Any project as durable and feature-laden as Thunderbird is bound to create or be facilitated by differences of opinion. The choices of paths to follow are many:
- pour more resources into Thunderbird,
- just maintain Thunderbird,
- develop a web-application that does the same things,
- …
Mozilla has decided to freeze the features and concentrate on web/cloud stuff. That annoys some who have grown to depend on Thunderbird, particularly those with many e-mail accounts. Thunderbird makes sense for its ability to concentrate those accounts in one application.
That move may put pressure on the using community to contribute more to Thunderbird or the community may disperse to other clients or web-mail. We shall see. I would bet a FLOSS application like Thunderbird with tens of millions of users will live on in one form or another indefinitely and may well grow. I would not be surprised to see its functionality appear as a web application sooner or later.
17474
12766
206
3
2
23917 
11868 
11720 
4639 
4263 
1641 
198 
14 
2 
0 
0 
0 
It is just the result of the natural order of things, Mr. Pogson. If you don’t pay the piper, you cannot call the tune and the number of developers willing to waste their time on such a ho-hum product has apparently declined to zero. They don’t get a paycheck, so why bother with something that has no intellectual thrill anymore?
Keep you hats on. Monday announcement is when we hear exactly what is going on.
It might be some sanity like killing off Thunderbird own version of gecko rendering engine and truly making firefox and thunderbird use the same engine.
There is duplication between firefox and thunderbird that really don’t need to exist.
That’s the funniest news I’ve heard in a while. So Mozilla is disappointed because the community ain’t doing more? Excuse me, but what is Mozilla doing with their $300 million a year from Google!? Have they been burning it through with cocaine parties?
Just another proof that if you rely on FLOSS, you will be burned.
Chris Weig wrote, “Just another proof that if you rely on FLOSS, you will be burned.”
No. It shows that possibility but then users always have the option of forking or taking over the project. With that other OS, we have seen endless examples of M$ burning people who relied on their products. That’s why I have nothing from M$ in my home.
Clarence Moon wrote, “If you don’t pay the piper, you cannot call the tune and the number of developers willing to waste their time on such a ho-hum product has apparently declined to zero. They don’t get a paycheck, so why bother with something that has no intellectual thrill anymore?”
That is an important factor in FLOSS but fortunately not the only one. Real computer-geeks can get a thrill from almost any random piece of software. Sustaining the thrill is an issue and probably why KDE/GNOME have become so strange lately. After accomplishing just about everything the leadership went looking for more interesting directions. That is a problem for all humanity, what to do “when I grow up”. Some leave a project. Others take the project in new directions. It’s all good. Diversity is good in software and it’s good in Nature and the human condition.
Yeah, look what happened to Open Office.
…not the only one…
The old saying, “For love or money…” seems to apply here, Mr. Pogson. If you are giving up the considerable money commonly associated with senior developers for big software companies on projects of this scope, you need to have an awful lot of love. Poking around on some hoary project like Thunderbird is not going to attract anyone with any innovative bent.
Regarding Open Office, Sun Microsystems created it then was bought up by Oracle, namely for Java, Solaris and MySQL.
Oracle drug it’s feet with the OpenOffice and people were fed up so it was forked and turned into LibreOffice to the benefit of everyone.
http://blogs.computerworld.com/17197/oracle_kicks_libreoffice_supporters_out_of_openoffice
Here are some examples of M$ slamming the door on its user base:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/258867/say_goodbye_to_windows_home_server.html
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10261742-56.html
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/60077/20100907/microsoft-steadystate-public-avenues-libraries.htm
http://gigaom.com/video/microsoft-giving-up-on-silverlight-joining-html5-party/
I migrated users from Money, and I am sure the Home Server deal will ring my phone as well.
Steadystate seemed like a decent product as it was primarily designed for use on computers shared by many people, however in reality a Linux server with few hundred thin clients will blow it out the water.
Hmmm, left out my quote:
OOo is one of many open source software projects that Oracle obtained in its acquisition of Sun. OOo has long been plagued by governance issues and friction between its corporate stakeholders. Sun’s copyright assignment policies and bureaucratic code review process significantly hindered community participation in the project. Oracle declined to address these issues after its acquisition of Sun and exacerbated the friction by failing to engage with the OOo community in a transparent and open way.
A group of prominent OOo contributors eventually decided to fork the project, creating an alternative called LibreOffice. They founded a nonprofit organization called The Document Foundation (TDF) in order to create a truly vendor-neutral governance body for the software. LibreOffice is based on the OOo source code, but it also incorporates a large number of other improvements driven by its own developer community.
Most of the major companies that have historically been involved in OOo development have moved to stand behind TDF and LibreOffice, including Red Hat, Novell, Google, and Canonical. LibreOffice has also succeeded in attracting a significant portion of OOo’s independent contributors. The ecosystem-wide shift in favor of LibreOffice has left Oracle as the only major party still developing OOo, forcing the company to compete against the broader community.
“A group of prominent OOo contributors eventually decided to fork the project, creating an alternative called LibreOffice. They founded a nonprofit organization called The Document Foundation (TDF) in order to create a truly vendor-neutral governance body for the software. ”
Thats nice, but since TDF are not a “throat to choke”, any business who actually looks beyond the so called “freeness” of the product towards paid support like we get from microsoft,will take a pass.
Remember there is no vendor who officers a commercially vetted and supported version of the package as Red Hat does to their Enterprise Linux.
oldman wrote of LibreOffice, “any business who actually looks beyond the so called “freeness” of the product towards paid support like we get from microsoft,will take a pass.”
