Monday, June 04, 2018

Engulf, assimilate and pervert.

Microsoft bought Github for $7.5 BILLION dollars.

If you are not now screaming at your computer screen, you are not a software developer.

That is all, as you were.

The Developing Phantom


Robin Munn said...

Having watched Microsoft's work over the past couple of decades, I'm not as worried as you seem to be. Microsoft is following the same route that IBM followed: they (both of them) used to be very anti-competitive companies, but then their income stream shifted to things where they actually benefit from cooperation. In IBM's case, it was selling servers that ran Apache; in Microsoft's case, it's selling services on Azure (where having serious Linux infrastructure behind the scenes is a big win for them). And I've also been watching Microsoft run a really *good* open-source project: Visual Studio Code, which has quickly become my favorite editor.

If Microsoft was still the "old" Microsoft of the 90's and 2000's, then I'd also be worried. But ever since Satya Nadella took over as CEO from Steve Ballmer in 2014, he's taken Microsoft in very different directions from the Gates & Ballmer eras. Very early on in his role as CEO, he announced that "Microsoft ♥ Linux", and the actions Microsoft has taken since then have proved that he's sincere. For example, they've invested serious work into making sure that .Net Core runs just as well on Linux as on other systems, and made sure that an official .Net Core installer exists for almost every major Linux system out there, including at least one (Alpine Linux) that I hadn't heard of at all before Microsoft's announcement that ".Net Core now has an official installer for Alpine Linux, as many of you have requested".

So as a developer, I'm not worried about this. And if I prove to be wrong, it's actually not that hard to move from Github to a different hosting service. There's competition: Bitbucket, Gitlab, Kiln, and many others, and because every Git repo is a complete copy of the project, Microsoft couldn't hold your code hostage even if they wanted to. Transferring to a different issue tracker would be the only real problem.

The Phantom said...

That's true, Robin. But it cannot be denied that Microsoft has a remarkably poor reputation in the developer community. One need only recall Skype and Mincraft to see it. Or if you want to go WAY back, do you remember how every new DOS and early Windows release used to break Lotus and Word Perfect? Every single time.

I use Microsoft products every day, for writing. This blog is done on Win 10 on my end. Having said that, Win 10 is the first Windows release where the networking is less trouble than Sneakernet between Windows machines. Yes, it has been -possible- to network since Win 98, but no, it is not easy and for some releases simply impractical.

Networking in Windows still doesn't see Apple products. Not Macs, or tablets, or phones. It also can't see WinXP boxes or Android devices. Which is idiotic, my crappy Linux NAS sees them all as soon as I plug it in. My phone sees Windows and Mac both. It isn't a technical issue, it is sales department flimflammery.

That type of walled-garden approach by MS is reason enough to approach the Github sale with trepidation. They're liable to mess it up as a piece of business vandalism, to f- over the non-Windows developers.

Problem is of course that even if they don't, a large cohort thinks they will. There's money at stake, after all.

Robin Munn said...

All of those problems except the networking one were created under the Gates/Ballmer era. The one where Windows doesn't see Apple products — does it see your Linux computer(s)? If so, then I'm personally more inclined to blame Apple than to blame Microsoft: I've seen Apple moving more and more towards a walled-garden approach in the past few years, to the point where I can no longer recommend OS X to people. (E.g., you can't plug an iPhone into a Linux box and have things Just Work™ to transfer files, because iPhone speaks a proprietary protocol over its USB connection. At least that was the case back in the iPhone 3 era; I don't know what modern iPhones are like because when that phone died, I ditched Apple products and never looked back. They just don't play nice with the other children.)

Also, when you say "doesn't see Apple products"... do you mean the Windows networking/file-sharing stack, a.k.a. SMB? (Which is, I'll grant, a piece of cr*p for multiple reasons, but they have too much software they have to maintain backwards-compatibility with to ever change it now.) Or do you mean it can't ping them or exchange IP packets? I doubt it's the latter, because I've seen that work just fine — but I wouldn't be at all surprised if it was the former. And if it's the Windows file-sharing stack that doesn't see your Apple products... do your Apple products have SMB turned on?

Anyway, I'm not here to play troubleshooter over blog comments, since I really should be working on something else right now. I just want to point out that the "walled garden" approach is not unique to Microsoft (in fact, I used the phrase "walled garden" myself back when I ditched Apple and never looked back*), and they've been moving *away* from it since Nadella took over.

* Case in point: this thread from 2012 where it's mentioned that Apple was defaulting their security settings to only allow installing software from their App Store (where they take a 30% cut). Goodbye buying something online and downloading an installer: now you have to pay 42% more for that software for the programmer to make the same amount of money (for him to make $1.00 after a 30% cut, you have to pay $1.42, because 70% of 1.42 is 1.00), or else the programmer has to take a 30% cut in profits. Now, back in 2012 you could still change that setting back to allow software installations from non-App Store locations. Can you still change that setting? Probably — but as I said, I haven't used Apple products in over six years now so I really don't know. And I wouldn't be at all surprised if at some point, they quietly turned off your ability to change that setting. For your "security", don'chaknow, because if you can download unapproved software, heavens! You could install a virus! Pay no attention the increase in Apple profits behind the curtain...

The Phantom said...

No arguments here. I hate Apple stuff. Source of constant irritation around Chez Phantom.