4 ms·

Spot on. This is no knit-your-own-yoghurt altruistic move. It's all part of a well-coordinated effort to re-establish Microsoft as _the_ place that everyone do

Spot on. This is no knit-your-own-yoghurt altruistic move. It's all part of a well-coordinated effort to re-establish Microsoft as _the_ place that everyone does compute. "Commoditize your complement" as Joel Spolsky put it [0]; "windows on every desktop" for the cloud era. Ballmer went head to head with open source and thought he could crush the threat. That didn't work, and things weren't looking great for MS before he was ousted. Nadella's strategy is far more subtle: not quite Embrace/Extend/Eliminate, more Embrace/Neutralise/Replace. Linux is a threat to server-side windows? Fine. Let them deploy on linux, so long as those linux boxes are in Azure. But that means devs get familiar with linux at the expense of windows, which means (a) they'll want linux on their desktop and (b) things are more readily transferable to AWS/GCP/whatever. So: give them linux _in_ windows. Make appealing tools like vscode available free to create good will and positive sentiment towards Microsoft. Re-build the advocacy that hemorrhaged in the latter days of Ballmer's tenure. And they're nailing it. By comparison to Google/Facebook/Amazon, there's very little negative press for Microsoft. And lots of positivity, even just in this thread. It's hard not to be impressed by how successful they're being. And I say that as someone who still bears the scars from the 90s/00s hegemony. Microsoft was positively reviled by swathes of people in those days. Their attitude and market abuses rightly got them into hot water with the DOJ. So, whilst I respect the turnaround, I'm wary. Microsoft is cruising inexorably back to dominance. History says that wouldn't be a good outcome. [0]: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/06/12/strategy-letter-v/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/06/12/strategy-letter-v/