Nope. Any business who gives FLOSS a try will find that it works and get on with using it. If a new version comes along with some problem, they can keep using the old version indefinitely. There’s no expiry date in the GPL.
Also, a business does not need to know there’s a particular business to demand service for a working product that costs $0. They can at any time spend some money if they want to fix a problem/add a feature or they can rely on the community of LibreOffice to do that for them. A business can make a donation to the Document Foundation in lieu of a licensing fee if they wish to ensure continuity. Instead of dealing with M$ they can be a part/investor/contributor to the organization. Because the whole world does that the expense per business can be much less. FLOSS works.
Thunderbird is an e-mail clients. There is no much left to innovate in any e-mail clients and users wanting to add features can via extensions. Thunderbird is supported and goes into maturity level which in turn brings more interest to businesses.
Webmail is not a solution IMO because of security issues, ackward interfaces and the inability to keep data offline through backup.
oldman Redhat supports the version of Libreoffice they ship.
“Thats nice, but since TDF are not a “throat to choke”, any business who actually looks beyond the so called “freeness” of the product towards paid support like we get from microsoft,will take a pass.”
If the throat to choke is important you pay for Libreoffice from someone like redhat. Mind you go read you ms fine print in License you don’t get a direct support contract with that either.
I will ask you a direct question oldman. Why in hell are you paying for MS software when you don’t get a legal throat to choke if something goes wrong.
Redhat support contract you do get a direct throat to choke. This is one of the reasons why I like Linux. When I spend money I get a throat to choke.
So really oldman if you care about a throat to choke you don’t use Microsoft products.
Finalzone wrote, “There is no much left to innovate in any e-mail clients and users wanting to add features can via extensions.”
Yes. It’s about time more projects entered a phase of maturity and quit adding/changing features just for the sake of it. What users really care about is reliability, speed, etc.
“oldman Redhat supports the version of Libreoffice they ship.”
That is an incidental to their support of Linux. They are not responsible for L—-Office.
“I will ask you a direct question oldman. Why in hell are you paying for MS software when you don’t get a legal throat to choke if something goes wrong.”
Because they have skin in the game sir, and because their have a stake in making customers happy. Thats the way it works in the real world, as opposed to the FOSS commune.
oldman
“Because they have skin in the game sir, and because their have a stake in making customers happy. Thats the way it works in the real world, as opposed to the FOSS commune.”
Really so do FOSS projects. Again MS throat is not on the line if something is wrong with there product. You have no legal come back against them either.
No developers no FOSS project that simple. So FOSS has a stake in making there users happy as well.
Reality you arguements on this topic so far have been completely bogus oldman. So when you are paying someone like redhat for support they they don’t have a stake in making you happy. Reality if you want someone to care you pay.
Difference here with FOSS when you pay someone like redhat they have a bigger stake in making you happy than Microsoft does. Why because if Redhat does not making you happy you go go to one of redhat competition who can address your problem.
FOSS you have many different parties competing and can provide the support and service you want.
FOSS support companies truly do put there neck on the line for you. With Microsoft you are lost in crowd. If Microsoft decides not to fixing something you need fixed stiff. FOSS gives you the option of directly deciding how important something is to your company and spending on it according to importance to your company.
Oldman you have this so wrong its not funny Microsoft stake to help you directly is way less than the FOSS world support companies to help you directly. Funny part is per year they cost about the same.
oldman next time you are near 1 Microsoft Way go visit MS product grave yard.
Then think about how many companies were using those products when MS decided to straight up terminate them. Then think about if MS is really putting there neck on the line for end users. Reality is Microsoft share holders become before providing end users with applications they are using.
Reality does not agree with your made up crap arguments oldman. You wonder why I call you incompetent at times. Your argument here has no base in fact. Fact is MS does not care about there users other than how to extract as much money from them to pay share holders.
Redhat and other Foss support companies on the other hand due to selling true support contracts they stuff up they may have to pay there customer back. So what one has more on the chopping block for you as a end user is the Foss support companies.
Yes as per any support company they can change there priorities. Mozilla changing away from thunderbird due to it being open source does not prevent Ubuntu and others from picking it up.
FOSS company decides to change away from supporting something other companies can fill the gap.
This is the weakness of closed source. When the vendor decides to kill it with closed source its over and its your company that has to cope with the migration to a new possible worse suited product.
This is the weakness of closed source. When the vendor decides to kill it with closed source its over and its your company that has to cope with the migration to a new possible worse suited product.
Huh? What kind of unsubstantiated BS is that? Just a few comments prior, Mr. Pogson wrote:
If a new version comes along with some problem, they can keep using the old version indefinitely. There’s no expiry date in the GPL.
Which is it now? Apparently you CAN use old software, even if it ain’t supported any longer. So there is parity between closed source software and FLOSS. The difference is that with FLOSS you hace the theoretical (!) possibility to fix problems yourself or have someone fix them for you. But the real question is: how feasible is it for a small or middle size business to lay an additional burden on themselves by having to play code maintainers?
Even if someone else does it for them it’s unfeasible and unrealistic. Because it directly violates the spirit and concept of FLOSS. For FLOSS to work, a piece of software has to actively circulate in the ecosystem. An abandoned piece of software just can’t do that, even if it’s FLOSS. That’s the same baseline reasoning by which it’s more feasible for companies to get their stuff into the Linux kernel instead of doing all the work themselves.
