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Surprised I don't see anyone else mentioning this. This looks to me like typical Microsoft strategy that they utilized a lot 25 years ago. 1. when not leader

by takeda 11y ago

Surprised I don't see anyone else mentioning this. This looks to me like typical Microsoft strategy that they utilized a lot 25 years ago. 1. when not leader in given market, make your product fully compatible with competitor 2. start gaining momentum (e.g. why should I use Linux, when on Windows I can run both Linux and Windows applications) 3. once becoming leader break up compatibility 4. rinse and repeat Happened with MS-DOS, Word, Excel, Internet Explorer, and others.

sabelo 11y ago
Embrace, extend and extinguish. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish
- wmccullough 11y ago
  Please GTFO. It's going to be awfully hard to extinguish all of their major technology When's it's developed in the wild and MIT licensed.
- EdSharkey 11y ago
  I'm not ruling EEE out, but this move feels more like "staunch the bleeding" to capture more developers and retain the ones they have. I'd love to read a leaked Powerpoint or memo that explains the long-term strategy here. I think this is a great move by Microsoft to be able to EXEC a competitor's binary files natively. But, I think it risks being an admission that Win32/64 syscalls and Windows file system semantics are a crufty boat anchor holding developers back. To admit that risks inviting more developers to bail on Windows.
  - CamperBob2 11y ago
    I'd love to read a leaked Powerpoint or memo that explains the long-term strategy here. If MS's marketing department has half a brain at all, they will accidentally leak such a memo fairly soon.
partiallypro 11y ago
Microsoft is not the same company it was 25 years ago, much less 3 years ago. Microsoft cares about Azure now, and Azure requires GNU/Linux. It just makes sense for Microsoft to do this, and I for one am pretty excited about it.
- takeda 11y ago
  Well... back in the day Microsoft also was the company everyone was rooting for that was standing to the evil IBM. Those who ignore history are bound to repeat it.
  - SideburnsOfDoom 11y ago
    yes, the roles of the actors cycles around, but the script is the same.
- SXX 11y ago
  Once Microsoft stop charge users of Linux-based products for their patents or at least stop doing that shady way under NDA I'll believe it's not the same company. So far they get better in communication with open source community, but their business practices are all the same and Windows 10 only prove it.
  - ed_blackburn 11y ago
    I'm curious how many people actually factor this into any due diligence for selecting technology for a project? How much weight do you give it? If I were to advise against using Azure, Windows, .NET because of patents charges for some Linux products I'm not sure my colleagues or clients would take me seriously. Yes, there are lots of reasons why you may not select MS tech, but patents seems a personal, political reason , which would be difficult to justify if you're trying to project it onto other people / organisations.
    - fulafel 11y ago
      An approximately shared set of values and/or (business-relevant) political aims is a great advantage in working together.
jupiter2 11y ago
Thank you for mentioning this! Really bothered by all the positive comments, especially coming from savvy HN users. Gave this a long look and my main beef is that I couldn't possibly do anything on a Windows Machine in its' current state. Linux isn't just about running apps - there's a philosophy behind the system. Users first! As long as Microsoft continues to disrespect the rights of users in regard to privacy, data-collection, data-sharing with unnamed sources, tracking, uncontrollable OS operations (updates, etc) - I will never go near it. I find it especially offensive that ex-open source and ex-Linux users (working for Microsoft) have the audacity to come on here and try to sell this as a 'Linux on Windows' system when most of what makes Linux special (respect for the user) has been stripped away. It's like giving a man who is dying of thirst sea water. Most comments here appear to be positive and that's fine... whatever. To anyone reading this... please don't sell your souls and the future of software technology for ease of use and abusive business practices. /rant
- thegenius2000 11y ago
  This is so true I'm loathe to add to it. I dual boot my laptop b/w Windows and Linux because the WiFi network at my school has issues with Linux...so I'm forced to use Windows, also for games, but it's such a pain. Today it updated forcefully while I was trying to study; I tried to postpone the update but the option was grayed out. The Windows philosophy through and through is to treat users as ignorant and incompetent idiots for whom even the most basic of tasks must be performed, and who cannot make important decisions. This, IMHO, is the epitome of disrespect, and the reason I look forward with great anticipation to the day when I am able to solely operate within computing environments that afford me the same dignity as the cars I drive.
  - adrianN 11y ago
    I hope you only drive old cars, because newer cars aren't really designed to let the user change anything. You always need to take them to a specialist shop.
    - creshal 11y ago
osweiller 11y ago
HN had a huge influx of developers who predominately (or only) work on the Microsoft platform, and it has been readily apparent in the stories that rise to the top, and the dominant reactions (e.g. cynical takes are quickly transparent. Exaggerated "this changes everything!" comments rise to the top). This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it does heavily slant the coverage and slant of the conversation. And as you said, there is nothing new in this. The whole "hell freezes over" thing gets a bit old because Microsoft has done this same routine countless times before. When they are the underdog, seeing a fleeing userbase, etc, they pragmatically veer towards open and integrated. When they aren't, they close off and exploit. (see Microsoft's arrogance and hubris as they exalted in their success with the Xbox 360 -- early initiatives like XNA, their unloved community gaming thing...abandoned and left to die -- and now that they're losing with the Xbox One, once again that wonderfully open and accommodating company returns again. People pretend it's new. Another example I would give is MSN Messenger -- Microsoft did a loud, public campaign, including taking out ads in newspapers, pushing an open messaging platform, interoperations, etc. Microsoft had just started to get into the messenger game, so of course they didn't want to be kept out via the network effect. Then, of course, MSN gained users (being pushed on users, automatically configured, tends to do that). Microsoft made a complete 180 in approach. Soon they incorporated an expensive licensing program that third party apps had to use to interoperate with MSN Messenger, endlessly doing technical fixes to block third party access. What happened to that gregarious, open and cooperative Microsoft that was taking out ads to implore AOL for blocking access? The situation changed, and suddenly it wasn't in their interest anymore.
