03.13.10
Posted in GNU/Linux, Mandriva, Mono, Novell, Vista, Vista 7, Windows at 5:58 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Andre Da Costa is still trolling the competition of Vista 7 while promoting this incarnation of Vista in exchange for gifts from Microsoft
OUR dear reader Goblin is the man who exposed a Microsoft AstroTurfer, Andre Da Costa, who also goes by the pseudonym “Mr Dee” in CNET. We have noticed that he is still trolling articles about GNU/Linux. “After he confessed to nymshifting one has to wonder,” wrote Goblin. “Maybe the Da Costa name has become too toxic to use? I see now he’s pimping Window 7 competitions,” he added [1, 2]. The reality behind Vista 7 is still being warped. Also from last night’s conversation:
| _goblin |
Speaking with many non-tech folks who are using Windows 7….all is not well…. |
Mar 12 21:21 |
| _goblin |
the general consensus is “Its just as bad as Vista” |
Mar 12 21:21 |
| _goblin |
looks and works great the first couple of times…..connect to the net, install a few apps and it reveals its true form. |
Mar 12 21:22 |
| Omar87 |
_goblin, let’s hope more sounds like these come to the surface. |
Mar 12 21:22 |
| _goblin |
these comments are coming from “average users” who already had their fill of Vista. |
Mar 12 21:23 |
We are not at all surprised to hear this. On the contrary, many people are pleased with Mandriva, which is one of my favourites (others in the family use it). Another reader commenting on the same superb article from Richard Hillesley points out that:
Anyone else see the irony?
[...]
This paragraph brought a wry smile to my face:
“Miguel de Icaza, at that time a rising star of the free software movement and co-creator, with Federica Mena, of the rival GNOME project, expressed the mixed feelings of many users and developers. “KDE was an inspirational project,” he told Linux Journal, “but at the time, the Qt toolkit on which KDE was built was a proprietary toolkit.”
The fact that he’s working with Microsoft now in producing the wretchedly slow Mono to provide compatibility with .NET and potentially laying Linux open to all sorts of future problems is deliciously ironic.
In terms of Mandriva, hopefully they will survive and flourish again, it still hangs in there fairly high up in Distrowatch. They probably do KDE better than any other distro and have done a splendid job with the now excellent KDE4 desktop.
There is some new Mono software from Novell employees this week [1, 2]. It’s fine for Novell, but it’s a patent fine for the rest.
Mandriva is indeed an excellent distribution. It puts to shame other operating systems, but it just doesn’t advertise as much. Since it is still KDE-centric for the most part, it hasn’t much of a Mono problem, either. █
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03.12.10
Posted in FOSS, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Mono, Novell, Windows at 3:02 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
No thanks for all the fish
Summary: Creator of land mines for the Free desktop ends his time at Microsoft’s group and returns to more risky activity
Novell’s VP and Microsoft MVP Miguel de Icaza joined Microsoft's CodePlex Foundation board last year. Microsoft used him as “proof” that the CodePlex Foundation was not just some shell constructed to promote Microsoft’s agenda (Windows, .NET, etc.) even though that was precisely its purpose, as it turned out later. The CodePlex Foundation’s board was announced prematurely probably to distract from the fact that Microsoft got caught selling anti-Linux patents to patent trolls [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]. That was also the opinion of Groklaw, for example, because this distracting announcement came amid other major fiascos like Microsoft’s distribution of anti-GNU/Linux pamphlets and training material to large chains of computer stores across the United States [1, 2].
“They change the API rules in exchange for benefits and/or paychecks.”Miguel de Icaza happily associates himself with a company that happily attacks the freedom of software while pretending to have embraced it, despite trying to change it from the inside (Windows, Mono, etc.). Together, they are demoting GNU/Linux and promoting Windows like Citrix still does with Xen. They change the API rules in exchange for benefits and/or paychecks. All along Microsoft is just buying its way and gently bribing a lot of people to get its way. There is some news from Microsoft about its so-called ‘foundation’ that it funds [1, 2, 3, 4] and in the press release we find:
Departing from the interim CodePlex Board are Miguel de Icaza, Vice President, Novell
Since de Icaza joined as interim board member he has also earned an MVP from Microsoft, so it’s not a total loss. It has also been revealed in the form of a confession from Microsoft that the CodePlex Foundation aimed to increase the use of Mono.