Abandoned FLOSS is in that sense no better than abandoned closed source software. But I’d be very much interested in real-life data concerning the continued use and self-maintenance of abandoned FLOSS in small or middle size businesses. I seriously doubt that much use is made of the source code’s availability.
Chris Weig, desperately trying to put more limits on FLOSS than the GPL, wrote, “For FLOSS to work, a piece of software has to actively circulate in the ecosystem. “
There’s nothing in FLOSS about that. That’s a limitation of your imagination. We keep old archives of FLOSS for a couple of reasons, to document what was and to make it usable indefinitely. See http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/ or http://archive.download.redhat.com/pub/redhat/linux/ or http://archive.debian.org/debian-archive/debian/dists/
Of course it’s better that FLOSS be used but there’s absolutely no requirement. The GPL gives permission not a burden.
Where did I write anything about a requirement? I wrote that FLOSS which falls out of active circulation is a lot harder to deal with. Just as kernel drivers which are maintained outside of the kernel are a lot harder to deal with. And software in some age-old release of a distribution doesn’t really count, because you’ll most likely have a hard time getting it to run on a current release of a distribution, even if you try to compile it from source.
And even from the Linux kernel drivers are removed regularly when they are deemed unused. Sure, you have your archives with old Linux versions, but of what advantage is that? Either you have to invest time pulling in an old driver from an old kernel, or you have to work with an old kernel.
Chris Weig
“This is the weakness of closed source. When the vendor decides to kill it with closed source its over and its your company that has to cope with the migration to a new possible worse suited product.”
This is not BS.
“If a new version comes along with some problem, they can keep using the old version indefinitely. There’s no expiry date in the GPL.”
This is also not BS.
Thing is historically FOSS projects have forked in cases of this like pidgin fork this was done by one user since the difference was not apply one patch. So you can stay with the old version and take up maintainership of it. So you can apply security updates to the old code base.
Yes you can keep on trying to use an old closed source bit of software that maker no longer supports but it is becoming more and more of a risk of major issues you cannot fix because you don’t have access to the source code.
Chris Weig
“Abandoned FLOSS is in that sense no better than abandoned closed source software. But I’d be very much interested in real-life data concerning the continued use and self-maintenance of abandoned FLOSS in small or middle size businesses. I seriously doubt that much use is made of the source code’s availability.”
Maintenance of software by small business does happen. There are projects out there with 1 to 2 developers. Self maintenance does happen.
The thing here is not an abrupt stop and need to migrate.
“FLOSS to work, a piece of software has to actively circulate in the ecosystem.”
Not true. There have been many historic cases of a FOSS project disappear into some company internally for 5 to 10 years before turning up again. Internally using can equal internally maintained due to the cost of migrating behind higher than the cost of just maintaining it.
Chris Weig remember a few secuirty patches to a php or python script or something else simple in a package a small business is using does not cost that much in resources. Compared to migrating to a complete new system just because something has gone end of life.
You do see FOSS projects die than few months or a few years latter the small business that are dependent on that code starting up a joint project to care for it.
Its the flux of FLOSS. Sometimes support pulling out causes the best growth as new minds take over maintainer ship of it.
FLOSS projects truly die when no one is using it any more and it completely disappears from all active usage. Until then it might magically come back. The magic return from the dead has happened a few times. Sometimes from companies of 5 people or less since the program was performing some task really well for them.
Chris Weig your arguement has no base in reality. Fork of gimpshop and others were one people projects as well for there own requirements.
Maintainership is not highly expensive if the alteration you need is minor. Like remove 1 patch. If that 1 patch happens to disrupt your operations FOSS can be very cheap. Yes foss will allow you to apply the future patchs and work around any case that the future patches are dependant on the patch you removed. Closed source falls in a heap on this as well. Lack of means to remove targeted patches and stay upto date otherwise is true to closed source.
Chris Weig you most likely have never maintained a web site for a business or something else where you have done minor customisation to the source base. So you presume its out of small busineses reach.
Remember Standing on the shoulders of giants. A stack if minor looking not related alterations over time can make huge changes. Minor small business customisations shared with other small business doing the same thing can result in project developing forwards.
Software development does not require big money all the time.
Chris Weig really good point you see some of the old Linux drivers that people need turn back up in mainline. Care for by redhat and the like. Reason people using them paid a support contract. Being small does not mean you cannot have a driver maintained. Deemed unused is no one paying support saying they need it.
“And software in some age-old release of a distribution doesn’t really count, because you’ll most likely have a hard time getting it to run on a current release of a distribution, even if you try to compile it from source.”
Depends if you have the scripts to correct old code or not. Yes there are spatchs in http://coccinelle.lip6.fr/ for forwards porting some of that historic code to fix issues gcc hates.
In fact if you know the spatchs bringing in drivers outside mainline are simpler. Since for each major struct change in the kernel a spatch is made to convert the old code forwards these days.
“Sure, you have your archives with old Linux versions, but of what advantage is that?”
If the driver was there after Linux kernel started using coccinelle spatchs for major changes in structs bringing it forwards is simple. Prior to that it is some work.
Chris Weig really its about time you stop living under a rock.
Latest developments
http://www.kdab.com/automated-porting-from-qt-4-to-qt-5/
The tools for taking old source code and transforming it to work on modern are getting way better.
Really the age old binaries are simpler to be made work just chroot them.
Linux kernel space ABI has barely changed and the old stuff using X11 talk a protocol that is still around today. Ok you might be stuck on software rendering but program still runs.
I have at times pulled programs out the scrap heap.
Today its simpler than 3 years ago massively.