- copperx 11y ago
  > Soon they incorporated an expensive licensing program that third party apps had to use to interoperate with MSN Messenger, endlessly doing technical fixes to block third party access. I remember this clearly as if it was yesterday, because I tried and failed to build a Messenger-compatible client. They defended exclusive access to the API fiercely. Their attitude seems so petty now in retrospect.
  - ts330 11y ago
    Oh stop complaining like MS is the only company to do this. Twitter is just as complicit in this sort of behaviour. If you're going to base your entire business on someone else's platform, don't start complaining when the earth shifts and you suddenly find yourself without foundations. You take risks and bets in life and business. Use the tools that give you the greatest flexibility and build a robust business. In this case, these announcements increase that flexibility. While everyone here keeps complaining and debating Embrace/Extend/Extinguish, someone is embracing the changes and out-executing them. I know which I'd rather be.
supertastic 11y ago
Even more surprised that no one seems to recall that they did exactly this back in the day. There was a version of the NT4 kernel that could run Unix programs. "Great, the program selection of Unix with the stability of windows!" people sneered, but still there was a market for it.
- copperx 11y ago
  They even marketed NT's POSIX compliance as a great feature.
- chinpokomon 11y ago
  It was still a little different. It isn't just about building the tools and making them run. It is the environment that comes with it so you can follow any number of recipes you find online to get your development environment up and running. For all the support work I've done in the past, or finding ways to virtualized Linux in a Windows environment (or vice versa), this will be a welcome addition.
- cturner 11y ago
  But that was a whac-a-mole, probably for getting boxes checked for whatever it is that audit departments did before sarbanes oxley. That they've gone with linux here shows that their focus is mainstream developers. Consider - it their main focus here had been EEE then BSD would have been a far better starting point. The GPL is far more restrictive than the BSD license. The one major area where linux wins over BSD is in drivers and that's irrelevant here. Apart from drivers and package management, BSD is a better platform. They could have found (or bought) a partner in the NetBSD community to do the Canonical stuff. Now some here would respond to this as - well - what they've done just shows how big the conspiracy is and how far it extends! There's never a full comeback to that. But I think there's a more straightforward explanation. The straightforward explanation would be this. Windows is no longer relevant in the way it once was - the cloud is the new platform, and people use tablets and phones. And - a lot of developers hate Windows. OSX has emerged as the dominant developer desktop. They've realised some combination of this, and formed a company directive, "make developers love us". Even if it means giving developers non-Windows platforms to work with. Like dot net for linux. Or MSSQL for linux. Or free Visual Studio for linux. Or linux that runs on a Windows kernel. Making a solid effort to do linux for azure. And basically giving away Windows as a desktop. Whatever. The things developers need, they're trying to do that. They want to be where the developer are. They're putting their back into it. The business case is the kind of vague thing that startups take - find some users, make them love us, and then we'll work out how to make money from it. Imagine the first reaction in the Redmond office when someone read out the feedback post asking for vi and apt-get. Groans all around. But someone in that room responded to the laughter with an "I know, I know" smile and asked, "OK, but what would it take?" And then everyone perked up, and had some fun with the conversation. And they came up with this. And someone saying "shit, we /could/ do that, and it would be amazing!" The people who were in that room will remember that as a career event. I think it's cool. I want to play with it.
derek_kanjus 11y ago
What bothers me about people bringing Embrace, Extend, Extinguish is how they never mention how all the big software companies do this. For example, how many nice JavaScript features are in Google Chrome that aren't anywhere close to real standards? But when anyone but Microsoft does it they're just pushing the industry forward, not out to stab you in the back. Let's not call it Embrace, Extend, Extinguish until we see the Extend & Extinguish. Microsoft is a very different company than it used to be.
- yoklov 11y ago
  What JS features are chrome exclusive other than maybe a few ES6 features nobody else has implemented yet?
- Saltor 11y ago
  I'm hopeful that this will lead towards greater unification and innovation, but I can see why people are more likely to bring up "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish" when Microsoft does something compared to when other companies do. The difference is that Microsoft is the one who internally coined the term and used it to describe their strategies. It was a conscious and explicitly stated strategy rather than an unspoken side benefit. You could certainly say that none of that matters and what we should care about is the actual actions that each company makes, but I can definitely see how people would read more intent into things like this when Microsoft does it compared to other companies.
- creshal 11y ago
  The difference is, Chromium and V8 are open source. JScript and J/Direct were not. Apple took KHTML and when it started to fail, forked it into WebKit. Google took WebKit and when it started to fail, forked it into Blink. When IE6 started to fail, the whole industry suffered. (And is now suffering again as Apple refuses to allow any other rendering engine but their failing WebKit port on iOS.)
- sametmax 11y ago
  By different you mean they stopped using patent trolls to bully competition and make money out of Linux based software ? You mean they started to implement open formats ? Or do you mean they started to change their PR team so that now, we got a different image of them ?