Novell programs like Banshee (Mono based) are still being promoted in some places [1, 2], despite the fact that Microsoft's revealing MCP says that Banshee is suitable for safe use only by Novell customers. To Novell’s MonoDevelop lead, says this one person from Linux Today a bunch of reasonable things.
“Here is your MVP award,” wrote an Anonymous Coward at Linux Today. “There’s nothing wrong with that except it’s trying to spread something that’s not very welcomed in the Free software community. At least, Microsoft should award MVP title to the developers for their hard work. Just trying to joke (hence, posting as AC), not mean to attack the developers. We are all technical savvy people, just happened to pick different paths.”
Now that Novell may be sold [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7], it’s expected that Microsoft might hire from Novell. Some “cool” programs written in Mono, however, will continue to cause harm. █
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03.10.10
Posted in GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Mono, Novell, Standard, Vista 7, Windows at 6:08 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
“[W]e should take the lead in establishing a common approach to UI and to interoperability (of which OLE is only a part). Our efforts to date are focussed too much on our own apps, and only incidentally on the rest of the industry. We want to own these standards, so we should not participate in standards groups. Rather, we should call ‘to me’ to the industry and set a standard that works now and is for everyone’s benefit. We are large enough that this can work.”
–Microsoft
Summary: Microsoft plants another flag in W3C, MonoDevelop pushes .NET at Novell or elsewhere, and Vista 7 continues to repel businesses
OUR LATEST post about the W3C has made the front page of Slashdot and almost immediately we found the familiar trolls attacking the messenger (a subject that we wrote about before [1, 2, 3, 4]). Jeremy Allison actually defended us by saying: “Jeff [Jaffe] was *definitely* one of the architects Novell/Microsoft deal, and had been part of the leadership for at least a year when it was finalized. I know. I was there.”
“Jeff [Jaffe] was *definitely* one of the architects Novell/Microsoft deal…”
–Jeremy AllisonAllison responded to the trolls and added: “don’t let facts get in the way of your post.” The funny thing is that some trolls are then attacking the messenger here too (the messenger who defends the messenger), which makes them — the trolls — hypocrites. The thread needs to be watched carefully in order for this claim to be understood. But anyway, based on this brand new page, Microsoft has already planted a flag in W3C and it rewrites history while it’s at it. Let’s not forget SVG, which Microsoft now pretends to have befriended [1, 2].
Over at Novell, it’s business as usual. Mono and Moonlight are key products and MonoDevelop is improved to encourage development with them. It’s all about empowering Microsoft Windows through its APIs.
It ought to be mentioned that Vista 7 continues to suffer difficulties because large businesses overwhelmingly reject it in RTM form, as expected all along [1, 2]. Pogson argues that “Things are not Rosy for “7″.”
They don’t want the public to hear any negatives about Vista-recycled. Now they have to worry that fewer will migrate from XP to “7″ or that migrations will be delayed. Poor babies. The longer XP hangs around, the more will migrate to GNU/Linux because it is an actual improvement and it’s faster. The patch rate of that other OS is the only thing fast about that other OS. Having to install a lot of patches on top of a retail licensed OS is not what they want a lot of consumers seeing, but it is happening.
There are many important releases of GNU/Linux just around the corner. We have seen and documented signs that many homes and businesses continue to migrate, at least into a dual-boot mode. █
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Posted in FUD, GNU/Linux, Marketing, Microsoft, Novell at 5:27 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
“Ideally, use of the competing technology becomes associated with mental deficiency, as in, “he believes in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and OS/2.” Just keep rubbing it in, via the press, analysts, newsgroups, whatever. Make the complete failure of the competition’s technology part of the mythology of the computer industry.”