With the work on qt4 to qt5 automatically will allow boost based and other c++ stuff that is busted to also be migrated by conversions tools.
Chris Weig this is interesting right its getting simpler to use old historic code if you still have it.
This is the interesting thing these days if you pull one applications forward from a particular time frame if you do it with automated tools pulling more from that time frame is quite simple. Most of the issues are the same ones.
So value of old source code is very hard to set particularly with the effects of automated tools on make that old code modern.
The “throat to choke” is a leftover from the proprietary business method. It’s being replaced by the partner in development way of software acquisition and quality assurance. It’s a much less violent way of doing business.
“It’s being replaced by the partner in development way of software acquisition and quality assurance. It’s a much less violent way of doing business.”
QA? from the people who gave use the OpenSSL disaster?
ROFLMAO!
oldman
Hey it was Microsoft who though it was a cool idea to run .exe files straight from the email client without updating as a Update system.
Autorun without question from any inserted media was another MS unique invention.
Its also Microsoft who was using out of date protections on there update system.
Sorry oldman FOSS is not unique for screwing up big time. Of course I have not covered the many SSL flaws MS windows has had including poor generation simpler problem to what openssl had in fact optimisation error.
“QA? from the people who gave use the OpenSSL disaster?”
Difference is the persons responsible were located with documentation in the OpenSSL case.
Really oldman commenting this way is pure incompetence caused by not have a true over view of the security state of affairs.
There is nothing to the argument you just put forwards bar smoke and mirrors. Once you look past the smoke and mirrors you see that you don’t know jack oldman about security.
@ldman wrote:
“QA? from the people who gave use the OpenSSL disaster?”
Who are the “people” who gave us the OpenSSl disaster?
What was the nature of the disaster? And, why is it such a big deal?
I did a little looking around. The answers to those questions tell you why you are better off trusting your data with open source than you are with Microsoft.
Thanks for pointing that out to me. I forgot all about it.
LibreOffice… every time I see this name I’m reminded of droopy-faced US Senator Joseph Lieberman. I’m sure I’m not the only one. Bleh!
Ranks right up there with Ubuntu, Gimp, and Diaspora on the all time list of terrible FOSS names. I guess a name like “Freedom Office” wasn’t obscure enough. Go figure.
Yonah wrote:
“LibreOffice… every time I see this name I’m reminded of droopy-faced US Senator Joseph Lieberman.”
One of the great features of Libre Office and one that is often forgotten about is that you can choose not to use it. I know that sounds strange but people often don’t realize they have a choice with Microsoft. You know you can refuse to use Libre Office as I’m sure everyone does.
In spite of what the Cult of Microsoft says, open source does not force itself on anyone. You can choose not to use it as long as you are willing to pay for proprietary commercial software.
“Oldman you have this so wrong its not funny Microsoft stake to help you directly is way less than the FOSS world support companies to help you directly. Funny part is per year they cost about the same.”
But in the end Microsoft and its ISV actually produce products that are theirs and theirs alone to profit from. In order to maximize and continue that profit, they have to on aggregate respond to those who are their customers. True a small nobody like yourself is going to have far less pull than a major entity like the one that I work for who has make a substantial commitment big time to microsoft products and who has expensive support agreements with them can and has pulled the trigger on getting problems solved.
But then again, that’s the way it works.
Even a company like Red Hat for all their professionalism and quality of offering, in the end offers NOTHING of substance. All they do ( and it is admittedly a big “all”) is provide support for an an open source distribution that is cleaned up regression tested and guaranteed to be stable for production. All of the work that they do is available to any comer, who need only strip out their trademarks and just proceed to benefit from Red Hat work without paying for it – can you say Oracle Enterprise Linux?
“Reality does not agree with your made up crap arguments oldman. You wonder why I call you incompetent at times”.
Coming from someone who is continually singing the “its getting better” tune in relation to the issues with linux, I find this funny. Telling someone “its getting better” is just as much a crap argument , if not more so.
Don’t presume to lecture me about my issues until you talk honestly about the state of linux as it stands NOW.
“ Fact is MS does not care about there users other than how to extract as much money from them to pay share holders.”
And I suppose that dealing with a bunch of geeks who need to get their a$$es kissed and who have been known abandon a product because the project is no longer interesting is better than dealing with a company that is in it for the money.
And BTW Red Hat is also in it for the money as well genius.
“This is the weakness of closed source. When the vendor decides to kill it with closed source its over and its your company that has to cope with the migration to a new possible worse suited product.”
The funny thing is that in 30+ years of computing I can’t think of a popular major product that was outright abandoned by a major vendor who actually managed to stay on business. I can however think of several promising FOSS projects where its users had to tread water and self maintain in hopes that it would be picked up by someone else and/or forked.
oldman
“The funny thing is that in 30+ years of computing I can’t think of a popular major product that was outright abandoned by a major vendor who actually managed to stay on business.”
MS Works for one.
Really go to MS product graveyard at One Microsoft way and walk around for a bit. Your memory will come back. There are many products in there Microsoft did straight up abandoned and they did stay in business.
This is the reality you have rose colored glasses on you have forgot the products that were terminated out under your feet. And the products MS left treading water for a long term before terminating them.
This is incompetence oldman on your part.
“who have been known abandon a product because the project is no longer interesting is better than dealing with a company that is in it for the money.”
