> > In as much as I have criticized the monster known as MS, I > don't think a lot of you really want to go slit your wrists > open, tear out your hair, and put on sackcloth just yet. We > don't even know the complete financial details of this deal yet. > And I wonder if the same doom and gloomers are the ones who > have consistently bitched about interoperability for > MS-Linux. Guess what guys, you can't have it both ways. >
I'd say this is convenient on both sides now, and the outcome depends upon how good the two sides are at managing their relationship and the outcome. It is convenient for MS is it is starting to get attacked for its abuse of market position, and so the existence of this exercise (and not any results) is a defence against further major prosecutions of that type. Any results will also have the benefit of allowing MS (and the software vendors who depend upon an MS platform) back into the growing number of places which have declared themselves as open-source only. On the Novell / SuSE side it will make it easier to introduce Linux into existing IT setups which are mostly MS based. Getting Linux to interoperate with the MS infrastructure is a real pain, and this pain is a distraction from the real job. We should all applaud if we get to the position where, whatever the underlying infrastructure, the choice of server / desktop OS is determined by what is right for the job at hand, not whether you can get the thing to talk properly to the existing infrastructure. And yes, MS has shown itself in the past to be much more adept at managing these situations to benefit itself. They're just doing what any true believer in capitalism should do. David --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