Mafana0 11y ago
Could you name a single company that doesn't follow where the market is and try to monopolises it later? Plus, Windows is still the leader in the desktop and laptop market until today. They are facing some tough competition but "not leader in given market" is not true.
- ssalazar 11y ago
  Uh, any company that sells niche or upmarket offerings of commodity products, for one. I.e. Apple, Tesla, a bunch of watch manufacturers. > Plus, Windows is still the leader in the desktop and laptop market until today. They are facing some tough competition but "not leader in given market" is not true. Their position in the server world is not nearly so secure, which is quite possibly what this move is meant to address.
  - Mafana0 11y ago
    > Uh, any company that sells niche or upmarket offerings of commodity products, for one. I.e. Apple Without thinking much I can come up with a list of instances where Apple did exactly follow where they think the market is. Example include making phones with bigger screens [0], using a stylus with tablets [1], smart watches, small screen tablets [2], the the list goes on and on. [0]: http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/16/jobs-no-ones-going-to-buy-a-big-phone/ http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/16/jobs-no-ones-going-to-buy... [1]: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/08/jobs-if-you-see-a-stylus-or-a-task-manager-they-blew-it/ http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/08/jobs-if-you-see-a-stylus-... [2]: http://fortune.com/2012/04/17/what-steve-jobs-said-about-an-ipad-mini/ http://fortune.com/2012/04/17/what-steve-jobs-said-about-an-... > Their position in the server world is not nearly so secure, which is quite possibly what this move is meant to address. Microsoft never had the lead in server operating systems. So they're not doing this just because they are no longer the leader. This is a proof that Microsoft is just changing how they handle competition and FOSS under Nadella.
  - mynameisvlad 11y ago
    Jumping on what Mafana said, Tesla is known for being one of the most closed off car systems on the planet. There were several HN posts over the last month or two talking about this, but they will require a full inspection to re-activate a car once it's been sold or written off, and it's almost impossible to get parts from them outside of service centers. You chose literally two of the worst examples out there to try and prove your point.
ekianjo 11y ago
Yes, I am so surprised to see the wave of folks here on HN jumping in joy about Windows 10 becoming more awesome for them. Oh, so all that time you guys did not care about running on a proprietary platform, even though most folks here actually like and promote Open Source? And that's not just that, it's basically strengthening the bully which uses aggressive patents against other Linux-based businesses, still to this day.
megablast 11y ago
I wonder how they are going to work ads into the command line?
- superobserver 11y ago
  You mean to wonder: how are they going to telemetrify the terminal?
  - Spivak 11y ago
    You mean like audit?
    - superobserver 11y ago
      Sure. But hey, I'm trying to fit in with all the hip Microsoft-loving shil... I mean hackers here. :)
- qb45 11y ago
  I thought everybody has seen this "vi assistant" gif by now...
  - robertcorey 11y ago
    could you link to this?
more_original 11y ago
> 2. start gaining momentum (e.g. why should I use Linux, when on Windows I can run both Linux and Windows applications) Remember OS/2 2.x? It could run Windows 3.x binaries, including GUI programs. The result was that noone wrote programs for OS/2. Windows programs would run both on Windows and on OS/2, so why write another one for OS/2? Why should anyone port Linux programs to Windows now? Just write for Linux and it will work both on Windows and on Linux. So now you actually have more reason to target Linux.
- partycoder 11y ago
  That same phenomenon sort of happens with WINE. Many software just suggests you: run it under WINE, so they just focus on Windows. Not that I am against WINE. I think it allows me to just ditch Windows entirely. I run StarCraft II on WINE 1.9 at a higher framerate than what Windows provides. That was probably the only reason I would use Windows for.
  - broodbucket 11y ago
    Out of curiousity, do you use wine-staging and the CSMT patches?
    - partycoder 11y ago
      I use wine-staging yes.
  - creshal 11y ago
    TeamViewer, e.g.; their official Linux version is simply the Windows build with a bundled WinE. As a result, it has a horrible UX, making me even less likely to pay their outrageous license fees. It's a lose-lose situation in cases like this.
  - ajdlinux 11y ago
    I doubt any game developer decides not to release a Linux version purely because "oh, Wine exists".
1024core 11y ago
It's called "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish". They also tried to do this with Java, but people were alert.
- narrator 11y ago
  They tried to do it with Java but Sun wrote a really good contract and filed and won a multi-million dollar lawsuit against them for trying to fragment the platform.[1] [1] http://www.cnet.com/news/sun-microsoft-settle-java-suit/ http://www.cnet.com/news/sun-microsoft-settle-java-suit/
  - chinpokomon 11y ago
    There are two entirely different narratives there when you view Java. Microsoft's implementation was a better, faster, and fully compliant JVM with what Sun was making. An application written for Sun's implementation ran on Microsoft's. This was before Swing, and Microsoft added extensions that allowed you to write Windows Forms applications using this new and upcoming language. Windows Forms applications would not run on Sun's implementation. Sun argued that Microsoft was intentionally breaking compatibility, but the other side was that Microsoft was actually exposing more developers to the fledgling language and providing a GUI that felt native to the rest of the OS. When Swing finally came out, it felt like you were running under CDE. That made me avoid running or writing Java applications for years. In a lot of ways, Android repeated the exact same thing. Dalvik applications won't run in the Oracle JVM.
    - peterashford 11y ago
      J++ was an example of the "extend" approach. They made a Java that was not compatible with the standard.
    - khattam 11y ago
      >In a lot of ways, Android repeated the exact same thing. Dalvik applications won't run in the Oracle JVM. No, because Android is not a JVM, was never presented as an alternative to Oracle JVM... and never intended to replace existing Java VMs anywhere.
partycoder 11y ago