Microsoft done this quite a few times. FOSS is not different to Microsoft here. Other than the fact you do have the option of employing other staff to take it over with FOSS.
oldman
“Even a company like Red Hat for all their professionalism and quality of offering, in the end offers NOTHING of substance. All they do ( and it is admittedly a big “all”) is provide support for an an open source distribution that is cleaned up regression tested and guaranteed to be stable for production. All of the work that they do is available to any comer, who need only strip out their trademarks and just proceed to benefit from Red Hat work without paying for it – can you say Oracle Enterprise Linux?”
Boy you don’t know jack and it really shows because you have just said something that is a complete lie.
Redhat does more.
http://www.redhat.com/products/enterprise-linux-add-ons/
OS extensions to start off with and middleware as well. Oracle Enterprise and Scientific Linux do lack some features that the true Redhat Linux has. Question is do you really need those features.
Sorry stripping out the trademarks also requires stripping out some applications and some features from them. Redhat is not fully open source.
Problem you have every claim you throw at FOSS oldman Microsoft is guilty of doing the same thing. This would become very clear if you take a walk around One Microsoft way Product grave yard.
If you did a walk around Oracle or IBM product grave yard there products are given up on when no one will pay for them any more and are not using them any more.
Some closed sources are better than FOSS on software abandonment. Microsoft is not one them Microsoft is about equal to FOSS for abandonment of a product while users are using it. There are a lot of closed source way worse.
Yes Oracle and IBM do care about there customers and will support some really old bit of software if the customer is stuck with something dependant on it and even assist customer to migrate so they can stop support on that prehistory product.
This is the problem oldman. Microsoft crap in a lot of ways worse than FOSS. This is why it was such a pitty that OS/2 warp did not get very far. At least that would have seen a decent company at the top.
For those expensive support agreements what are you really getting. This is my problem for the expense we could pay to Microsoft we are better to pay to IBM, Oracle and Redhat and get solutions that don’t have user limits.
oldman and you say you can pull the trigger. I will tell you now you are fooling yourself. If MS decides to end of life a project those expensive deals with them are worth nothing.
Same expensive deals with IBM or Oracle will get you migration support even to a competitors product. Oldman you are forgetting how bad Microsoft does treat you when they end a product and don’t have a substitution in there own list.
Why should I pay big money to a company that is willing to kick me in teeth if I have a option of a company who will not.
oldman wrote, “I can’t think of a popular major product that was outright abandoned by a major vendor who actually managed to stay on business.”
M$ does that all the time. They add a few features, change the price, change the licence and sell the same old product under a new title. They leave the customers stuck with the lock-in of the old product out to dry. Think XP and IE6. M$ abandoned IE6 long ago so customers are made to feel they are second-class citizens with their IE-only apps. M$ manages to stay in business because they fooled customers into believing they had no choice but to keep paying for the privilege of placing restrictions on their use of IT. If retailers everywhere sold and promoted GNU/Linux this nonsense would end promptly because consumers would know they have a choice. That happens in Brazil where a major share of PCs sell with GNU/Linux.
Pogson, XP is still supported.
“They add a few features”
How do they dare update XP for free more than a decade after its release?
“M$ abandoned IE6 long”
Well, of course. Users can choose stay with IE6, or upgrade freely to IE8. Updates can be turned off, if you really want to.
How exactly is this bad, and how is it with that other OS you choose to call Linux? Can I run Firefox 1 on the latest version of Debian out-of-the-box?
But you are being a hypocrit again. First you blame MS for not forcing users to update, now you blame them that they want users to update. Please choose one of the two, and try better next time.
Spam filter at works.
Phenom wrote, “Pogson, XP is still supported.”
Only because people refuse to take another step on the Wintel treadmill. The support of XP is minimal. All versions of XP are in “extended support” phase or have had support ended. “Mainstream” support ended 2009. How would you enjoy living, knowing someone is about to pull the plug unless you paid for a new licence and new hardware?
Take Debian GNU/Linux, for instance. They generally provide updates for about two years, at no cost to the user except the machine cycles. M$ provides updates for ~a decade that slow your machine down, create ever more weird and wonderful ways malware can get in and miss no opportunity to require the PC or the user to “phone home” or buy another licence. Oh, and there are a Hell of a lot more re-re-reboots with that other OS than GNU/Linux.
““Mainstream” support ended 2009. ”
Oh, really? Then why existing XP boxes continue to receive updates?
Phenom wrote, “Then why existing XP boxes continue to receive updates?”
Security updates abound for M$’s crapware even a decade after its release because it’s spaghetti-code and cannot be fixed properly.
@ldman wrote:
“The funny thing is that in 30+ years of computing I can’t think of a popular major product that was outright abandoned by a major vendor who actually managed to stay on business.”
Microsoft – Dead Divisions or Products
2011
Big Data project
Zune
Windows Live Gallery
Hohm
SideKick/Danger service
Windows CardSpace (Windows InfoCard)
Unnamed flagship project in cloud computing
Pivot
2010
Bing Maps 3-D Component
Silverlight (rendered dead for most purposes)
IronPython
Live Labs
Massive (product and division/unit)
Windows Live Spaces (user accounts migrated to another company)
Milo (to be confirmed)
Oslo (key portions)
Vine
Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF)
SteadyState
IronRuby
Quadrant
KIN (Sidekick problems too)
Expression Media (sold)
Slate
Courier
Forefront/Stirling
Windows Essential Business Server
Microsoft System Center Capacity Planner (SCCP)
Xbox Live For Original Xbox Games
2008-2009
Oslo (may be folded )
PerformancePoint Server, SharePoint Designer (subsumed or became free)
OneCare (renamed/merged into another product)
Office Live (renamed/merged into another product)
Forms Server
Automated Service Agents
Connected Services Framework
Microsoft Works
Live Labs
RoundTable (now at Polycom)
Razorfish (sold)
Numerous developer magazines
Book scanning project
Questions & Answers Site
MSN Music
Musiwave
ESP (not confirmed)
adCenter Analytics
Iowa Datacentre
Live Search product upload tool
Response Point
Equipt
Flight Simulator
Channel 8 and Channel 10
Office Accounting
Microsoft Money
Soapbox
Popfly
Encarta
MSN Direct
MSN Groups
MSN Web Messenger
Ensemble
Recite
Dynamics Entrepreneur
Dynamics ERP (mobile version)
For more info/details see: http://techrights.org/wiki/index.php/Microsoft_-_Dead_Divisions_or_Products
Think fast @ldman, what’s your new definition for “popular major product”?