d1zzy 6y ago
This is a very smart strategic move on behalf of Microsoft that I would have never guessed (not because it doesn't make sense but simply out of corporate pride, considering they are the authors of the "Linux Facts" memorandum...). I think it's smart because this will capture all those Linux people who aren't super comfortable administrating their own distro and even for those that are it's now giving them another option if they ever need to run things both in Windows and Linux at the same time or just run into some Linux issues and don't want to spend the time on them they can switch to Windows 10 WSL. At this point the only thing that I still think it doesn't make much sense is Microsoft running/developing their own kernel. It's entirely possible for them to start running Linux and run all the WIN32 support, drivers, DirectX, etc as a separate sandbox (similar to the type of sandbox WSL runs). The performance overhead from doing that should be negligible on modern hardware. EDIT: note that I only mean switching to Linux kernel for their desktop OS, there are plenty of usecases of Microsoft kernels where every bit of performance matters but I suspect those will continue to use their own kernel as part of Windows Server releases.
- xnyan 6y ago
  >corporate pride Corporate pride took a huge hit after they completely wiffed on mobile, then went on to throw good money after bad for a long long time before they were willing to admit that they had lost. Think about where MS could be if they taken google/android seriously at the beginning. For a while, the prevailing opinion was that Microsoft was nearly (or already) no longer a a supermax tech company. Lots of business orthodoxy got nixed, most prominently the supremacy of Windows over all.
- mycall 6y ago
  There is one place where it makes sense for Microsoft to have their own Linux Kernel: Azure Sphere [0] [0] https://3rdpartycodeprod.blob.core.windows.net/download/Azure%20Sphere%2F21.03%2FLinux%20Kernel.zip?sv=2019-02-02&st=2021-04-22T01%3A02%3A48Z&se=2021-04-22T02%3A42%3A48Z&sr=b&sp=r&sig=jUddK6bnf%2BBrqihN34wVS6iRhqaahVCiWrVnKWxcHcc%3D https://3rdpartycodeprod.blob.core.windows.net/download/Azur...
ljm 6y ago
I see it a bit more simply: A lot of developers use MacOS, particularly web developers who are almost always deploying the server to a linux machine. With the Mac being BSD-flavoured, a lot of open source tooling works the same as it does on Linux. MacPorts and Homebrew have done a lot to drive that. The experience on Windows for this has been incredibly poor. There are solutions, but they're less integrated. WSL comes in, along with Windows Terminal, and now you can have a much nicer time with it all without dual booting or running a VM. Who knows where it'll be in a decade, but if anything, they're just making themselves a viable competitor to Apple by providing better development tools than they do.
- wayneftw 6y ago
  I used Windows for twenty years as a developer and macOS for ten. Once I got away from .Net and iOS development and into Node/React both of them just got in my way while providing nothing of value. (Actually macOS has always annoyed me in many ways, so mostly I only used it for iOS stuff.) Once I moved to Manjaro/XFCE a few years ago, all the problems disappeared. Docker just works. All the web dev tools are built for my platform and just work. There are no compatibility layers or emulation layers to worry about. I'm in charge of updates. I don't get nagged to do things at inopportune times. I'll never go back to either one of them full time. Windows for games, Macs for iOS/Xcode. That's it for me. Even for .Net and iOS now - I can do that too on Linux with .Net core and React Native.
- apatheticonion 6y ago
  Originally a Window dev, moved to Linux, eventually MacOS due to a lack of nice a DE on Linux and the nice UNIX base of MacOS. Before WSL1 I would run Linux inside a VM from Windows and use remote development tools (like VSCode via SSH, SSH tunnels for port sharing, etc). It was all pretty straight forward, stable and I had no issues. I used WSL1 when it launched and it was _incredible_. Bash actually on Windows. My workflow changed because of the level of integration I had with Windows. I could run browser automation tools against my Windows browsers, from Linux. I could run Windows programs from bash. WSL2 came on the scene and introduced a hypervisor layer and I essentially came full circle. Sure it has some smarts around memory VM allocation - but it doesn't always work right and you're never really certain it's not running, consuming memory. Network port mappings were automatically tunneled, but only in one direction and they would occasionally fail causing random issues that require a reboot to solve. Now GUI windows are shared with Windows via RDP, cool.. Ultimately, WSL2 is the attempt to take Linux VM and make it appear like it's not a VM. Maybe it'll get there one day, but due to the got-ya's it's not for me. I have since reverted back to using my choice of distro inside my choice of hypervisor, where I know what's going on and don't have to mentally reverse engineer the magic when it goes wrong.