–Microsoft, internal document [PDF]
Summary: The same old myths that Microsoft spreads in the media contradict reality and fact; the GNU/Linux userbase resists hostile intervention
YESTERDAY we gave a new example of Microsoft TEs smearing GNU/Linux in the technology media. SJVN has politely responded to the same FUD without exposing the messenger, who is a former Microsoft employee whose job still appears to be boosting of Microsoft (we have gathered many examples to show this and got in touch with the actual person, who politely denied it).
Here are the rebuttals to particular technical points that were exaggerations, lies, and spin (for example, the typical suggestion that GNU/Linux needs to look and act like Windows in order to succeed).
I found it more than a little sad that someone in 2010 could still think that Linux is “still a non-starter on the desktop.” Please — wake up: We’re all Linux desktop users now.
No matter what you’re running on your desktop — Windows 7, Snow Leopard, XP, whatever — you use the Internet, right? And you use Google to search? You talk to your friends on Facebook, Twitter of some other social network, yes? Then congratulations — you’re a Linux user.
Thanks to the Web, desktop Linux is everywhere. The old desktop metaphor is dying. Every day that goes by the lines between what used to be a desktop, a server, and the network keep blurring. Don’t think so? Answer me this: How much work could you get done without access to the Internet?
It goes on and discusses more areas such as the desktop. On the desktop too there is this issue of bad reporting regarding market share and the following new rebuttal just posted by Jeff Hoogland:
For starters how do these places collect their statistics? What websites do they pull their data from? The content of a webpage very much determines the type of operating system that a person is likely to view it on. For instance these are the operating system statistics from the last month for my own (primarily Linux-focused) blog :
* Windows: 44.4%
* OSX: 8.03%
* Linux: 44.03%
* Other: 3.54%
[...]
Beyond just looking at the source of web statistics of operating systems, when it comes to the global market as a whole, you have to consider the countless systems that are offline or are rarely connected to the internet. Unlike OSX where you can count the systems by the amount of Apple hardware sold or Mircosoft’s Windows where they can count the number of activations, a single Linux ISO download can account for multiple (sometimes even hundreds) of offline (or online) installations.
Truth be told, will we ever truly know the precise market share of each operating system? No, we will not. From my four sources here (and others you can find around the internet) I’m inclined to believe that currently Windows floats somewhere around 88%, OSX around 8%, Linux somewhere close to 2%, and the rest can get lumped into that wonderful “other” category.
What do you think? Know of another credible source for market share statistics regarding operating systems that I didn’t mention? Let me know!
This is an issue that we explored several times before. Here at Boycott Novell we get similar percentages (similar to the above). In a way, Boycott Novell is a ‘vacuum’ of GNU/Linux traffic in the sense that it is one among many GNU/Linux sites that ‘deplete’ from the presence of GNU/Linux users in sites that give away their users’ privacy (for Microsoft- and Apple-sponsored firms like Net Applications).
Speaking of this Web site, there seems to be misunderstanding when it comes to the effect of Boycott Novell (especially when it comes to so-called divisiveness); The site actually addresses potential problems, it never strives to divide, but where a division does exist it’s often a case of people who cross over (for money) to a side that’s hostile towards GNU/Linux. Shane Shields has just explained why it’s OK if “the Linux community is fragmented” and here is part of his argument:
So while the Linux community may look fragmented to those outside looking in, in reality it has a stronger, larger bond than any proprietary company can ever hope to achieve. It is the individuality of it’s members which drive and motivate innovation as well as the shedding of unneeded cruft. What is good in Linux quickly propagates through the rest of the Linux community and what is not fades away.
This is, in my humble opinion, the reason why Linux is becoming so powerful and in a surprisingly short time has surpassed the capabilities of older, more established operating systems. This is why proprietary companies have made efforts to either embrace or destroy the Linux community. Those who have embraced Linux have not lost anything and those who tried to destroy it have, in some cases, lost everything.