“M$ manages to stay in business because they fooled customers into believing they had no choice but to keep paying for the privilege of placing restrictions on their use of IT.”
Fooled? Hardly. Microsoft had the platform and the ISV’s that produced the applications that people wanted. Competition was nil. As far as “placing restrictions on IT” is concerned, that is hokum. What was done is a vendor of a product sets the terms for the product that the vendor licenses. THose terms set the limits to its use.
Now I realize that this is a problem for someone like yourself who thinks that he had a right to free software, but you don’t, any more that you have to live in your home without having paid for it.
because it’s spaghetti-code and cannot be fixed properly
Where did you come to that conclusion, Mr. Pogson? It sounds like you are just repeating the snide comments from the amateur programmer wannabes that infest the FLOSS world and proliferate such myths. Windows source is generally very well formed C++ classes that have been refined and refactored over and again over more than a decade of development.
Most FLOSS code that I have looked at, on the other hand, is a clumsy snarl of mostly ancient C language subroutines, glued together by someone without a job as a pasttime.
““Mainstream” support ended 2009.”
Which gave XP a support period four times longer than any non-LTS Ubuntu or Debian release. This is somehow a bad thing?
“How would you enjoy living, knowing someone is about to pull the plug unless you paid for a new licence and new hardware?”
What nonsense is this? MS can’t “pull the plug” on XP. When support for it ends, it’ll carry on working.
“because it’s spaghetti-code and cannot be fixed properly.”
How would you know this, Robert? You’re always bemoaning the fact it’s closed and you can’t look at it.
@Phenom
“But you are being a hypocrit again. First you blame MS for not forcing users to update, now you blame them that they want users to update.”
It’s the usual double-standards from the Linux crowd. MS don’t force updates, so they’re “irresponsible” when the likes of Sasser, Slammer and CodeRed run riot after the patch has been released and people don’t bother installing it. If MS did force updates (or even strongly encouraged them) then they’d be only a short step from “fascist”.
Clarence Moon Linux kernel has also been re-factored over and over again. 80 percent + are paid full time to work on the Linux kernel. So that pasttime stuff is a lie for most major projects. Myth repeated by MS Trolls.
Linux kernel might be C but it has a very strict design that must be followed for patches to be included. Linux kernel is using a form of object based C. https://sparse.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Main_Page
Yes sub beast sparse you find extra things in the kernel source that are just for sparse. This tracks things C++ language does not. Like memory accessibility between kernelspace and userspace.
Clarence Moon very little of the windows NT source base uses classes(this covers NT-Windows 8). You can detect the use of classes by the existence of vtables and class encoded into function names these are highly lacking from driver and kernel space because simply they are not used in there. So stop lieing most of windows NT core is basically C with exception handling most of the interface libraries are the same. Main reason C++ is screwed up there is nothing in the standard of C++ stating the format of vtables or function name encoding. So if you want future compatibility you cannot use classes.
Only the surface applications of windows use C++ with classes Clarence Moon.
Also you must have never looked at QT stuff. QT based stuff under Linux is normally very well formatted C++ maybe with a little too much overloading.
The Linux kernel also get interesting when you look at what they do instead of try catch and raise.
http://eli.thegreenplace.net/2009/04/27/using-goto-for-error-handling-in-c/
Lot of goto error handling. Interesting thing is it ends up smaller code.
Then there is a reason why the Linux kernel hates building with anything other than Gcc or something Gcc compatible.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Acquisition_Is_Initialization#C_example_using_GCC_extensions
Gcc has a method of all things in C that allows you to add operations a variable goes out of scope.
The really horrid C stuff you see is stuff that tries to run on gcc and other non gcc compadible compliers. Most Unix world compliers are gcc compatible these days. Normally your cross platform windows Linux stuff is crap.
Gcc compatible C is quite nice C. Pure C not so much. You are lacking so many of the I declare this here and it will auto clean up.
This is why C++ was not exactly that much of a welcome invite to the Linux kernel. Most of the usable C++ features for kernel development gcc c already has.
Reading gcc c on the other hand is like learning a new language a few things look strange at first like the cleanup attributes. Those do add important features. Really the cleanup attributes are more flexable than classes. Since this clean up is not object tied it triggers when ever that particular var becomes defunct. More exact form of garbage collection.
That is a common mistake C on Linux and Unix is more often gcc C. Different beast.
oldman wrote, “yourself who thinks that he had a right to free software”.
