Man, this is really blowing up, and several Linux developers are offended. If you talk to Microsoft, or read any of their 6000 blogs, they are extending an olive branch. However, most in the FLOSS world are skeptical, to say the least, and quite a few are expecting M$ to rip the entire tree out of the ground. Do you hear that giant sucking sound? A significant portion of the Linux world are uninstalling SUSE as we speak (even the commercial version), and moving to Debian or whatever.

My thoughts? I don't trust M$ as far as I can throw them, and the greatest thing they can do is find a hole for Ballmer to crawl into. As a figurehead, you'd like someone to be articulate and thoughtful, but as honest and direct as possible -- which is difficult when you run a multi-billion dollar company. Replace the loud-mouthed Ballmer, and any others like him (make him a salesman again!), and let the spirit of the 65k talented employees (well, 75% of them) shine through. Speak plainly with people, and don't always assume everyone is out for blood. Words mean little, in the end, and M$ has a lot of aggresive history to contend with, in future joint efforts. Anyone discussing getting into bed with M$ will *always* keep one foot on the floor, regardless of their intent. Actions speak louder than words. Trouble is, nobody is giving credit to M$ for anything truly positive work in the OSS community, based on this skeptical business-practice history.

Any company this big ALWAYS has a bevy of lawyers, but don't let them lead the way into any future meetings you may have. It tends to turn that olive branch into a gun barrell.

One day - in the far distant future there will be one OS; a mix of Windows and UNIX/Linix. Hopefully by then all the boys, and girls, in the playground will have grown up and stopped being so petty.

From one who has had to study this as part of my degree. It does look like little boys in the play ground do need to grow up. All I ask is "GROW UP and PLAY NICE" for the good of the human race.

I find it strange when people slag Microsoft off. Whilst I don't agree with some of their business decisions (like their prices for one) I do think that the IT world needs them and it can only be good for Windows and Linux to be compatible in areas.

Microsoft gets a bad name as it's the leader in desktop software so it gets targeted more. If Linux became the leader then we would see the same things happening to Linux that we do with Windows.

It all sounds like religion to me.

But where does that leave me, as an Antitheist?

J.