jasonfarnon 6y ago
Do you think there is something inherent in MS's DNA that makes it more dangerous in a position of dominance than its competitors? Where you can extrapolate from MS in 2000 to now? (In any event, I personally don't think MS when it was dominant and going through the anti-trust suit was doing much that isn't routinely done by its competitors these days.)
- dec0dedab0de 6y ago
  Do you think there is something inherent in MS's DNA that makes it more dangerous in a position of dominance than its competitors? Where you can extrapolate from MS in 2000 to now? (In any event, I personally don't think MS when it was dominant and going through the anti-trust suit was doing much that isn't routinely done by its competitors these days.) Microsoft is very good at making deals with management. The marketing/sales apparatus is what really sets them apart. I can imagine being forced to give up my mac because someone who is barely technical made a decision after going out to lunch and hearing that WSL solves all the reasons I would use a Mac while giving more control to the enterprise. While that example is a stretch to match the story, it's basically the reason why all the developers where I work have to spend time migrating from our self-hosted GitLab to GitHub enterprise. BTW If anyone at GitHub is reading this, can someone pretty please add sub namespaces within the enterprise?
  - tadfisher 6y ago
    That's interesting. I raised a stink and demanded a ThinkPad with Linux after my former employer required CrowdStrike, Zscaler, and some self-service + remote-management crap on the Mac fleet. Then they tried asking us to install CrowdStrike voluntarily on our Linux machines. I told them sure, once they ship a NixOS package for it. They never did, and the company shut down in any case.
    - distances 6y ago
      Linux is a small problem with remote work, I'm currently working for a client whose VPN only supports Windows and Mac. I'm very happy about WSL in this situation, allows me to use my desktop with all the familiar tools instead of buying an expensive and underpowered Mac. This limitation came as a surprise even to the client, they were under the impression that Linux would work fine.
HomeDeLaPot 6y ago
I have the same feeling. Nothing altruistic about it, Microsoft stands to benefit greatly from having Linux inside Windows. Altruistic would be open-sourcing Windows or something. That said, I'm glad they're seeking to benefit by increasing interoperability and developer goodwill. Their current strategy is good for users and devs and probably the best we can hope for. This will change if/when Windows becomes the one and only viable platform again and switches back to using that as leverage, but with the way things are going I think that will take a while. Not only have they been losing to Linux on the server front, they've been losing to the web and Apple/Google on the application & mobile fronts, so they are a long way from lock-in there.
cptskippy 6y ago
> Embrace/Neutralise/Replace I haven't really seen that, as a primarily Windows Dev all the moves they are making are to encourage you to use Linux over Windows for backend work. Hell, they own Windows but for some reason App Services targeting Windows are more expensive than Linux on Azure. It's almost as if they want us off Windows.
- GoOnThenDoTell 6y ago
  Maybe they do, windows costs money to enhance/secure/optimise/etc Could be easier for just make Linux do the hard lifting and put a Microsoft layer on top
- andyferris 6y ago
  That’s a competition law thing. They charge AWS the right to use Windows - so Azure also needs to markup by a similar price, otherwise they would fall foul of antitrust regulations. It’s not legal to give Windows away for free on Azure but not AWS/GCP/anyone else who wants to rent a computer from their garage (I.e. essentially making Windows Server free-as-in-beer).
samatman 6y ago
When I'm feeling optimistic, I muse that the relentless hostility and distrust which a large cohort of 30+ year old developers will feel toward MS for their entire careers, might just be enough to keep them honest. As one of those developers, I hope so: but I can barely bring myself to use VSCode, and made excuses to switch everything to GitLab once they bought GitHub. The latter is somewhat of a coincidence but it was a factor for sure.
mb720 6y ago
>scars from the 90s/00s hegemony Honestly curious, are you referring to Microsoft's illegal[0] tactics to destroy Netscape? [0]https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2000/04/04/judge-says-microsoft-broke-antitrust-law/165a2acf-05a1-45fd-9dc0-2a3992752804/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2000/04/04/j...
- chx 6y ago