To the extent that software is information it should be $0 or nearly so. No one has a copyright or patent on ideas. It’s the same as freedom of speach, religion, assembly etc. The fundamental human rights to communicate in this age depends on IT and software should be $0 or nearly so. Further, sharing of software is good and it’s good for the giver as well as the receiver. I mostly receive but I have written a bunch of software in my day and shared it freely with others. For, example, my Master’s thesis reveals every line of code I wrote for collecting and analyzing my data and designing my instrument. I have “given back” to the community by testing software, filing bug reports, training students, fixing PCs and installing GNU/Linux.
To the extent that software is information…
Software is not information, my dear Pogson. Not by any definition. Software works with information, and its aim is to produce information.
While certain software might contain knowledge (for example, certain implementation of algorithms), there is no incentive that this knowledge should be made widely available to anyone. Obtaining such knowledge, i.e. implementing certain algorithm, can very, very, very hard. For you information, there are many algorithms which are fine on paper, but simply can’t be implemented yet, not with feasible efforts.
Shall I need to remind you again that Google patents algorithm implementations? And they’ve been doing that for years, long before Android was ever conceived by the company that Google aquired?
Help with spam, please.
To the extent that software is information it should be $0 or nearly so.
That’s why you buy licenses. Not “information”.
No one has a copyright or patent on ideas.
Reality says otherwise. And patents were originally created to protect ideas. It may well be that software patents have become quite the farce, but that problem must be dealt with within the patent system, it can’t be dealt with outside of it.
It’s the same as freedom of speach, religion, assembly etc.
No, it’s not. There is no modern democratic state on earth where these things are absolute. A modern democratic state precisely requires limitations to any of those things in order to make living together possible.
The fundamental human rights to communicate in this age depends on IT and software should be $0 or nearly so.
BS. If you want to partake in such communication, you have:
- to be able to buy a computer (in which form ever). These come with an OS. Whether it’s “that other OS” or Android or *cough* GNU/Linux doesn’t matter. The cost of the hardware does matter. Unless you get it from the scrap yard.
- to be able to afford internet access.
That Debian or Umbuntu is free (as in beer) doesn’t matter a bit, if you’re unable to fulfill the prerequisites.
Further, sharing of software is good and it’s good for the giver as well as the receiver.
If the copyright holder of said software allows you to share, you can share. Where’s the problem again? Did you forget again that free software is available for “that other OS”, too?
I mostly receive but I have written a bunch of software in my day and shared it freely with others. For, example, my Master’s thesis reveals every line of code I wrote for collecting and analyzing my data and designing my instrument.
And that comes as a surprise how? Would be utterly strange if you wouldn’t reveal said code if it’s a central component of your master’s thesis.
I have “given back” to the community by testing software, filing bug reports, training students, fixing PCs and installing GNU/Linux.
Not surprisingly you can do all this in the realm of “that other OS”, too.
Chris Weig wrote, “No one has a copyright or patent on ideas.
Reality says otherwise. And patents were originally created to protect ideas. It may well be that software patents have become quite the farce, but that problem must be dealt with within the patent system, it can’t be dealt with outside of it.
…
If you want to partake in such communication, you have:
- to be able to buy a computer (in which form ever). These come with an OS.
…
- to be able to afford internet access.”
Read the law:
US patents: “Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.”
Nothing on ideas…
US Copyright: “Works of authorship include the following categories:
(1) literary works;
(2) musical works, including any accompanying words;
(3) dramatic works, including any accompanying music;
(4) pantomimes and choreographic works;
(5) pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works;
(6) motion pictures and other audiovisual works;
(7) sound recordings; and
(8) architectural works.
(b) In no case does copyright protection for an original work of authorship extend to any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work.”
Ideas are definitely excluded there.
In Canada, anyway, one can find perfectly good PCs in dumpsters or find government, business, and individuals willing to donate old but usable PCs to anyone just to avoid the costs of getting rid of them; so, no, one does not need to have a certain amount of money to afford a computer. Also, I was at McDonald’s Drive Thru yesterday and Wifi was free, so even Internet access can be had for $0. There are whole communities who promote free Wifi as part of the fabric of the community. So, no, one does not need to have a certain amount of money to be able to communicate. There may be regulations/practical limitations limiting the usefulness of free connectivity but it is available.
Is IT $0? Certainly not but it is strange when the cost of permission to use M$’s OS far exceeds any other cost in the system of small/cheap computers. M$’s cost to supply their OS to any particular user may amount to a few dollars yet M$ and “partners” feel it is OK to charge ~$100 or more for use of the product. That does not make sense morally, economically or in any other way except to a monopolist. The fact that they manage in some regions to exclude GNU/Linux from competing fairly, say, bundled with retail PCs, is a crime, a serious offence against the values of our society.
Phenom wrote, “Software is not information, my dear Pogson. Not by any definition. Software works with information, and its aim is to produce information.”
Software is input/output to/from a computer the same as data on a stored-programme computer. There’s a reason for that. It’s most efficient. Imagine a PC where one had to have two hard drives, one for software and one for data. There might be practical reasons like backup why you would want that but it does increase the cost of hardware and is therefor less efficient. That’s the reason most PCs sold retail have only one hard drive, to reduce costs. Also, having software as data facilitates the production of software on any computer, not just special-purpose machines.
see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stored_program_computer
M$’s software-regime defeats the huge economy possible by treating software as data. It’s unnatural. It’s primitive. It’s archaic. It defeats the purpose of creating or owning modern computing equipment.
Chris Weig until recently there was no such thing as a patent that could cover software.
So with the scorched earth problem we have going on with software and with how hard it is to work out where a patent item should end in software. Just maybe the best outcome would be add software to the list of things that cannot be patented.
You cannot patent a building design.
There are three levels of protections.
