11.15.08

Monoment [sic] of Novell’s Demise

Posted in FSF, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Mono, Novell, Videos at 10:32 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Monument
Living and dying with Mono

A FREQUENTLY-ASKED question is, “what distinguishes between the FSF’s approach to .NET and that of Novell?”

Aside from the fact that the FSF seems to have lost interest in .NET cloning, the key difference between dotgnu and Mono is that the former is intended to bring legacy applications over to GNU/Linux (much like Wine), whereas the latter — Mono — is somehow making its way into GNOME/GTK applications. Ximian/Novell are the cause for this and Novell encourages use of MonoDevelop.

A reader brought to our attention this video from a year and a half ago where Richard Stallman answers a question about Mono.

Direct link

Mr. Stallman says people “shouldn’t implement in .NET.” It is important to use our own tools. For example, it would be impossible to find GNU/Linux developers selecting Microsoft DirectX just because Wine can sort of handle it. Unsurprisingly, one of the most vocal boosters of Mono goes by the name directhex.

Novell is actively developing its desktop with Mono, so it’s not just a matter of bringing applications to GNU/Linux; it’s also about making applications in GNU/Linux using Microsoft technologies and therefore enriching Windows as well. Here is a brand-new reminder that comes with Novell’s release of Banshee 1.4:

Developers should use GPL-licensed tools like net2java (there are also non-Free ones) to escape the .NET trap as soon as possible.

Even Miguel seems to be having regrets. An older article is summarised thusly:

Novell Vice President Miguel de Icaza criticizes choice of Microsoft technology over open-source options.

To quote further from this article:

Speaking on a panel at the MIX 08 conference in Las Vegas, de Icaza said that Novell has done the best it could to balance open-source interests with patent indemnification. However, if he had his way, the company would have remained strictly open source and not gotten into bed with Microsoft. Novell entered into a controversial multimillion dollar cross-patent licensing and interoperability deal with Microsoft in November 2006.

Despite all of this, Novell’s new leadership is looking into further development of Microsoft technologies with Moonlight. Yes, it even “calls for [Moonlight] 2.0 contributors.”

Moonlight 1.0 Beta 1 Nears Rollout, Calls for 2.0 Contributors

The Moonlight team has announced that the first beta release of Moonlight 1.0 is nearly ready for testing. Moonlight is an open source implementation of Microsoft’s Silverlight product.

“Come and volunteer to help the poisoning of GNU/Linux…”

Who are they kidding? Novell should fight XAML, not support it. Fedora knows better.

Truthfully, .NET is Microsoft’s imitation of Java, but the patent office does not recognise the fact that all ideas (or so-called ‘inventions’) are merely aggregations of existing knowledge. This is why we push so hard for a reform and so should everybody else (shall time permit). █

“The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.”

–Albert Einstein

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6 Comments

jo Shields said,

November 15, 2008 at 7:47 pm

Go on, finish your train of thought.

What’s the specific link between a pseudonym I’ve been using for a decade, some guy named AlternateAlias, and a Windows media/game API? You’re obviously inferring something, why not just come out with it?

And out of interest, how does the time you’ve spent pushing MATLAB (rather than, say, GNU Octave) support your ‘advocat[ion of] the use of Open Source technology in the public and private sector’? Have you ever tried doing a patent search on The Mathworks, the proprietary software company you’ve spent your spare time supporting?
G. Michaels said,

November 15, 2008 at 9:08 pm

I wouldn’t worry about this. Roy has a friend whose main function seems to be to disrupt Slashdot (his hatred of the website is well-known) and promote BoycottNovell at all costs. This ‘twitter’ person (see the IRC logs) operates 14+ accounts on Slashdot:

http://slashdot.org/~SockDisclosure/journal/214377

Just a few examples of the hundreds of instances of blatant promotion and shilling by proxy:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=651859&cid=24682165
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=985275&cid=25253715

His handywork can also be seen in the recent Linux.com article about this website, where ‘twitter’ posted anonymously attacking the author and even pasted a link to his Slashdot journal.

So I wouldn’t worry about this too much.

Note: writer of this comment adds absolutely nothing but stalking and personal attacks against readers, as documented here.
Roy Schestowitz said,

November 15, 2008 at 9:16 pm

There are many people who link to this site. This has nothing to do with me. Has it occurred to you that some people want to share what they read?

That person you speak of is a reader and regular in the public IRC channel. It’s not a friend, but it’s someone who actively contributes to BN in IRC. His insight is always appreciated here.

You continue trolling, harassing and libeling this site in a pathological fashion. The only equally troublesome troll is eet.

The Internet is a big place. You can stop heckling this site 24/7 and read sites you agree with.
Needs Sunlight said,

November 16, 2008 at 6:19 am

Roy, they go after you cause you’re 1) right and 2) in their face about it. Keep up the good work.

Mono/.NOT is a cheap imitation of Java and Javaserver Pages aimed at lock-in. Please, please remember to point out that whenever .NOT is mentioned. Novell’s job is as you point out, to catch FOSS projects with their mouth open.
jo Shields said,

November 16, 2008 at 7:22 am

@G. Michaels

No, the troll responsible for the entire content of this post is Neighborlee, not Twitter.

The massive irony that Lee goes uncredited, when this post’s quote says “The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.”, has not gone unnoticed.
Roy Schestowitz said,

November 16, 2008 at 7:32 am

This was added in relation to Mono/Java. The post states very clearly that a reader gave the pointer/s and this entire site is filled with all the external references that make up the posts.

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