5 ms·

I swear Microsoft are slowly putting all of the pieces in place for Windows LX, which will be a Linux distribution.

by trollied 6y ago

tw04 6y ago
If they truly wanted to go that route I think they’d just acquire canonical.
- jedieaston 6y ago
  Why do you have to jinx it?
  - shaan7 6y ago
    Now we has. We're all doomed.
- mikece 6y ago
  Why acquire Canonical when they can just create a Redmond Linux distro and cherry-pick the best aspects of RHEL, Debian, or Gentoo -- or just plain fork something out there now and add the option of Microsoft corporate support for any manager wanting to buy a throat to choke in case there's a production hiccup? Or better yet: a Windows-like or Windows-compatible desktop that can run on any number of systems (and maybe corporate support is available for Debian, CentOS)? Let's not forget that the co-founder of Gnome has been working for Microsoft since 2016.
- mikece 6y ago
  I can see only one scenario where it makes sense for Microsoft to buy Canonical: to prevent Amazon or Google from acquiring them and doing something anti-competitive (or as much as can be done legally in that respect) and making life difficult for customers using Ubuntu on Azure. The comparison of relevance is Github. Microsoft was using Github so much already that the prospect of someone else buying them was an issue (not to mention the joke that buying Github was cheaper than paying for Microsoft's growing use of the platform). In practice, has Microsoft done anything to Github that has limited them in any way? The biggest change is that Github has a super-rich benefactor and they can offer free accounts to everyone now... and their budget for hiring/retaining top talent has been boosted as well. Microsoft has more than enough money to do the same with Canonical and if they do I think it will largely be a matter of making sure Canonical doesn't need to worry about finances anymore and can hire whomever they need to build and deliver features. And yes, it's possible that Azure Linux applications might be available on Ubuntu first but extending and extinguishing Ubuntu would be massively opposed to making money on Azure -- I don't see Microsoft doing that.
Talinx 6y ago
Windows LX? What about just the last letter: Windows X Of course Windows 10 is the last major version of Windows, so you got to have that in the name: Windows 10X
Krasnol 6y ago
You may be right there https://devblogs.microsoft.com/directx/directx-heart-linux/ https://devblogs.microsoft.com/directx/directx-heart-linux/
- loeg 6y ago
  That's just a passthrough for WSL VMs on Windows hosts.
mmm_grayons 6y ago
I'd be pretty happy were I able to run office on linux (apart from 2010 version in wine).
- loeg 6y ago
  Office365 works as well as it does anywhere.
  - mmm_grayons 6y ago
    No it doesn't, at least, not as far as I've seen. Do you mean the web version? If so, I'd hardly call that, "as well as it does anywhere."
mikece 6y ago
You misspelled "WinX" and it was "leaked" fifteen years ago in Wired magazine. https://www.wired.com/2005/02/microsoft-5/ https://www.wired.com/2005/02/microsoft-5/

I swear Microsoft are slowly putting all of the pieces in place for Windows LX, which will be a Linux distribution.

tw04 6y ago

If they truly wanted to go that route I think they’d just acquire canonical.

jedieaston 6y ago
Why do you have to jinx it?
- shaan7 6y ago
  Now we has. We're all doomed.
mikece 6y ago
Why acquire Canonical when they can just create a Redmond Linux distro and cherry-pick the best aspects of RHEL, Debian, or Gentoo -- or just plain fork something out there now and add the option of Microsoft corporate support for any manager wanting to buy a throat to choke in case there's a production hiccup? Or better yet: a Windows-like or Windows-compatible desktop that can run on any number of systems (and maybe corporate support is available for Debian, CentOS)? Let's not forget that the co-founder of Gnome has been working for Microsoft since 2016.
mikece 6y ago
I can see only one scenario where it makes sense for Microsoft to buy Canonical: to prevent Amazon or Google from acquiring them and doing something anti-competitive (or as much as can be done legally in that respect) and making life difficult for customers using Ubuntu on Azure. The comparison of relevance is Github. Microsoft was using Github so much already that the prospect of someone else buying them was an issue (not to mention the joke that buying Github was cheaper than paying for Microsoft's growing use of the platform). In practice, has Microsoft done anything to Github that has limited them in any way? The biggest change is that Github has a super-rich benefactor and they can offer free accounts to everyone now... and their budget for hiring/retaining top talent has been boosted as well. Microsoft has more than enough money to do the same with Canonical and if they do I think it will largely be a matter of making sure Canonical doesn't need to worry about finances anymore and can hire whomever they need to build and deliver features. And yes, it's possible that Azure Linux applications might be available on Ubuntu first but extending and extinguishing Ubuntu would be massively opposed to making money on Azure -- I don't see Microsoft doing that.

Talinx 6y ago

Windows LX? What about just the last letter: Windows X Of course Windows 10 is the last major version of Windows, so you got to have that in the name: Windows 10X

Krasnol 6y ago

You may be right there https://devblogs.microsoft.com/directx/directx-heart-linux/ https://devblogs.microsoft.com/directx/directx-heart-linux/

loeg 6y ago
That's just a passthrough for WSL VMs on Windows hosts.

mmm_grayons 6y ago

I'd be pretty happy were I able to run office on linux (apart from 2010 version in wine).

loeg 6y ago
Office365 works as well as it does anywhere.
- mmm_grayons 6y ago
  No it doesn't, at least, not as far as I've seen. Do you mean the web version? If so, I'd hardly call that, "as well as it does anywhere."

mikece 6y ago

You misspelled "WinX" and it was "leaked" fifteen years ago in Wired magazine. https://www.wired.com/2005/02/microsoft-5/ https://www.wired.com/2005/02/microsoft-5/