  https://web.archive.org/web/20040202024941/http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/facts/ https://web.archive.org/web/20040202024941/http://www.micros... Also while this image https://i.redd.it/c4izfrkd4jl61.png https://i.redd.it/c4izfrkd4jl61.png is obviously just a meme (before we even called them memes) it really does grasp the messaging from Microsoft about Linux around the turn of the century. Dating the meme is easy, that's a first gen iMac visibly. https://i2.wp.com/sixcolors.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/bondiimg_3169-6c.jpeg?ssl=1 https://i2.wp.com/sixcolors.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/b... Those were not happy years.
- CRConrad 5y ago
  There's sooo much more stuff, going back decades further: 1) Putting code in Windows, back when it was a separate graphical shell that ran on top of DOS, to detect if it was running on DR-DOS and shutting down with error messages more or less vaguely blaming the underlying OS. 2) Screwing their development partner IBM over on their joint project OS/2, switching to marketing their own branch Windows NT in stead. 3) Bundling their productivity apps together into an "Office Suite", thereby having the strongest[1] ones help selling the weaker[1] ones. (Yes, such bundling used to be illegal; it's actually a legal term that may have entered the vernacular via their first antitrust trial. For all I know it still is illegal in other industries.) 4) Related to both of the above, faking out Lotus and Word Perfect by pretending that OS/2 was the way to go, but themselves developing MS Office to have it work much better on Windows 3.x than these competitors. Arguably, WP an Lotus were somewhat out of touch and got started on porting their apps to Windows 3 far too late... But from all one could gather from the media at the time (and the trial documents later), that was in large part because MS had kept them in the dark. 5) OEM license deals with computer manufacturers that made selling both machines with Windows and with other OSes much more expensive for the manufacturer than if they sold only Windows machines. This was the main reason, IIRC far into this century, that it was almost impossible for ordinary consumers -- including up to at least SMBs -- with Linux preinstalled. (And I suppose this history has led to entrenched habits and business models in the industry which still make it pretty difficult and rare.) And these are just the landmark ones that come to mind immediately. Beyond that, there were just endless amounts of "FUD"[2] and "EEE"[3] that helped them become a de facto monopoly in PC operating systems (and, arguably, office productivity software) -- "Linux is a cancer", etc etc. (Wouldn't surprise me if they're behind the insidious terminology of calling copyleft licenses "infectious" and "viral", too.) All in all, back in their heyday -- from at least the mid-eighties to at least the early 00s -- they were just simply the actual supervillain of the computer industry. And damn, it makes you feel old -- "What's wrong with kids nowadays, that they don't know this stuff?!?"... No, really, I just realized I'll probably never get around to trusting Microsoft again: When someone's been behaving very badly for years, then claims to be rehabilitated, how long does it take you to see them as trustworthy again... Twice as long as they were "bad"; three times? Counting low, say twenty years of monopolistic FUD / EEE / illegality and a 2× "probation period" starting ten years ago, that would be in thirty years. If I live, I'll be 87 then. Buuut... Given their history as I know it, these current WSL shenanigans feel far too much like EEE all over again. (And, not to be too paranoid about it, I'm still not sure Stephen Elop wasn't a mole parachuted in at Nokia to try and make the mobile phone industry a Windows Mobile quasi-monopoly...) So, supervillain career possibly still ongoing. ___ [1]: Which is which varied with the customer. In the legal business, Word Perfect used to be the absolute de facto standard, but they were probably less married to their Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheets, so getting Excel bundled in "for free" with MS Word was at least a bit of an incentive to switch. In the accounting industry, it worked the other way around. [2]: "Fear, uncertainty, and doubt". [3]: "Embrace, extend, extinguish".
ixacto 6y ago
Yes Microsoft does have an incentive to make a POSIX dev env available on their OS and also make the experience of using it not suck. I'm curious as to why they didn't just purchase https://x410.dev/ https://x410.dev/ and integrate that into WSLv2 as it has hidpi support already too. Also If Microsoft is able to get GPU compute working with native performance I would absolutely switch back from M1 mac.
- comex 6y ago
  One difference is that this is based on Wayland, whereas X410 is based on X11. The Linux desktop is currently undergoing a (very) slow transition from X11 to Wayland.
- psd1 5y ago
  POSIX is a standard that Windows complies with natively and has done for decades - it's a requirement for DoD contracts IIRC.

