Mail Archives: cygwin/2004/01/14/19:18:59
Who knows for sure what the *real* driving force that is behind this
change. However, it is timed very closely (concurrently?) with MS's
extension of 98, 98SE, and Me support through Fall 2006. The current
buzz on this change was that MS was afraid too many "orphaned" 98 users
(currently 25% of Windows users) might "defect" to Linux rather than
upgrade if they were left high and dry. So Linux was perceived as a
real threat in this situation. SFU becoming free may have just "come
along for the ride" in the hysteria. It certainly helps with the story
that "Windows is the best" (so why would you want to leave it) too. But
too much discussion about MS's motives here will get us very off-topic.
Suffice it to say it's an option for some other folks now but also easier
for us to evaluate presumably.
Larry
At 06:52 PM 1/14/2004, Buchbinder, Barry (NIH/NIAID) you wrote:
>Before one gets too excited, one might wait until one sees the licensing
>terms. I seems to remember that MS was all hot and bothered about what they
>were calling viral software. (Misnomer, Outlook is viral software, in as
>far as it is designed to help viruses propagate. GPL might be better termed
>a viral license.) Will the license let one do what one wants to do?
>
>Does this mean that that MS finds that Cygwin (and U/Win, MKS, et al.) is a
>threat? Or that they were not making much from SFU but cannot drop it for
>various reasons, so are going for brownie points?
>
>I also liked the part about
> "The real driver behind this [pricing]
> change is this interoperability issue,"
> Oldroyd says. "We want Windows to be the
> best platform for interoperability."
>Since MS has long desired that "Windows be the best platform for"
>productivity suites, will Office soon be available for free?
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Robb, Sam [mailto:sam DOT robb AT timesys DOT com]
>Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2004 2:43 PM
>To: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
>Subject: MS offers "Services For Unix" free of charge
>
>Thought this might interest some of the folks who frequent
>this list... particularly those who have to support Cygwin
>installations, and might now have to deal with a parallel
>(conflicting?) install of SFU :-/
>
>-Samrobb
>
><http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=17300643>
>
>Microsoft Offers Linux-Interoperability Software For Free
>Jan. 13, 2004
>
>Microsoft has decided to drop the $99 licensing fee previously
>required for its Services For Unix software and plans to make
>a new version of the interoperability product available this
>week at no cost on its Web site.
>
>...
>
>The three main components of SFU--Unix's Network File System
>and Network Identity Service and Microsoft's Interix layer of
>Posix APIs--have all been tuned for better performance, with
>some commands running 50% faster, Oldroyd says. SFU 3.5 also
>features first-time support for P-Threads (for Posix-compliant
>multithreaded applications), a broader set of Posix APIs, and
>updated utilities and libraries.
>
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