What you describe is the "embrace, extend and extinguish" strategy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish This is well known and I think it would be really hard to pull off the same trick again.
dcw303 11y ago
Sure, they've done it before. But if it's Embrace/Extend/Extinguish, why did they wait for so long to do this? What is it about Linux in 2016 that makes it a different threat to them than it was 5, 10, 15, 20 or 24 years ago? Isn't it far more likely that this is simply another execution in their recent opening up of their platforms to developers?
- akerro 11y ago
  What long? MS didn't stop it even for a moment. You just don't hear about patent wars because MS is not promoting them on their blogs.
akerro 11y ago
I mentioned it and got completely downvoted, thanks for telling this again and getting to the top!
partycoder 11y ago
Some brief history refresher: Apple + Microsoft "collaborating" on Macintosh software = Windows IBM + Microsoft "collaborating" on OS/2 = the NT kernel, Windows NT Sybase + Microsoft "collaborating" on Sybase SQL server = MS SQL Server Sun + Microsoft "embracing" Java = .NET Framework
- creshal 11y ago
  Canonical + Microsoft "including" Ubuntu = Microsoft Xenix 2016?
  - cturner 11y ago
    I think it would be difficult to do a full unix experience on the Windows kernel because the forking will never be as fast. I'm not going to cite facts, so be dubious of this, but let me try to explain. There's lots of layers within the Windows kernel. They give a lot of functionality, and from many perspectives are superior to unix. For example, it would be far easier to write a massive and robust and sensible init system on top of Executive Services than it is on top of unix. But, I can't see how they get the extra functionality except by introducing larger overhead for things like forking. And certainly in my previous experience of NT, forking has been incredibly slow. Everything-is-a-file is much talked about with regard to unix. But fast forking is far more significant. Apache happened because of fast forking. Shell pipes assume fast forking. The way that you write shell scripts assumes fast forking. One of the reasons that cygwin has never felt right to me is because the forking is sluggish. I don't think that's cygwin's fault, I think it comes from the design of the Cutter kernel. The hybrid they're offering here is probably the sweet spot - getting the strenghts of Windows, but getting access to a full unix layer.
Quiark 11y ago
Assuming that Microsoft _ever_ becomes relevant again.
nthcolumn 11y ago
Yeah, embrace, extend, extinguish. I don't think it is about that though as they can easily be ignored now. I imagine that they are genuinely losing enterprise traction. If I were on windows I'd run some docker or a VM. I would NEVER compile g++ via openssh from Visual >BARF< Studio. Really in your enterprise you should have a macbook/chromebook on your desk (at home or in the office) and a linux server in the cloud. Unix everywhere now. Bye bye windoze.
chrisdotcode 11y ago
> A team of sharp developers at Microsoft has been hard at work adapting some Microsoft research technology to basically perform real time translation of Linux syscalls into Windows OS syscalls. We've actually even seen this before: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_POSIX_subsystem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_POSIX_subsystem (EDIT: To nitpick, I think the MS POSIX subsystem actually implemented the POSIXy standards as native code, as opposed to the translation layer that's mentioned here).
- facorreia 11y ago
  Also similar to the discontinued Windows Services for UNIX (SFU) and Subsystem for UNIX-based Applications (SUA). And reminescent of Cooperative Linux, although that worked at the driver level and allowed the actual Linux kernel to be used.
randiantech 11y ago
If any software company would decide to use the same strategy adopted 25 years ago, then all of them would horribly fail. Context is different, mission and vision as well. I honestly dont see how is this similar to any of the examples you mention. This is MS targeting developers like me that decided to buy an MBP over a Windows laptop (In my case: A MBP over an XPS). IF I would have bash, I'd buy XPS.
doktrin 11y ago
> typical Microsoft strategy > utilized a lot 25 years ago. I don't know about you guys, but I'm not gonna hold onto that grudge forever without good reason. The world's changed a lot since gif's of Calvin pissing on bill gates were all the rage.
- khattam 11y ago
  It's not that they tried to use it once... they have tried to use it multiple times over the years.
  - doktrin 11y ago
    Most recently, when?
SudoNhim 11y ago
Winners and losers from my perspective: - Linux CLI beats Windows CLI - hopefully I can go the rest of my life without learning to use Powershell or cmd.exe. If anything this cements rather than undermines my preference to use Linux on embedded devices and webservers. - Windows desktop environment beats Linux environments. I'm now less likely to use Unity/GNOME/KDE in my desktop OS, because, while they are ok, they were never one of the reasons I used Linux for my desktop. I'm not sure which OS this helps/hurts more in the long run, but I know I'm happy. Disclaimer: I work for Microsoft (double disclaimer: but I'm almost fresh out of university)
tw04 11y ago
What's the benefit of breaking up compatibility? What's the end-game there? The whole point of this, beyond allowing developers to develop without having to run a VM, is to allow *nix apps to run on Windows. If they break that compatibility... people will just ditch Windows. They don't care about the OS, they care about the apps that run on top.
jug 11y ago
I'm not too worried. This is not a full Linux software stack, so it seems more useful to make Windows a more attractive development platform, but what you develop on this would still be for Linux and not instead of Linux. It might in theory tempt developers to migrate from Linux to Windows more comfortably, with both userlands now available at once, but this doesn't really attempt to make that process easier, other than that. Besides, I don't feel like Windows is a that attractive platform to develop for nowadays with the cesspool that is Windows Store, the pointless new Universal Windows Platform when your apps need to follow a weakest link due to an almost non-existing Windows Phone market, combined with their lack of leading position on the web. I think all this is what's bothering Microsoft, because with no development steam, the whole platform suffers a lot. I think the transition at Microsoft lately is happening because they are transitioning from a comfortable leader to a competitor, not because they are trying to squash the competition. They probably long for the days when they were in a position to still have that luxury.