Copyright, Patents and Trade Secrets. Software was going along quite well only using 2.
Patents are attend to make Trade Secrets more freely traded. Complete failure at this in software.
Pogson, it beats me how you came to this rather ridiculous conclusion:
“M$’s software-regime defeats the huge economy possible by treating software as data.”
Software is not data. Software is implementation of algorithms, either known or devised. Implementation is often hard and costs serious resources to create. Therefore, developers by nature want to protect these implementations, as they want to benefit from them. Only academics can afford to give away their implementations for free, but for many years it is private companies that finance these researches, and get access to the fruit of their labour in return for their money.
Phenom wrote, “Software is implementation of algorithms, either known or devised. Implementation is often hard and costs serious resources to create.”
Software implements nothing without hardware.
It does take serious effort to produce software but the cost to put it on any particular computer is far less than the cost of a licence from M$. The value of the software to the user is IMHO negative from M$ because of the re-re-reboots, restrictions, slowing down and malware. So, on several counts, M$ is over-charging. They should pay people to run their software.
Phenom Redhat manages todo quite well giving most of there tech away for free and selling support.
Microsoft model is not the only model.
oiaohm wrote, “Microsoft model is not the only model.”
Further, M$’s model is not the best model and it may indeed be the worst model for an IT business ever conceived. The idea that a monopoly must be the foundation of a business dooms the business. Eventually such a business will spread so many lies that no one will believe anything they say and trust nothing they do. Customers will flee to safer suppliers.
My impression of the huge IT industry is that everyone has an eye open for an exit strategy. For the last several years more players have at least opened the door marked “EXIT”. We see every OEM shipping some */Linux products. We see new OEMs entering the field by shipping Android/Linux competing successfully with established OEMs shipping Wintel. We see customers lapping up small cheap computers. Nothing M$ does fits the visible future of IT. The world wants to use its hardware to best advantage and M$ is selling restrictions on use of technology.
kozmcrae, in fact, I have MORE choice than you and I think that really gets under your skin.
First of all, I never expressed directly nor implied that I was forced to use LibermanOffice. I can use any software I choose, but you can’t. You can’t choose a proprietary software product or anything bearing the Microsoft name. Such choices are forbidden in the Cult of FOSS. I have both Microsoft Word 2007 and AbiWord installed. I can use them both. You however, can’t use them both, and that makes me happy. ^_^
Yonah from a valid company budget point of view. You should only use software that costs you money when there expenditure is justified.
Like installing full MS Office when you just need a email client is highly wasteful.
Its not just what you call Cult of FOSS.
Like me I only need 1 copy of MS Office between 4 machines. 1 copy on server. Have one per machine is just wasteful. I am only 1 user so why do I need more than 1 copy of it. I really cannot justify 1 copy per seat when only 1 copy would be used at any one time.
Yonah wrote:
“You can’t choose a proprietary software product or anything bearing the Microsoft name.”
The Cult of Microsoft often try to put words in my mouth. Now they making my choices for me. You really are full of yourself Yonah. What is the kind of person who believes they can make choices for other people? I’m typing this comment, like I type all my comments, on a Microsoft keyboard.
Squirm your way out of that one Yonah.
oiaohm, file that one under “D” for “Duuuuuuuuuuhhhhhhh!”
Next, please explain the complicated process of making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I really can’t figure out where I’m supposed to spread the peanut butter. On the edge of the bread slice, on the crust? I really can’t figure it out. Please educate me with your advanced knowledge!
kozmcrae, wouldn’t putting words in your mouth require quotes? Also, I do not have the power nor do I want the power to make choices for you. Rest assured, if I did you’d be folding my laundry and screening my calls. I merely made an assumption that, as a member of the Cult of FOSS, you detest Microsoft products and would never knowingly use them. I still stand by that assumption but I never expect you to be truthful about it because you don’t like being called out.
Talk is cheap, especially on the Internet. Assuming you are using a Microsoft keyboard it’s likely you either stole it, purchased it used, or it was purchased new before you were indoctrinated into FOSS. I don’t need to squirm my way out of anything to call you out. I guess you’re not a poker player.
Yonah wrote:
“Assuming you are using a Microsoft keyboard it’s likely you either stole it, purchased it used, or it was purchased new before you were indoctrinated into FOSS.”
I purchased a Microsoft multimedia keyboard with the rest of the components of my system including a copy of Windows XP service pack 1. The reason for purchasing XP was because I was indoctrinated into using Microsoft like almost everyone else. It wasn’t until almost two years later that I realized I was banging my head against a wall using Windows. I migrated to GNU/Linux and have been blessing the move every day since.
By the way, Linux recognized the keyboard and I’m able to use the multimedia features while watching DVDs.
So you were almost right, I purchased the keyboard before I migrated to GNU/Linux but I still use it because it hasn’t failed me yet, unlike the Microsoft mouse. I use a Logitech mouse now.
Yonah wrote:
“I merely made an assumption that, as a member of the Cult of FOSS, you detest Microsoft products and would never knowingly use them.”
“You can’t choose a proprietary software product or anything bearing the Microsoft name. Such choices are forbidden in the Cult of FOSS.”
“Such choices are forbidden in the Cult of FOSS.” Doesn’t sound like an assumption to me. Sounds as though you read it somewhere in a Mission Statement or something similar.
I was wondering how you were going to try to squirm your way out of that. I’m not wondering any more. You are just like any other weasel in the Cult of Microsoft Yonah. You spew garbage, speak for others and then pretend you did nothing of the sort. You are not fooling anyone here.