Microsoft has tried to embrace Novell; to a great extent it succeeded, but Novell is rejected by many who are using GNU/Linux, so this ‘fragmentation’ can be seen as a defensive one, and thus not a detrimental one. █
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03.09.10
Posted in Apple, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Novell, Red Hat, Ubuntu at 9:14 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: A dissection of unfounded suggestions that Red Hat will lose its independence because Novell is dying
IT is no secret that we distrust Matt Asay, who currently links to fluff from Microsoft's shill Eric Savitz. Based on this shill, he then assumes that Novell’s serious troubles as of late [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7] are likely to spell doom for Red Hat as an independent company. But these are totally unrelated events; if anything, Novell dissipating would give more room for Red Hat to expand, not to be acquired. Asay is a very clever guy, so why does he spread such FUD about Red Hat? One possibility that crossed our minds is that such hasty/hopeful/awful predictions would work well for the company he helps manage now, namely Canonical. What’s with his recent headline that says (with a question mark, as usual), “When will Microsoft sue Google over Linux?” Such a headline is not helpful and it sometimes seems like he just wants traffic with headlines like these.
“Asay is a very clever guy, so why does he spread such FUD about Red Hat?”Our reader Brandon says that it sounds like Asay is “a conspiracy theorist now” (because of the speculative, provocative headlines). But anyway, the criticism in general ought to be tied to other things. Asay is also routinely citing lobbyists for software patents (maybe unknowingly) and sucking up to Gartner, which is corrupt and better off ignored. You needn’t play nice with crooks like Gartner, you should expose them instead.
We apologise for not being fans of Canonical’s current COO, but why lie or keep silent about it? In the forums we refer to him as “Mac Asay” because of his love for Apple, which is currently his competitor. Is this behaviour (from the news) the type of thing that GNU/Linux should be imitating?
Reader: Steve Jobs says no tethering between iPad and iPhone
Steve Jobs appears to have fired off a tersely worded email reply to a user in Sweden who asked whether the WiFi-only iPad could be tethered to the iPhone: “No.”
Apple retards its own products and does not listen to users, as usual.
Put together with Apple’s lawsuit against GNU/Linux [1, 2, 3, 4, 5], Apple should be abandoned, not taken as an example. Apple is a niche product for spree-happy people with more taste for GUIs, not technical merit that includes powerful file systems, centralised software management, and frequent updates. Bar marketing, Ubuntu beats Mac OS X in many areas. Making GNU/Linux “more like the Mac” (even with a new default theme that begs to suggest so) will give GNU/Linux the reputation of “cheap Windows/Mac” and that’s not a way to win the market’s respect. █
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Posted in GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Mono, Novell, Patents, Ubuntu at 8:29 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: Mono lock-in potentially increased due to Novell’s Banshee in Ubuntu GNU/Linux
OUR reader Ryan has shown us this new page, which according to him, brings Ubuntu One closer to Mono (there is also the increased dependency due to gbrainy [1, 2]). The page says:
libubuntuone (0.2.100-0ubuntu1) lucid; urgency=low
* New upstream release.
– Added mono bindings
* debian/control
– added build depends needed for the mono bindings
– added mono bindings
[Jo Shields]
* debian/patches/use_debian_cli_policy_0.7_dir.patch
– Follow debian CLI policy
* debian/rules
– Added libubuntuone1.0-cil
— Ken VanDine <email address hidden> Mon, 08 Mar 2010 11:07:59 -0500
Jono Bacon from Canonical explains to us that “they are just mono bindings – so it works in Banshee, but we don’t ship the mono bindings on the disc.” Ryan replies with: “So Banshee brings in the offending bindings for Ubuntu One? Or will or something?”
Bacon explains that “there has been some work upstream to have support for U1 [Ubuntu One] in Banshee, but not sure if it will be in the upstream build… as we ship RB [RhythmBox], we don’t ship the bindings on the disc… as we don’t need to.”
The main issue that we have with Banshee is that only Novell customers can use it safely because of the limitations in Microsoft's "Community Promise" (MCP). █
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Posted in Finance, GNU/Linux, Novell at 4:37 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: With Novell’s big decision perhaps just days away, questions remain about the immediate ramifications (affecting this month)
A SALE of Novell may be imminent [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7], so CBR goes through some of Novell’s history in this new article that says:
Novell was founded in Provo, Utah as Novell Data Systems Inc way back in 1979, by George Canova, Darin Field, and Jack Davis. Canova’s wife came up with the name Novell, mistakenly believing that it meant ‘new’ in French. It started life making disk operating systems, but was reincorporated as Novell Inc in 1983 after a venture capital injection, and turned its attention to designing network hardware. In May of that year Ray Noorda became president and CEO, and it introduced NetWare that same year.