by takeda 11y ago

sabelo 11y ago

Embrace, extend and extinguish. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish

wmccullough 11y ago
Please GTFO. It's going to be awfully hard to extinguish all of their major technology When's it's developed in the wild and MIT licensed.
EdSharkey 11y ago
I'm not ruling EEE out, but this move feels more like "staunch the bleeding" to capture more developers and retain the ones they have. I'd love to read a leaked Powerpoint or memo that explains the long-term strategy here. I think this is a great move by Microsoft to be able to EXEC a competitor's binary files natively. But, I think it risks being an admission that Win32/64 syscalls and Windows file system semantics are a crufty boat anchor holding developers back. To admit that risks inviting more developers to bail on Windows.
- CamperBob2 11y ago
  I'd love to read a leaked Powerpoint or memo that explains the long-term strategy here. If MS's marketing department has half a brain at all, they will accidentally leak such a memo fairly soon.

partiallypro 11y ago

Microsoft is not the same company it was 25 years ago, much less 3 years ago. Microsoft cares about Azure now, and Azure requires GNU/Linux. It just makes sense for Microsoft to do this, and I for one am pretty excited about it.

takeda 11y ago
Well... back in the day Microsoft also was the company everyone was rooting for that was standing to the evil IBM. Those who ignore history are bound to repeat it.
- SideburnsOfDoom 11y ago
  yes, the roles of the actors cycles around, but the script is the same.
SXX 11y ago
Once Microsoft stop charge users of Linux-based products for their patents or at least stop doing that shady way under NDA I'll believe it's not the same company. So far they get better in communication with open source community, but their business practices are all the same and Windows 10 only prove it.
- ed_blackburn 11y ago
  I'm curious how many people actually factor this into any due diligence for selecting technology for a project? How much weight do you give it? If I were to advise against using Azure, Windows, .NET because of patents charges for some Linux products I'm not sure my colleagues or clients would take me seriously. Yes, there are lots of reasons why you may not select MS tech, but patents seems a personal, political reason , which would be difficult to justify if you're trying to project it onto other people / organisations.
  - fulafel 11y ago
    An approximately shared set of values and/or (business-relevant) political aims is a great advantage in working together.

jupiter2 11y ago

Thank you for mentioning this! Really bothered by all the positive comments, especially coming from savvy HN users. Gave this a long look and my main beef is that I couldn't possibly do anything on a Windows Machine in its' current state. Linux isn't just about running apps - there's a philosophy behind the system. Users first! As long as Microsoft continues to disrespect the rights of users in regard to privacy, data-collection, data-sharing with unnamed sources, tracking, uncontrollable OS operations (updates, etc) - I will never go near it. I find it especially offensive that ex-open source and ex-Linux users (working for Microsoft) have the audacity to come on here and try to sell this as a 'Linux on Windows' system when most of what makes Linux special (respect for the user) has been stripped away. It's like giving a man who is dying of thirst sea water. Most comments here appear to be positive and that's fine... whatever. To anyone reading this... please don't sell your souls and the future of software technology for ease of use and abusive business practices. /rant

thegenius2000 11y ago
This is so true I'm loathe to add to it. I dual boot my laptop b/w Windows and Linux because the WiFi network at my school has issues with Linux...so I'm forced to use Windows, also for games, but it's such a pain. Today it updated forcefully while I was trying to study; I tried to postpone the update but the option was grayed out. The Windows philosophy through and through is to treat users as ignorant and incompetent idiots for whom even the most basic of tasks must be performed, and who cannot make important decisions. This, IMHO, is the epitome of disrespect, and the reason I look forward with great anticipation to the day when I am able to solely operate within computing environments that afford me the same dignity as the cars I drive.
- adrianN 11y ago
  I hope you only drive old cars, because newer cars aren't really designed to let the user change anything. You always need to take them to a specialist shop.
  - creshal 11y ago

osweiller 11y ago

HN had a huge influx of developers who predominately (or only) work on the Microsoft platform, and it has been readily apparent in the stories that rise to the top, and the dominant reactions (e.g. cynical takes are quickly transparent. Exaggerated "this changes everything!" comments rise to the top). This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it does heavily slant the coverage and slant of the conversation. And as you said, there is nothing new in this. The whole "hell freezes over" thing gets a bit old because Microsoft has done this same routine countless times before. When they are the underdog, seeing a fleeing userbase, etc, they pragmatically veer towards open and integrated. When they aren't, they close off and exploit. (see Microsoft's arrogance and hubris as they exalted in their success with the Xbox 360 -- early initiatives like XNA, their unloved community gaming thing...abandoned and left to die -- and now that they're losing with the Xbox One, once again that wonderfully open and accommodating company returns again. People pretend it's new. Another example I would give is MSN Messenger -- Microsoft did a loud, public campaign, including taking out ads in newspapers, pushing an open messaging platform, interoperations, etc. Microsoft had just started to get into the messenger game, so of course they didn't want to be kept out via the network effect. Then, of course, MSN gained users (being pushed on users, automatically configured, tends to do that). Microsoft made a complete 180 in approach. Soon they incorporated an expensive licensing program that third party apps had to use to interoperate with MSN Messenger, endlessly doing technical fixes to block third party access. What happened to that gregarious, open and cooperative Microsoft that was taking out ads to implore AOL for blocking access? The situation changed, and suddenly it wasn't in their interest anymore.

