to full fledge political and legal destruction of everything that stands in his way and microsoft.
Dan O'Brian said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:30 am
@Alan: Get used to it, Roy Schestowitz is a known for being a fear monger. Google his name and you’ll find plenty of evidence of this.
As some have suggested, it is likely that Roy himself is paid by Microsoft to try and discredit projects like Mono. I can’t think of anyone who has more to gain from the destruction of Mono than Microsoft, so it makes a lot of sense.
Roy likes to point out that this notion is absurd because he spams comp.os.linux.advocacy with “rah for linux!” news, but being that no one but linux users actually read comp.os.linux.advocacy, it’s hardly helping to promote Linux at all.
Here’s a conspiracy theory for ya:
Roy pops up out of no where 2 years ago when Novell and Microsoft made their deal and begins spamming comp.os.linux.advocacy to give himself “street cred” (precisely so he can point to it and say “see? I’m a Linux supporter, I advocate the use of Linux” and thus try to avert speculations that he’s actually a Microsoft paid troll[1]) while simultaneously working to discredit Microsoft’s biggest competitor/projects.
With Novell, it was easy because they had made a deal - and so he played the typical Slashdotter’s hatred of Microsoft and used it to fuel his anti-Novell campaign.
Time passes and he starts attacking GNOME, Mono, Mandriva, Fedora and Ubuntu.
Oh sure, he claims that he was a big fan of OpenSuSE, GNOME, etc etc before the Microsoft-Novell deal, but talk is cheap and a common ploy used by trolls like Roy to try to establish a form of credibility - the idea is to make people assume that you are a reasonable person and that whoever you are speaking out against has crossed some line.
In fact, Apple used a similar ploy in some of their commercials a few years back to get people to switch from Windows to MacOS.
1. whenever someone proves that the view that Roy is trying to push is based on misrepresentations of the facts (or outright lies), Roy turns around and accuses them of being paid Microsoft shills in an attempt to discredit all that oppose him while simultaneously changing the subject and confusing the issue.
As someone wiser than I once said, “those who scream the loudest are often the most guilty”.
…And no one screams louder than Roy Schestowitz.
Alan McGovern said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:32 am
“What can a gnome user do to stop this ?”
Write your own software that doesn’t use mono, or just don’t use mono and live with inferior products.
“Our voices have been silenced. We are dependent on gnome developers for this (and M$ has been funding them)”
More FUD? Have any proof that any gnome developers are being funded by MS? Secondly, as there are legitimate cases where developers are indeed being funded by MS to work with gnome (i.e. interoperability folk), you need to also prove that they’re forcing mono into gnome.
Until you have more than thin air to base your arguments on, don’t reply with more FUD.
CoolGuy said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:34 am
Licensing
Although the C# language definition is standardized under an ISO standard, only a part of the Base Class Library, which contains the fundamental functions that are used by all C# programs (IO, User Interface, Web services, …) is also standardized. Furthermore, parts of the BCL have been patented by Microsoft,[20][21] which may deter non-Microsoft implementations of the full frameworks.
CoolGuy said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:38 am
libraries not documented or included in the ECMA specification but are included in Microsoft’s standard .NET Framework distribution.
Dan O'Brian said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:40 am
And which of these .NET libraries of which you speak are used by Linux Mono applications?
Alan McGovern said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:40 am
Please don’t copy and paste stuff from other peoples sites without actual links to back up those claims.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:43 am
Hi again Alan,
Thanks for the quick response. First of all, I have just followed the hyperlink on your name and realised that you develop MonoTorrent. Well done, I have no problem with that at all (au contraire), but let’s set things straight and clarify that you have vested interests here, whereas I have none (trust me, I am omitting no disclosures, of which I have none). I understand that my post must be annoying or frustrating to you and I can only offer my apologies, but not my blind eye. We ought to understand what we have here in our hands.
This may be true, but let us refocus on the issue. The deviation or extension you cannot guarantee will also be free (gratis). If a large department was to embrace a GNOME-based GNU/Linux distribution, this could lead to ‘taxation’. Remember what Mark Shuttleworth once told Matt Asay about the crucial difference between a $0.00 Linux and a $0.01 Linux. I can find you the link if you want. They spoke about this over lunch in London last year.
.NET can be seen as more than just a tool for development. It comes with licensing, ownership and control as ‘appendages’. When you are not in control, you become more sensitive. GTK is about control, ownership. Mono is an entirely different story.