In 1997 Noorda was succeeded by Eric Schmidt, who is CEO of Google today. Schmidt accelerated efforts to leverage Novell’s core networking strengths in the Internet arena, soon launching NetWare 5 and Novell Directory Services (NDS), with native support for the Internet communications protocol (IP).
The firm bought services firm Cambridge Technology Partners in 2001 as it diversified yet further, and the former CEO of Cambridge, Jack Messman, took over the reins at Novell.
SCO will receive some more funds from its former employee, Ralph Yarro [1, 2, 3, 4], who is betting (along with others) on the trial against Novell and against Linux. The H has just covered this:
The SCO Group is to receive 2 million dollars from a group of investors headed by majority shareholder Ralph Yarro. Following an oral hearing, the Delaware bankruptcy court dealing with SCO has approved the loan. This means that the company now has sufficient funds for the pending jury trial against Novell. The trial, which is to address rights to Unix and the legality of protective licences for Linux users, is set to start today and is expected to last three weeks.
This trial intersects with the bid for Novell and BrainShare too. The VAR Guy reckons that Novell must decide whether to accept this takeover offer very soon, or else it can spell a disaster for BrainShare.
During the conference, attendees and the press (and persistent anonymous bloggers) won’t be able to avoid the temptation to ask — over and over again — Novell’s ownership status, which ultimately influences the future of SUSE Linux and Novell’s other products.
At the least: Watch for Novell’s board to offer an update on the Elliott Associates bid within the next few days. The result could be a company sale or an outright rejection of Elliot Associates’ offer. Either way, Novell needs to provide an update before BrainShare starts. Without that update, Novell’s ownership status could become a distracting topic during the conference.
BrainShare was canceled last year after it had failed to attract attendants [1, 2]. Novell can hopefully make up its mind very soon. █
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03.08.10
Posted in Apple, Microsoft, Novell, Patents, Standard at 11:23 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Jeff Jaffe at the event announcing the Microsoft/Novell deal (2006)
Summary: Novell’s CTO, who encourages maximisation of software patents, becomes another threat to the Web as he takes leadership in the World Wide Web Consortium
“SMELLS fishy,” told me Jan Wildeboer regarding the fact that “MSFT enters W3C WGs, Jeff Jaffe becomes the CEO.” Yes, the W3C has been letting in some bad staff recently, including some of the latest arrivals. First there’s a person from the software patents supporter known as IBM which has a seat, along with one from Microsoft and Apple, who are anti-GNU/Linux bullies that attack the platform with software patents (yes, Apple too [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]). Some of these people are not compatible with the W3C. One of the reasons that the World Wide Web was so successful was the deliberate absence (by exclusion) of software patents, which made the platform free.
On top of all this, based on many news reports [1, 2, 3, 4], the chief executive will be Novell’s departing CTO, Jeff Jaffe, who also has roots in IBM (which doesn’t help much). He was chosen despite his love for software patents [1, 2, 3] and patent traps like Mono.
The World Wide Web Consortium, which oversees development of Hypertext Markup Language and several other standards relating to the Web, has a new leader who wants to help streamline some of the group’s standardization efforts and beef up its ties with outside programmers.
Jeff Jaffe, Novell’s chief technology officer until January and a former executive at IBM and Lucent Technologies’ Bell Labs, was named W3C’s new chief executive officer on Sunday. In the post, he’ll work with group director and Web founder Tim Berners-Lee.
Berners-Lee very much dislikes software patents, so why does he surround himself with these people? They are all in favour of software patents (or their employers are). Apple has already ‘planted’ some software patents in the Web and also strongly opposed Ogg. Added below is a relevant conversion from one hour ago. █
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