copperx 11y ago
> Soon they incorporated an expensive licensing program that third party apps had to use to interoperate with MSN Messenger, endlessly doing technical fixes to block third party access. I remember this clearly as if it was yesterday, because I tried and failed to build a Messenger-compatible client. They defended exclusive access to the API fiercely. Their attitude seems so petty now in retrospect.
- ts330 11y ago
  Oh stop complaining like MS is the only company to do this. Twitter is just as complicit in this sort of behaviour. If you're going to base your entire business on someone else's platform, don't start complaining when the earth shifts and you suddenly find yourself without foundations. You take risks and bets in life and business. Use the tools that give you the greatest flexibility and build a robust business. In this case, these announcements increase that flexibility. While everyone here keeps complaining and debating Embrace/Extend/Extinguish, someone is embracing the changes and out-executing them. I know which I'd rather be.

supertastic 11y ago

Even more surprised that no one seems to recall that they did exactly this back in the day. There was a version of the NT4 kernel that could run Unix programs. "Great, the program selection of Unix with the stability of windows!" people sneered, but still there was a market for it.

copperx 11y ago
They even marketed NT's POSIX compliance as a great feature.
chinpokomon 11y ago
It was still a little different. It isn't just about building the tools and making them run. It is the environment that comes with it so you can follow any number of recipes you find online to get your development environment up and running. For all the support work I've done in the past, or finding ways to virtualized Linux in a Windows environment (or vice versa), this will be a welcome addition.
cturner 11y ago
But that was a whac-a-mole, probably for getting boxes checked for whatever it is that audit departments did before sarbanes oxley. That they've gone with linux here shows that their focus is mainstream developers. Consider - it their main focus here had been EEE then BSD would have been a far better starting point. The GPL is far more restrictive than the BSD license. The one major area where linux wins over BSD is in drivers and that's irrelevant here. Apart from drivers and package management, BSD is a better platform. They could have found (or bought) a partner in the NetBSD community to do the Canonical stuff. Now some here would respond to this as - well - what they've done just shows how big the conspiracy is and how far it extends! There's never a full comeback to that. But I think there's a more straightforward explanation. The straightforward explanation would be this. Windows is no longer relevant in the way it once was - the cloud is the new platform, and people use tablets and phones. And - a lot of developers hate Windows. OSX has emerged as the dominant developer desktop. They've realised some combination of this, and formed a company directive, "make developers love us". Even if it means giving developers non-Windows platforms to work with. Like dot net for linux. Or MSSQL for linux. Or free Visual Studio for linux. Or linux that runs on a Windows kernel. Making a solid effort to do linux for azure. And basically giving away Windows as a desktop. Whatever. The things developers need, they're trying to do that. They want to be where the developer are. They're putting their back into it. The business case is the kind of vague thing that startups take - find some users, make them love us, and then we'll work out how to make money from it. Imagine the first reaction in the Redmond office when someone read out the feedback post asking for vi and apt-get. Groans all around. But someone in that room responded to the laughter with an "I know, I know" smile and asked, "OK, but what would it take?" And then everyone perked up, and had some fun with the conversation. And they came up with this. And someone saying "shit, we /could/ do that, and it would be amazing!" The people who were in that room will remember that as a career event. I think it's cool. I want to play with it.

derek_kanjus 11y ago

What bothers me about people bringing Embrace, Extend, Extinguish is how they never mention how all the big software companies do this. For example, how many nice JavaScript features are in Google Chrome that aren't anywhere close to real standards? But when anyone but Microsoft does it they're just pushing the industry forward, not out to stab you in the back. Let's not call it Embrace, Extend, Extinguish until we see the Extend & Extinguish. Microsoft is a very different company than it used to be.

yoklov 11y ago
What JS features are chrome exclusive other than maybe a few ES6 features nobody else has implemented yet?
Saltor 11y ago
I'm hopeful that this will lead towards greater unification and innovation, but I can see why people are more likely to bring up "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish" when Microsoft does something compared to when other companies do. The difference is that Microsoft is the one who internally coined the term and used it to describe their strategies. It was a conscious and explicitly stated strategy rather than an unspoken side benefit. You could certainly say that none of that matters and what we should care about is the actual actions that each company makes, but I can definitely see how people would read more intent into things like this when Microsoft does it compared to other companies.
creshal 11y ago
The difference is, Chromium and V8 are open source. JScript and J/Direct were not. Apple took KHTML and when it started to fail, forked it into WebKit. Google took WebKit and when it started to fail, forked it into Blink. When IE6 started to fail, the whole industry suffered. (And is now suffering again as Apple refuses to allow any other rendering engine but their failing WebKit port on iOS.)
sametmax 11y ago
By different you mean they stopped using patent trolls to bully competition and make money out of Linux based software ? You mean they started to implement open formats ? Or do you mean they started to change their PR team so that now, we got a different image of them ?