d1zzy 6y ago

This is a very smart strategic move on behalf of Microsoft that I would have never guessed (not because it doesn't make sense but simply out of corporate pride, considering they are the authors of the "Linux Facts" memorandum...). I think it's smart because this will capture all those Linux people who aren't super comfortable administrating their own distro and even for those that are it's now giving them another option if they ever need to run things both in Windows and Linux at the same time or just run into some Linux issues and don't want to spend the time on them they can switch to Windows 10 WSL. At this point the only thing that I still think it doesn't make much sense is Microsoft running/developing their own kernel. It's entirely possible for them to start running Linux and run all the WIN32 support, drivers, DirectX, etc as a separate sandbox (similar to the type of sandbox WSL runs). The performance overhead from doing that should be negligible on modern hardware. EDIT: note that I only mean switching to Linux kernel for their desktop OS, there are plenty of usecases of Microsoft kernels where every bit of performance matters but I suspect those will continue to use their own kernel as part of Windows Server releases.

xnyan 6y ago
>corporate pride Corporate pride took a huge hit after they completely wiffed on mobile, then went on to throw good money after bad for a long long time before they were willing to admit that they had lost. Think about where MS could be if they taken google/android seriously at the beginning. For a while, the prevailing opinion was that Microsoft was nearly (or already) no longer a a supermax tech company. Lots of business orthodoxy got nixed, most prominently the supremacy of Windows over all.
mycall 6y ago
There is one place where it makes sense for Microsoft to have their own Linux Kernel: Azure Sphere [0] [0] https://3rdpartycodeprod.blob.core.windows.net/download/Azure%20Sphere%2F21.03%2FLinux%20Kernel.zip?sv=2019-02-02&st=2021-04-22T01%3A02%3A48Z&se=2021-04-22T02%3A42%3A48Z&sr=b&sp=r&sig=jUddK6bnf%2BBrqihN34wVS6iRhqaahVCiWrVnKWxcHcc%3D https://3rdpartycodeprod.blob.core.windows.net/download/Azur...

ljm 6y ago

I see it a bit more simply: A lot of developers use MacOS, particularly web developers who are almost always deploying the server to a linux machine. With the Mac being BSD-flavoured, a lot of open source tooling works the same as it does on Linux. MacPorts and Homebrew have done a lot to drive that. The experience on Windows for this has been incredibly poor. There are solutions, but they're less integrated. WSL comes in, along with Windows Terminal, and now you can have a much nicer time with it all without dual booting or running a VM. Who knows where it'll be in a decade, but if anything, they're just making themselves a viable competitor to Apple by providing better development tools than they do.

wayneftw 6y ago
I used Windows for twenty years as a developer and macOS for ten. Once I got away from .Net and iOS development and into Node/React both of them just got in my way while providing nothing of value. (Actually macOS has always annoyed me in many ways, so mostly I only used it for iOS stuff.) Once I moved to Manjaro/XFCE a few years ago, all the problems disappeared. Docker just works. All the web dev tools are built for my platform and just work. There are no compatibility layers or emulation layers to worry about. I'm in charge of updates. I don't get nagged to do things at inopportune times. I'll never go back to either one of them full time. Windows for games, Macs for iOS/Xcode. That's it for me. Even for .Net and iOS now - I can do that too on Linux with .Net core and React Native.
apatheticonion 6y ago
Originally a Window dev, moved to Linux, eventually MacOS due to a lack of nice a DE on Linux and the nice UNIX base of MacOS. Before WSL1 I would run Linux inside a VM from Windows and use remote development tools (like VSCode via SSH, SSH tunnels for port sharing, etc). It was all pretty straight forward, stable and I had no issues. I used WSL1 when it launched and it was _incredible_. Bash actually on Windows. My workflow changed because of the level of integration I had with Windows. I could run browser automation tools against my Windows browsers, from Linux. I could run Windows programs from bash. WSL2 came on the scene and introduced a hypervisor layer and I essentially came full circle. Sure it has some smarts around memory VM allocation - but it doesn't always work right and you're never really certain it's not running, consuming memory. Network port mappings were automatically tunneled, but only in one direction and they would occasionally fail causing random issues that require a reboot to solve. Now GUI windows are shared with Windows via RDP, cool.. Ultimately, WSL2 is the attempt to take Linux VM and make it appear like it's not a VM. Maybe it'll get there one day, but due to the got-ya's it's not for me. I have since reverted back to using my choice of distro inside my choice of hypervisor, where I know what's going on and don't have to mentally reverse engineer the magic when it goes wrong.

jasonfarnon 6y ago

Do you think there is something inherent in MS's DNA that makes it more dangerous in a position of dominance than its competitors? Where you can extrapolate from MS in 2000 to now? (In any event, I personally don't think MS when it was dominant and going through the anti-trust suit was doing much that isn't routinely done by its competitors these days.)