I fear that the C# language may be gradually becoming a de facto choice for portions of GNOME (consider C#-based dbus). C#-exclusive bits such as OOXML translators are a big church bell ringing loudly for someone’s attention. The same goes for Moonlight. These technologies are part of the ‘Microsoft Stack 2.0′ and it seems like GNOME permits itself to become a second fiddle and supporter of Microsoft (nervously wait for HD, XPS, DRM, SharePoint and so forth), rather than embrace opposing forces from Google, Sun, and IBM (see this new analysis http://www.linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2008-02-22-021-26-OP-BZ-SV ). Microsoft appears to be manipulating a lot of people who lose sight of the Big Picture and they are unable to see how they get used.
I beg to differ. OOXML embeds various bits and pieces of Microsoft Windows and other parts of the Microsoft stack including SharePoint and media files (with or without DRM). It is no coincidence that C# mimics/emulates things to enable conversions. If anything, this explains why Microsoft has been all along so supportive of Miguel’s work ‘ripping off’ Microsoft’s bread and butter.
That’s new to me. Check the licence of Java and then check the licence of .NET. Then we can discuss this. This leads to another serious issue by the way:
http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Linux-and-Open-Source/Microsofts-OpenSource-Trap-for-Mono/
CoolGuy said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:43 am
If someone pollutes the Linux kernel you will advise them to write their own kernel. Why dont you tell groklaw to stop the SCO bashing and write their own kernel… ?
Just funny.
We are users. We are not developers. But IT DOES CONCERN US. We use and support FOSS.
Telling people to not raise their voice over a legit issue because they cant write code is just FUD. It affects everyone.
Everyone is not a developer. People come from different background - you need to understand that. it doesnt mean people are stupid or need to shut up if they cant code.
CoolGuy said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:46 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C_Sharp
That was directly taken from the wiki…
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:50 am
I will write an analysis of Nokia tomorrow. It turns out that a Nokia employee who used to work at Microsoft is responsible for shooting down Ogg (out of HTML5). But be aware that Nokia has other rivals though. It’s complicated.
For example, earlier today I read about Nokia grabbing Qt so that Ericsson (among many others) stay ‘Qt-naked’. A week or two went by (after Qt had been ‘hijacked’) and Erikson committed itself to Windows Mobile (signing a deal with Microsoft, just a few days before Microsoft’s long-time head of the Mobile Unit jumped ship). Sony Ericsson is one thing. Another is Nokia, which was approached by Microsoft for Windows Mobile just a week after acquiring Qt. Nokia declined.
Dan O'Brian said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:55 am
@CoolGuy: *sigh* this is precisely people should not comment on what they know nothing about. No one is telling you to shut up because your stupid or because you can’t code, you should shut up because you’re clueless.
Yes, Web Services (referring to ASP.NET) and UI (referring to Windows.Forms) are not covered by ECMA, but they are hardly required for writing applications using C#/Mono/.NET.
Mono has Gtk# and a Qt binding to use in place of Windows.Forms. As far as the Web Services side, no one uses that to write GNOME apps.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 11:58 am
Dan O’Brian,
Where have you pulled those ludicrous claims from? Your previous comment sounded almost as though you reused one of the posts from those trolls who had posted from honeypots to USENET since the OS/2 era (many evidence to suggest they are astroturfing, so you needn’t ask for *my* assessment of this). The theory is so crazy that I won’t even bother commenting to refute it.
Dan O'Brian said,
February 23, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Haha, typical Roy response - try to discredit the messenger rather than the message.
Alan McGovern said,
February 23, 2008 at 12:19 pm
“let’s set things straight and clarify that you have vested interests here, whereas I have none (trust me, I am omitting no disclosures, of which I have none).”
I have made no secret of who i am or what i work on. I included the link deliberately so people can see what it is i do.
“The deviation or extension you cannot guarantee will also be free (gratis).”
Yes, but if it is *not* free (gratis) then you simply don’t implement it in Mono. If Mono itself does not support your non-free (gratis) extension, then there’s no way for the developers to use it. Once again, non-issue.
“.NET can be seen as more than just a tool for development. It comes with licensing, ownership and control as ‘appendages’.”
Then you’re not talking about Mono anymore. Remember, we’re talking about MONO here, not what microsoft does with it’s 3rd party applications. They have no place in a discussion about the .NET framework and the standardised components such as the JIT and the C# language.
“C#-exclusive bits such as OOXML translators are a big church bell ringing loudly for someone’s attention.”
But… it’s not C# exclusive. Anyone who wants to can write an equivalent piece of code in C, or perl, or whatever. If you feel so strongly about this and cannot code yourself, just hire a developer to do it, or find an interested one who’ll do it gratis.
But (as i’ve said many times before), OOXML irrelevant to the current context. I’m talking specifically about Mono and C#, i’m not talking about OOXML. That’s something completely different. OOXML can do whatever the hell it likes, but that does not affect Mono and C#. Do you understand that? OOXML is a completely unrelated technology.
