2006/11/4, Harsh Busa harsh.busa@gmail.com:
i think its an excellent step taken by both ms and novell. finally its becoming a mature market.
tech market has always been about co-operative competition. interoperability is key to fostering growth of all platforms.
kudos to novell and ms
Atleast Bruce Perens and Eben Moglen does not seem to agree with you.
Novell-Microsoft: What They Aren't Telling You
Today Novell and Microsoft announced a partnership in which Microsoft has
made some unlikely-seeming promises regarding Linux. What aren't they telling you? First, you can be sure that Microsoft's not out to help a competitor. This announcement paves the way for Microsoft to implement significant control over commercial customer's use of Free Software. And it has significant negative implications for Open Source in general.
http://technocrat.net/d/2006/11/2/9945
See what Eben Moglen has to say about the possibility of GPL violation http://news.com.com/2061-10795_3-6132156.html
Microsoft is bragging in their press release that they found a way around the GPL by "using a covenant", probably a covenant not to sue, we'll have to see the details. Whatever way they do it, they are at least circumventing the spirit of the license, and possibly the letter. Shame on Novell for helping them do that. And doesn't this remind you why we need a GPL3.
I don't think that coupling the patent protection to a support contract would be any better - it's still about using the software, the GPL still covers that software.
http://technocrat.net/d/2006/11/2/9986
Regards Praveen