dec0dedab0de 6y ago
Do you think there is something inherent in MS's DNA that makes it more dangerous in a position of dominance than its competitors? Where you can extrapolate from MS in 2000 to now? (In any event, I personally don't think MS when it was dominant and going through the anti-trust suit was doing much that isn't routinely done by its competitors these days.) Microsoft is very good at making deals with management. The marketing/sales apparatus is what really sets them apart. I can imagine being forced to give up my mac because someone who is barely technical made a decision after going out to lunch and hearing that WSL solves all the reasons I would use a Mac while giving more control to the enterprise. While that example is a stretch to match the story, it's basically the reason why all the developers where I work have to spend time migrating from our self-hosted GitLab to GitHub enterprise. BTW If anyone at GitHub is reading this, can someone pretty please add sub namespaces within the enterprise?
- tadfisher 6y ago
  That's interesting. I raised a stink and demanded a ThinkPad with Linux after my former employer required CrowdStrike, Zscaler, and some self-service + remote-management crap on the Mac fleet. Then they tried asking us to install CrowdStrike voluntarily on our Linux machines. I told them sure, once they ship a NixOS package for it. They never did, and the company shut down in any case.
  - distances 6y ago
    Linux is a small problem with remote work, I'm currently working for a client whose VPN only supports Windows and Mac. I'm very happy about WSL in this situation, allows me to use my desktop with all the familiar tools instead of buying an expensive and underpowered Mac. This limitation came as a surprise even to the client, they were under the impression that Linux would work fine.

HomeDeLaPot 6y ago

I have the same feeling. Nothing altruistic about it, Microsoft stands to benefit greatly from having Linux inside Windows. Altruistic would be open-sourcing Windows or something. That said, I'm glad they're seeking to benefit by increasing interoperability and developer goodwill. Their current strategy is good for users and devs and probably the best we can hope for. This will change if/when Windows becomes the one and only viable platform again and switches back to using that as leverage, but with the way things are going I think that will take a while. Not only have they been losing to Linux on the server front, they've been losing to the web and Apple/Google on the application & mobile fronts, so they are a long way from lock-in there.

cptskippy 6y ago

> Embrace/Neutralise/Replace I haven't really seen that, as a primarily Windows Dev all the moves they are making are to encourage you to use Linux over Windows for backend work. Hell, they own Windows but for some reason App Services targeting Windows are more expensive than Linux on Azure. It's almost as if they want us off Windows.

GoOnThenDoTell 6y ago
Maybe they do, windows costs money to enhance/secure/optimise/etc Could be easier for just make Linux do the hard lifting and put a Microsoft layer on top
andyferris 6y ago
That’s a competition law thing. They charge AWS the right to use Windows - so Azure also needs to markup by a similar price, otherwise they would fall foul of antitrust regulations. It’s not legal to give Windows away for free on Azure but not AWS/GCP/anyone else who wants to rent a computer from their garage (I.e. essentially making Windows Server free-as-in-beer).

samatman 6y ago

When I'm feeling optimistic, I muse that the relentless hostility and distrust which a large cohort of 30+ year old developers will feel toward MS for their entire careers, might just be enough to keep them honest. As one of those developers, I hope so: but I can barely bring myself to use VSCode, and made excuses to switch everything to GitLab once they bought GitHub. The latter is somewhat of a coincidence but it was a factor for sure.

mb720 6y ago

>scars from the 90s/00s hegemony Honestly curious, are you referring to Microsoft's illegal[0] tactics to destroy Netscape? [0]https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2000/04/04/judge-says-microsoft-broke-antitrust-law/165a2acf-05a1-45fd-9dc0-2a3992752804/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2000/04/04/j...