“That’s new to me. Check the licence of Java and then check the licence of .NET. Then we can discuss this. This leads to another serious issue by the way:”
Officially, Java is now under the GPL, but is the code freely available? Bear in mind that this only happened in the last few months. How long has Mono been open source? Why, since the day it started!
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 12:20 pm
I hardly discredited the messenger at all. I see bits of the slander that was spread in a coordinated fashion and repeated to create a Big Lie effect (striving to gain validity through endless repetition of libelous claims). If you wish, I will counter your points one by one, no matter how weird it feels to refute something which is totally made up.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 12:26 pm
I appreciate this. My statement on this was by no means a complaint.
The patent ‘promise’ of OOXML is not compatible with the GNU GPL, but that’s a separate issue.
We compared Java and .NET (Mono aside). Java code is already being released, albeit gradually, IIRC.
Dan O'Brian said,
February 23, 2008 at 12:28 pm
For the record, Roy is noted for changing the subject and drawing in unrelated issues in order to confuse the issue because he can’t win an argument any other way.
He attempts to keep his opponent off-balance in order to “win” which is why he keeps pulling in OOXML (which is completely unrelated to Mono).
Anyone with half a brain can se right through Roy’s ploys.
He’s a professional liar with no moral conscience.
Blue Knight said,
February 23, 2008 at 12:29 pm
@Miles
“Obviously if there are equivalent or better alternatives to F-Spot, Banshee and Tomboy for GNOME that Red Hat and Canonical can choose, they will. Currently there are no such alternatives. For example, gThumb is not a viable alternative to F-Spot. There is nothing even close to Tomboy, either. There are a few programs that could probably replace Banshee, but I think they are behind in functionality as well - just not sure by how much.”
I’m sorry but are you crazy? gthumb IS a viable alternative to F-spot!
“F-spot is LESS capable than Gthumb. The interface is easier to use but if you try to go deeper with Gthumb you’ll clearly understand how f-spot is useless.
Gthumb is the only gnome app I know that can print multiple photos on the same page! Something Windows XP had built-in in 2001.
So, we can’t replace gthumb with f-spot. (and you can tag with gthumb too).”
And “it gets my images folder and make a second copy of all the pictures in an irrational and stupid folder tree without asking me if I want that done or how. And why would I want my pics put into folders with different years??? Would you let *me* decide how I want to have my pictures sorted out, *please*? Thank you.”
Banshee is a crap. Rythmbox is already perfect for newbies and Quod Libet with all it’s tagging goodness, it’s “album view” media library is the best gnome app for heavy use. you have also Exaile…
Alan McGovern said,
February 23, 2008 at 12:34 pm
@Dan: I agree 100%
He is consistantly dragging in completely unrelated issues whilest i’m trying to find out what exactly he is scared of about mono. It just makes no sense. All i want is straight answer, but he can’t give that. All he can give is a big long spiel containing references to unrelated issues.
He doesn’t seem to understand the distinction between a language syntax, a runtime and a 3rd party application. With people like that, there’s nothing that can be argued. He can’t be convinced of the error in his arguments because *he has no argument*. He’s just spreading FUD and lies with no foundation of truth that he can prove with cold hard facts.
I’d be quite willing to accept that there are legal issues with mono if, and ONLY if, they can be backed up with irrefutable facts. Of course, if such an issue were to be found, for example it was found that a patent was infringed, i’d be among the first to remove that code from mono, and thus gnome, and replace it with a patent unencumbered equivalent.
Roy Schestowitz said,
February 23, 2008 at 12:40 pm
Dan O’Brian,
The issue is trivial and I did not change the subject (definitely not deliberately if you suspect the I did). Allow me to explain again why I associated Mono with OOXML and Silverlight also.
In order for someone to support OOXML and Silverlight, there are prerequisites that need to be implemented. That’s what Mono is there for. To Microsoft, such a thing is a perfect reason (excuse) to argue that OOXML and Silverlight are ’supported’ by FOSS (they are not really and can never be). Jody Goldberg has already given them such an excuse/reason that they endlessly rave about. Therein lies the danger of accepting Mono in the core of our DEs.
Moreover, if people choose convenience over principles of FOSS they will find themselves locked in to Mono for things like OOXML (documents they will not reject from colleagues) and Moonlight (the Web, whose developers will argue that the “freetards” can use Mono to access Silverlight). As things stand at the moment, I see Mono invading not only GNOME but /all/ DEs. I said this several months ago on numerous occasions. This isn’t even just a question that revolves around GNOME.
GNOME happens to just be the DE where Mono is being seeded.
CoolGuy said,
February 23, 2008 at