Microsoft Has A Large Presence At This Year's X.Org Conference

[cyrix]

Yes. This is the work that Microsoft should be involved with. They have access to all the Windows source code. They have access to all the internal documentation. They hold all the keys to making this happen in a much shorter amount of time.

But why? Microsoft has zero interest in allowing people to run Windows software without Windows. They want you to use (and pay for) Windows, so no way they will be making it possible to run things like the Adobe Photoshop Windows version in Linux without trouble.

And that's why they're also involved with WSL: because they are turning Linux into just an add-on for their OS. So you keep using their OS (and paying for it) and they can keep trying to make you use the rest: Edge, Bing, Office, etc.

What I can't understand is why Canonical volunteered to help them make it possible.

[archsway]

Quote:

"We see developers as really important - like the whole Steve Ballmer 'Developers!!! Developers!!!! Developers!!!!!'"

[intelfx]

Just to be clear, that sounds like you are saying that unless you use X11... there is no GUI support in WSL2 (via Wayland) yet

Are you able to use WSL2 and Wayland today like you can with VcXsrv or Xming the day WSL2 came out?

Oh, for unaccelerated graphics? All day long, run a virtual Wayland compositor inside and stream framebuffer. However I don't really care about that. For me, unaccelerated graphics is as good as nothing.

[onlyLinuxLuvUBack]

So many spicy comments. And we haven't even gotten to ID2020 yet.

The spice must flow !

[ThoreauHD]

So many spicy comments. And we haven't even gotten to ID2020 yet.

[t.s.]

Wayland will get there in time, there is no point in forking X, wayland will eventually absorb X.

X is not going anywhere but wayland eventually will take the command seat.

Perhaps we would get there faster if it wasn't for Nvidia's constant sabotage.

IIRC, we've talked about wayland will get there in time at the beginning of this year; at one year ago, two years ago. And look how far the progress today. I really hope 'in time' here not referring to half decade later.

[k1e0x]

Yes. This is the work that Microsoft should be involved with. They have access to all the Windows source code. They have access to all the internal documentation. They hold all the keys to making this happen in a much shorter amount of time.

WINE has been around for how many decades? How many open source developers have spent their time and effort on WINE? Scroll through the credits list in WINE and it is pretty eye watering how much has been thrown at it over the years. This is the one area where Microsoft could really make themselves useful, but no, they continue to waste time on ridiculous things.

Nobody wants to boot Windows and get hit with ransomware, malware, BSODs, poorly tested forced updates that crash the system, etc. Yet this is the path that Microsoft continues to try forcing on their users. It is ridiculous and it will not work in the end. Eventually Linux will supplant Windows OS, just like Android did to the Windows Phone. The sooner Microsoft stops dragging their feet and accept the inevitability of Windows OS being mothballed, the better off they and their users will be.

The reason this is much harder and Wine hasn't been more successful is it's a moving target. Microsoft contently changes.. In Linux their API compatibility has been relatively static for a long time now. Microsoft *could* do it but... yeah right.. why would they? They want every computer running Microsoft Windows and Wine isn't needed on Windows.

[ed31337]

I think that Linux community should try do the same what Microsoft is doing. WSL2 in short it is Linux VM with 3D acceleration (using mapping guest OpenGL/Vulkan -> host DirectX12), so Linux community should try create QEMU/KVM driver that will map Windows VM guest DirectX -> Linux host Vulkan. The problem is that probably without Microsoft involvement - it is very hard to implement such driver...

Yes. This is the work that Microsoft should be involved with. They have access to all the Windows source code. They have access to all the internal documentation. They hold all the keys to making this happen in a much shorter amount of time.

WINE has been around for how many decades? How many open source developers have spent their time and effort on WINE? Scroll through the credits list in WINE and it is pretty eye watering how much has been thrown at it over the years. This is the one area where Microsoft could really make themselves useful, but no, they continue to waste time on ridiculous things.

Nobody wants to boot Windows and get hit with ransomware, malware, BSODs, poorly tested forced updates that crash the system, etc. Yet this is the path that Microsoft continues to try forcing on their users. It is ridiculous and it will not work in the end. Eventually Linux will supplant Windows OS, just like Android did to the Windows Phone. The sooner Microsoft stops dragging their feet and accept the inevitability of Windows OS being mothballed, the better off they and their users will be.

[k1e0x]

They want windows developers to stick to windows, and windows centric companies to not bother running on metal linux

There is a type of modern developer who is lazy and woefully ignorant (they know very little about low level stuff and leverage copy/paste a lot) MS knows this and want to prevent those developers from ever moving to Linux.

By embracing running Linux on top of windows they keep those developers on an environment that is familiar and works for them.

Trying to run bare metal Linux is not always straight-forward and requires to learn. Those ILD (Ignorant lazy devs) will feel at home running windows while they leverage whatever Linux has to offer that is unavailable on Windows for the time being.

MS might not know how to do the extinguish phase yet, but you can count that they're waiting for the right moment and the right opportunity.

Getting into the action right now getting involved with Linuxland and pretending to be your friend is what they always do to any industry they want to assault.

What count is not words but actions, what has MS done that benefits the Linux ecosystem at large? so far: NOTHING.

Always keep in mind, besides themselves, Linux is their only competition left.



They will never do such a thing, MS only does what is good for MS, and this is what the Linux community/ecosystem should do, do things that are good for Linux, however keeping an eye on not falling into traps from the likes of MS.

MS has a money printing machine with their stronghold of Exchange, Office and Windows on the desktop which also pushes sales of windows servers, why would they break it?

Yes this is exactly right. The only reason you might see some Microsoft software on Linux is to collect advertising data. You will never see full flagship products of theirs like Office or DX12 on Linux. MacOS did get office, but it was a cut down broken version (probably only to keep apple from making something better)

EEE 100% it's an old playbook. At the rank and file level maybe many of the employees actually like Linux.. but.. at the corporate level they are a threat. WSL turns Linux into nothing more than a run time layer.

Other OS's can do this as well.. Illumos has LX Zones and FreeBSD is fairly close and can run many unmodified Linux binaries already (such as Skype or Steam). The difference is they are open source and are happy to contribute.

[onlyLinuxLuvUBack]

They want windows developers to stick to windows, and windows centric companies to not bother running on metal linux

There is a type of modern developer who is lazy and woefully ignorant (they know very little about low level stuff and leverage copy/paste a lot) MS knows this and want to prevent those developers from ever moving to Linux.

By embracing running Linux on top of windows they keep those developers on an environment that is familiar and works for them.

Trying to run bare metal Linux is not always straight-forward and requires to learn. Those ILD (Ignorant lazy devs) will feel at home running windows while they leverage whatever Linux has to offer that is unavailable on Windows for the time being.

MS might not know how to do the extinguish phase yet, but you can count that they're waiting for the right moment and the right opportunity.

Getting into the action right now getting involved with Linuxland and pretending to be your friend is what they always do to any industry they want to assault.

What count is not words but actions, what has MS done that benefits the Linux ecosystem at large? so far: NOTHING.

Always keep in mind, besides themselves, Linux is their only competition left.



They will never do such a thing, MS only does what is good for MS, and this is what the Linux community/ecosystem should do, do things that are good for Linux, however keeping an eye on not falling into traps from the likes of MS.

MS has a money printing machine with their stronghold of Exchange, Office and Windows on the desktop which also pushes sales of windows servers, why would they break it?

You forgot "teams" and skype which IT bootlickers are willing to force upon everyone.