chx 6y ago
https://web.archive.org/web/20040202024941/http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/facts/ https://web.archive.org/web/20040202024941/http://www.micros... Also while this image https://i.redd.it/c4izfrkd4jl61.png https://i.redd.it/c4izfrkd4jl61.png is obviously just a meme (before we even called them memes) it really does grasp the messaging from Microsoft about Linux around the turn of the century. Dating the meme is easy, that's a first gen iMac visibly. https://i2.wp.com/sixcolors.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/bondiimg_3169-6c.jpeg?ssl=1 https://i2.wp.com/sixcolors.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/b... Those were not happy years.
CRConrad 5y ago
There's sooo much more stuff, going back decades further: 1) Putting code in Windows, back when it was a separate graphical shell that ran on top of DOS, to detect if it was running on DR-DOS and shutting down with error messages more or less vaguely blaming the underlying OS. 2) Screwing their development partner IBM over on their joint project OS/2, switching to marketing their own branch Windows NT in stead. 3) Bundling their productivity apps together into an "Office Suite", thereby having the strongest[1] ones help selling the weaker[1] ones. (Yes, such bundling used to be illegal; it's actually a legal term that may have entered the vernacular via their first antitrust trial. For all I know it still is illegal in other industries.) 4) Related to both of the above, faking out Lotus and Word Perfect by pretending that OS/2 was the way to go, but themselves developing MS Office to have it work much better on Windows 3.x than these competitors. Arguably, WP an Lotus were somewhat out of touch and got started on porting their apps to Windows 3 far too late... But from all one could gather from the media at the time (and the trial documents later), that was in large part because MS had kept them in the dark. 5) OEM license deals with computer manufacturers that made selling both machines with Windows and with other OSes much more expensive for the manufacturer than if they sold only Windows machines. This was the main reason, IIRC far into this century, that it was almost impossible for ordinary consumers -- including up to at least SMBs -- with Linux preinstalled. (And I suppose this history has led to entrenched habits and business models in the industry which still make it pretty difficult and rare.) And these are just the landmark ones that come to mind immediately. Beyond that, there were just endless amounts of "FUD"[2] and "EEE"[3] that helped them become a de facto monopoly in PC operating systems (and, arguably, office productivity software) -- "Linux is a cancer", etc etc. (Wouldn't surprise me if they're behind the insidious terminology of calling copyleft licenses "infectious" and "viral", too.) All in all, back in their heyday -- from at least the mid-eighties to at least the early 00s -- they were just simply the actual supervillain of the computer industry. And damn, it makes you feel old -- "What's wrong with kids nowadays, that they don't know this stuff?!?"... No, really, I just realized I'll probably never get around to trusting Microsoft again: When someone's been behaving very badly for years, then claims to be rehabilitated, how long does it take you to see them as trustworthy again... Twice as long as they were "bad"; three times? Counting low, say twenty years of monopolistic FUD / EEE / illegality and a 2× "probation period" starting ten years ago, that would be in thirty years. If I live, I'll be 87 then. Buuut... Given their history as I know it, these current WSL shenanigans feel far too much like EEE all over again. (And, not to be too paranoid about it, I'm still not sure Stephen Elop wasn't a mole parachuted in at Nokia to try and make the mobile phone industry a Windows Mobile quasi-monopoly...) So, supervillain career possibly still ongoing. ___ [1]: Which is which varied with the customer. In the legal business, Word Perfect used to be the absolute de facto standard, but they were probably less married to their Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheets, so getting Excel bundled in "for free" with MS Word was at least a bit of an incentive to switch. In the accounting industry, it worked the other way around. [2]: "Fear, uncertainty, and doubt". [3]: "Embrace, extend, extinguish".

ixacto 6y ago

Yes Microsoft does have an incentive to make a POSIX dev env available on their OS and also make the experience of using it not suck. I'm curious as to why they didn't just purchase https://x410.dev/ https://x410.dev/ and integrate that into WSLv2 as it has hidpi support already too. Also If Microsoft is able to get GPU compute working with native performance I would absolutely switch back from M1 mac.

comex 6y ago
One difference is that this is based on Wayland, whereas X410 is based on X11. The Linux desktop is currently undergoing a (very) slow transition from X11 to Wayland.
psd1 5y ago
POSIX is a standard that Windows complies with natively and has done for decades - it's a requirement for DoD contracts IIRC.