by Playfuls Staff |
8th November 2006
What exactly is Microsoft wining from its partnership (and possible future acquisition) with Novell?[more]
Everybody knows today that the little Penguin just got a big hug from the big daddy, Microsoft. Novell was the lucky company to make its Linux distro available for interoperability with Windows, and to me, that was not a surprise. Actually, of all the companies out there providing open source solutions for individual customers or for enterprise, Novell seemed to me the only one to be able to accept a treaty with the enemy.
Novell was always a company that sort of tried to elude the GPL, beginning with their famous XGL desktop, developed “in house”. They got a lot of criticism for that, although offering it progressively for Linux distros like Ubuntu, Kororaa or Knoppix dampened that criticism and eventually turned the company into a worldwide hero.
I remember those days at the beginning of 2006 when everybody was so excited about Novell’s XGL and on the emergent YouTube you would find lots of videos detailing the power of seduction of Novell’s product.
At that time everyone was commenting on how nice and sweet and extraordinary is XGL compared to what Windows XP is offering and how this new desktop will totally pawn Microsoft’s OS.
In the mean time, people got used to it, began to understand it and use it, and eventually the hype fell into some sort of oblivion. More details about Vista’s interface began to emerge in May and the following months about Aero and XGL made its triumphant re-entry into public’s attention, only to be praised as a certain winner.
And XGL definitely outruns Aero in capabilities and eye-catching features and even a simple comparison between the two sounds almost like a blasphemy.
Now take a look at what Microsoft has to deal with: they have been building, and building and building at Vista (formerly known as Longhorn) for more than 5 years (in 2001, when they’ve launched XP, it was already in production). Repeated delays of Vista have not only affected MS’s revenues, but what matters most in business: its credibility (although, in MS’s case, I really don’t know if there is any credibility left to damage…).
They eventually announced us last week that Windows Vista is in the RTM phase and that on November 30, it will be available along with Office 2007 for corporate customers. They have also promised that Vista will be a “great product” and that they hope to see Vista installed on more than 200 millions computers in the first two years since its launch. Steve Ballmer also mentioned something interesting: that no other upgrade to MS’s OS will take that long to build in the future.
What’s the catch about all these facts? It’s simple: MS is scared. To many IT experts Windows Vista is nothing but a Windows XP Service Pack 3. With a bit of improvement in the user interface domain, thanks to Aero, and some new security features that will not make your OS impenetrable to malware, they will most probably stop its spreading to upper levels of your machine. On the other hand, MS declared that Vista is made out of scratch, meaning that they’ve completely re-written the source code. I ask you: if Vista turns out to be a baloney OS, what will it happen to all that work?
MS’s PR campaign was centered on building a positive image to Vista, but more importantly, make it look like “their best product in more than 10 years”. Even the comparison with Windows 95 was rejected, simply because Vista is much better.
But what if Vista is flawed? What if it turns out that they have not eliminated all the bugs? What if some creepy mind lurking in the shallow waters of the Web finds that vulnerability and builds THE VIRUS (or whatever) for Vista? (How much do you bet that there is already a competition between hacker-clans about “who cracks the SPP first” or “who builds the next MyDoom for Vista”? And don’t be naïve to think Redmond doesn’t know about them…). What’s left of Ballmer’s confident declarations, what’s left of MS’s PR campaign?
From the positive impression it (still) produces, Vista will most certainly generate a lot of laughs. “Is this what they’ve been tinkering for 5 years?”. The smallest bug will soon become a huge hole of universal proportions for many users. Customers are expecting something much exaggerated compared to what they should expect from any OS, and no one is to be blamed than MS for that. They have made Vista look so shiny, although it’s far form being that impressive. Vista is definitely a better OS, but compared to what I’ve seen at WWDC about Leopard and what I know about Linux, is light years behind.
People will start to notice (again…) MS’s tyrannical strategy: they’ll see that some applications don’t work unless you have Vista installed; new software and hardware will only be built for it and will only work if you run it. Of course, many people won’t like that.
So what is Microsoft thinking? “Let’s pay Novell some serious cash and then make Vista interoperable with Linux (SUSE in particular).” They’ve already seen what Oracle did to Red Hat and they’re now paving Novell’s way to Hell with good intentions. Don’t let yourselves fooled by press releases and happy, smiling declarations of peace. Microsoft will never do something that will eventually destroy its profits. Interoperability is just the second step (the first was the one made in June concerning the ODF-Open XML interoperability) in a plan meant at diminishing borders between the Redmond-built OS and the open source OS. The steak? Lots of cash, of course and the precious contribution of the open source community.
Just think of the fact that MS has been fined millions of Euros for not revealing its source code. What if?...What if they bought Novell, integrated SUSE’s code in Vista, replaced the Aero interface with XGL and in the end made everyone happy?
When the EU fined them in 2004 and then in 2006, MS came up with one hilarious proposition: we’ll let you take a look at our code, but you cannot print it, photograph it, copy it or whatever. It’s like: hey, I’m one lucky bastard! I saw The Thing! The Windows source code! Of course, I cannot tell you much about it but cuz I only got at glimpse at it…
And what if MS would do the trick now with open source? They show the EU (or other regulatory organizations) parts of Windows source code that was previously…open source. Wouldn’t that be convenient, following the interoperability?
Don’t expect these maneuvers soon. Redmond is expecting your reaction for Vista first. They’ll buy Novell only after you swear at them…Until then, enjoy your Vista!