Mafana0 11y ago

Could you name a single company that doesn't follow where the market is and try to monopolises it later? Plus, Windows is still the leader in the desktop and laptop market until today. They are facing some tough competition but "not leader in given market" is not true.

ssalazar 11y ago
Uh, any company that sells niche or upmarket offerings of commodity products, for one. I.e. Apple, Tesla, a bunch of watch manufacturers. > Plus, Windows is still the leader in the desktop and laptop market until today. They are facing some tough competition but "not leader in given market" is not true. Their position in the server world is not nearly so secure, which is quite possibly what this move is meant to address.
- Mafana0 11y ago
  > Uh, any company that sells niche or upmarket offerings of commodity products, for one. I.e. Apple Without thinking much I can come up with a list of instances where Apple did exactly follow where they think the market is. Example include making phones with bigger screens [0], using a stylus with tablets [1], smart watches, small screen tablets [2], the the list goes on and on. [0]: http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/16/jobs-no-ones-going-to-buy-a-big-phone/ http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/16/jobs-no-ones-going-to-buy... [1]: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/08/jobs-if-you-see-a-stylus-or-a-task-manager-they-blew-it/ http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/08/jobs-if-you-see-a-stylus-... [2]: http://fortune.com/2012/04/17/what-steve-jobs-said-about-an-ipad-mini/ http://fortune.com/2012/04/17/what-steve-jobs-said-about-an-... > Their position in the server world is not nearly so secure, which is quite possibly what this move is meant to address. Microsoft never had the lead in server operating systems. So they're not doing this just because they are no longer the leader. This is a proof that Microsoft is just changing how they handle competition and FOSS under Nadella.
- mynameisvlad 11y ago
  Jumping on what Mafana said, Tesla is known for being one of the most closed off car systems on the planet. There were several HN posts over the last month or two talking about this, but they will require a full inspection to re-activate a car once it's been sold or written off, and it's almost impossible to get parts from them outside of service centers. You chose literally two of the worst examples out there to try and prove your point.

ekianjo 11y ago

Yes, I am so surprised to see the wave of folks here on HN jumping in joy about Windows 10 becoming more awesome for them. Oh, so all that time you guys did not care about running on a proprietary platform, even though most folks here actually like and promote Open Source? And that's not just that, it's basically strengthening the bully which uses aggressive patents against other Linux-based businesses, still to this day.

megablast 11y ago

I wonder how they are going to work ads into the command line?

superobserver 11y ago
You mean to wonder: how are they going to telemetrify the terminal?
- Spivak 11y ago
  You mean like audit?
  - superobserver 11y ago
    Sure. But hey, I'm trying to fit in with all the hip Microsoft-loving shil... I mean hackers here. :)
qb45 11y ago
I thought everybody has seen this "vi assistant" gif by now...
- robertcorey 11y ago
  could you link to this?

more_original 11y ago

> 2. start gaining momentum (e.g. why should I use Linux, when on Windows I can run both Linux and Windows applications) Remember OS/2 2.x? It could run Windows 3.x binaries, including GUI programs. The result was that noone wrote programs for OS/2. Windows programs would run both on Windows and on OS/2, so why write another one for OS/2? Why should anyone port Linux programs to Windows now? Just write for Linux and it will work both on Windows and on Linux. So now you actually have more reason to target Linux.

partycoder 11y ago
That same phenomenon sort of happens with WINE. Many software just suggests you: run it under WINE, so they just focus on Windows. Not that I am against WINE. I think it allows me to just ditch Windows entirely. I run StarCraft II on WINE 1.9 at a higher framerate than what Windows provides. That was probably the only reason I would use Windows for.
- broodbucket 11y ago
  Out of curiousity, do you use wine-staging and the CSMT patches?
  - partycoder 11y ago
    I use wine-staging yes.
- creshal 11y ago
  TeamViewer, e.g.; their official Linux version is simply the Windows build with a bundled WinE. As a result, it has a horrible UX, making me even less likely to pay their outrageous license fees. It's a lose-lose situation in cases like this.
- ajdlinux 11y ago
  I doubt any game developer decides not to release a Linux version purely because "oh, Wine exists".

1024core 11y ago

It's called "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish". They also tried to do this with Java, but people were alert.

narrator 11y ago
They tried to do it with Java but Sun wrote a really good contract and filed and won a multi-million dollar lawsuit against them for trying to fragment the platform.[1] [1] http://www.cnet.com/news/sun-microsoft-settle-java-suit/ http://www.cnet.com/news/sun-microsoft-settle-java-suit/
- chinpokomon 11y ago
  There are two entirely different narratives there when you view Java. Microsoft's implementation was a better, faster, and fully compliant JVM with what Sun was making. An application written for Sun's implementation ran on Microsoft's. This was before Swing, and Microsoft added extensions that allowed you to write Windows Forms applications using this new and upcoming language. Windows Forms applications would not run on Sun's implementation. Sun argued that Microsoft was intentionally breaking compatibility, but the other side was that Microsoft was actually exposing more developers to the fledgling language and providing a GUI that felt native to the rest of the OS. When Swing finally came out, it felt like you were running under CDE. That made me avoid running or writing Java applications for years. In a lot of ways, Android repeated the exact same thing. Dalvik applications won't run in the Oracle JVM.
  - peterashford 11y ago
    J++ was an example of the "extend" approach. They made a Java that was not compatible with the standard.
  - khattam 11y ago
    >In a lot of ways, Android repeated the exact same thing. Dalvik applications won't run in the Oracle JVM. No, because Android is not a JVM, was never presented as an alternative to Oracle JVM... and never intended to replace existing Java VMs anywhere.

partycoder 11y ago

What you describe is the "embrace, extend and extinguish" strategy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish This is well known and I think it would be really hard to pull off the same trick again.

