5 ms·
This is very good, with this I learned that it's never too late to a company change. A very slow and large company like MS took decades to make this change, but
by edpichler 10y ago
This is very good, with this I learned that it's never too late to a company change. A very slow and large company like MS took decades to make this change, but they did well.
And, they do that not because they are "good guys", but because this is the strategy to make them grow on their business. They are thinking on themselves.
- testgiveme123 10y ago> A very slow and large company like MS took decades to make this change, but they did well. From the outside imo it feels like it took ages for them to start this change, but actually doing it once they first started open-sourcing things seems to have been an incredibly quick switch, over just a couple of years. Has there been loads of progress on this in the background that's just only become visible now?
- pm90 10y agoI suspect that most of their code was probably version controlled in Git anyway, so it wouldn't take that much effort to simply upload it to Github. What really delays stuff is probably the approval process, which for some companies can be really slow.
- edpichler 10y agoThey started this move almost a decade ago, gradually, and just recently the accumulated effort got so relevant, that is evident even for an outsider like me, that they changed their strategy, that is why it seems now it's "visible". "How I can notice this change of strategy?" may you ask, It's because they always said things like this, per example, that Linux was not good because something open source could never be better than a closed and proprietary system with a company protecting their code.
- amelius 10y agoUm, Microsoft has also been a steady producer of academic research papers. Just as an example: http://jeffhuang.com/best_paper_awards.html http://jeffhuang.com/best_paper_awards.html (Scroll to the bottom, and see that MS is #1, ahead of e.g. MIT, which is #3 on the list, and far ahead of Google which is #17 on the list)
- lake99 10y agoNot to mention, they employ many stalwarts of CS, like Simon Peyton Jones and Leslie Lamport.
- rajeemcariazo 10y agoDavid DeWitt, Michael Freedman, Jim Gray, Anders Hejlsberg, Butler Lampson are all Microsoft Technical Fellows
- secfirstmd 10y agoPity they changed and became even worse in relation to privacy with Windows 10...
- FT_intern 10y agoIt's because they're bleeding engineers like crazy. Anyone with offers from Google, FB and MSFT would choose Google or FB 99/100 times
- nojvek 10y agoThat's because Microsoft doesn't pay well and the benefits aren't as nice as goog or FB.
- arcticfox 10y ago"doesn't pay well" - source? Remember to factor in insane California cost of living and taxes
- 794CD01 10y agoSeattle's cost of living is not exactly low either.
- arcticfox 10y agoTaxes are the much bigger factor, but Seattle is certainly significantly cheaper. Of course, other areas are much cheaper than Seattle as well.
- FT_intern 10y agoMSFT has worse compensation progression and FB/Google Seattle locations pay more than MSFT. MSFT also doesn't have free lunch (as privileged as this sounds)
- edpichler 10y agoI also believe that this is one of the reasons. Open source is "cool" and motivating to work for.