dcw303 11y ago

Sure, they've done it before. But if it's Embrace/Extend/Extinguish, why did they wait for so long to do this? What is it about Linux in 2016 that makes it a different threat to them than it was 5, 10, 15, 20 or 24 years ago? Isn't it far more likely that this is simply another execution in their recent opening up of their platforms to developers?

akerro 11y ago
What long? MS didn't stop it even for a moment. You just don't hear about patent wars because MS is not promoting them on their blogs.

akerro 11y ago

I mentioned it and got completely downvoted, thanks for telling this again and getting to the top!

partycoder 11y ago

Some brief history refresher: Apple + Microsoft "collaborating" on Macintosh software = Windows IBM + Microsoft "collaborating" on OS/2 = the NT kernel, Windows NT Sybase + Microsoft "collaborating" on Sybase SQL server = MS SQL Server Sun + Microsoft "embracing" Java = .NET Framework

creshal 11y ago
Canonical + Microsoft "including" Ubuntu = Microsoft Xenix 2016?
- cturner 11y ago
  I think it would be difficult to do a full unix experience on the Windows kernel because the forking will never be as fast. I'm not going to cite facts, so be dubious of this, but let me try to explain. There's lots of layers within the Windows kernel. They give a lot of functionality, and from many perspectives are superior to unix. For example, it would be far easier to write a massive and robust and sensible init system on top of Executive Services than it is on top of unix. But, I can't see how they get the extra functionality except by introducing larger overhead for things like forking. And certainly in my previous experience of NT, forking has been incredibly slow. Everything-is-a-file is much talked about with regard to unix. But fast forking is far more significant. Apache happened because of fast forking. Shell pipes assume fast forking. The way that you write shell scripts assumes fast forking. One of the reasons that cygwin has never felt right to me is because the forking is sluggish. I don't think that's cygwin's fault, I think it comes from the design of the Cutter kernel. The hybrid they're offering here is probably the sweet spot - getting the strenghts of Windows, but getting access to a full unix layer.

Quiark 11y ago

Assuming that Microsoft _ever_ becomes relevant again.

nthcolumn 11y ago

Yeah, embrace, extend, extinguish. I don't think it is about that though as they can easily be ignored now. I imagine that they are genuinely losing enterprise traction. If I were on windows I'd run some docker or a VM. I would NEVER compile g++ via openssh from Visual >BARF< Studio. Really in your enterprise you should have a macbook/chromebook on your desk (at home or in the office) and a linux server in the cloud. Unix everywhere now. Bye bye windoze.

chrisdotcode 11y ago

> A team of sharp developers at Microsoft has been hard at work adapting some Microsoft research technology to basically perform real time translation of Linux syscalls into Windows OS syscalls. We've actually even seen this before: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_POSIX_subsystem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_POSIX_subsystem (EDIT: To nitpick, I think the MS POSIX subsystem actually implemented the POSIXy standards as native code, as opposed to the translation layer that's mentioned here).

facorreia 11y ago
Also similar to the discontinued Windows Services for UNIX (SFU) and Subsystem for UNIX-based Applications (SUA). And reminescent of Cooperative Linux, although that worked at the driver level and allowed the actual Linux kernel to be used.

randiantech 11y ago

If any software company would decide to use the same strategy adopted 25 years ago, then all of them would horribly fail. Context is different, mission and vision as well. I honestly dont see how is this similar to any of the examples you mention. This is MS targeting developers like me that decided to buy an MBP over a Windows laptop (In my case: A MBP over an XPS). IF I would have bash, I'd buy XPS.

doktrin 11y ago

> typical Microsoft strategy > utilized a lot 25 years ago. I don't know about you guys, but I'm not gonna hold onto that grudge forever without good reason. The world's changed a lot since gif's of Calvin pissing on bill gates were all the rage.

khattam 11y ago
It's not that they tried to use it once... they have tried to use it multiple times over the years.
- doktrin 11y ago
  Most recently, when?

SudoNhim 11y ago

Winners and losers from my perspective: - Linux CLI beats Windows CLI - hopefully I can go the rest of my life without learning to use Powershell or cmd.exe. If anything this cements rather than undermines my preference to use Linux on embedded devices and webservers. - Windows desktop environment beats Linux environments. I'm now less likely to use Unity/GNOME/KDE in my desktop OS, because, while they are ok, they were never one of the reasons I used Linux for my desktop. I'm not sure which OS this helps/hurts more in the long run, but I know I'm happy. Disclaimer: I work for Microsoft (double disclaimer: but I'm almost fresh out of university)

tw04 11y ago

What's the benefit of breaking up compatibility? What's the end-game there? The whole point of this, beyond allowing developers to develop without having to run a VM, is to allow *nix apps to run on Windows. If they break that compatibility... people will just ditch Windows. They don't care about the OS, they care about the apps that run on top.

jug 11y ago

I'm not too worried. This is not a full Linux software stack, so it seems more useful to make Windows a more attractive development platform, but what you develop on this would still be for Linux and not instead of Linux. It might in theory tempt developers to migrate from Linux to Windows more comfortably, with both userlands now available at once, but this doesn't really attempt to make that process easier, other than that. Besides, I don't feel like Windows is a that attractive platform to develop for nowadays with the cesspool that is Windows Store, the pointless new Universal Windows Platform when your apps need to follow a weakest link due to an almost non-existing Windows Phone market, combined with their lack of leading position on the web. I think all this is what's bothering Microsoft, because with no development steam, the whole platform suffers a lot. I think the transition at Microsoft lately is happening because they are transitioning from a comfortable leader to a competitor, not because they are trying to squash the competition. They probably long for the days when they were in a position to still have that luxury.