Microsoft's Open-Source Strategy Coming Into Focus
If Microsoft and OSI come to terms, IT organizations should not interpret this as a radical shift in Microsoft's long-term business strategies, analysts suggest.
Bill Hilf, general manager of platform
strategy said last week at the O'Reilly Open Source Convention in
Portland, Ore., that Microsoft would submit three licenses from its
Shared Source Initiative to the OSI for certification as true open source licenses.
"Microsoft and the OSI are currently in active discussion on this and
additional details will be made available in the coming weeks," Hilf
said in a statement e-mailed Monday. The warming relations reflects a maturity on both sides, driven
by corporations demanding more interoperability between Microsoft
software, particularly Windows, and open source technology. "Although
open source at Microsoft and the OSI are two different animals, I would
submit to you that both are at a point in their maturity where their
constituencies need to become more involved to maintain growth In
Microsoft's case, the reason is simple: Customers. IT professionals
told us they wanted both platform choices and platform
interoperability," Hilf said in Port 25, a blog set up by Microsoft's Open Source Software Lab.
Dan Kusnetzky, analyst for the Kusnetzky Group, said Microsoft, like IBM, Oracle and other commercial vendors, is acknowledging that open source software has a permanent place in IT systems.
"Microsoft is expressing publicly that open source software and open
source licensing is important in the data center," he said. "This move
indicates that open source software is in many data centers, and they
need tools to respond to that."
In a soon-to-be published research note, Gartner analyst Mark Driver
Also getting in the way, according to Driver, has been a "high degree
of animosity" between the OSI and Microsoft. "Many proponents within
the OSS (open source software) community have championed themselves as
anti-Microsoft evangelists and Microsoft has been openly critical of
open source on numerous occasions as well."
Driver credits Hilf and the Open Source Laboratory with changing
Microsoft thinking internally, "This announcement now sends a strong
signal that Microsoft is better able to clearly articulate its larger
open source strategy with less fear of sending mixed messages to the
industry moving forward."
Nevertheless, Driver told InformationWeek that working
with the OSI is a necessary step in a long journey for Microsoft. "It's
going to take them years to show that they're serious about their
open-source strategy," he said. Of course, there's no guarantee that Microsoft and the OSI
would come to terms. But assuming they do, IT organizations should not
interpret this as "radical shifts in Microsoft's long-term business
strategies." "Gartner believes Microsoft will remain challenged in
positioning its core assets both in support of and in competition to
open source solutions," Driver wrote. "These announcements will however
remove considerable roadblocks in better executing these strategies in
coming years." Despite working with the OSI, many open-source advocates are
unlikely to change their anti-Microsoft feelings anytime soon. A major
point of contention has been Microsoft's insistence that Linux and
other open-source technologies infringe on 235 of its patents. The
company has signed licensing agreements with Novell and other companies, while other Linux distributors, such as Red Hat, have refused to make similar deals.
It's also uncertain how far Microsoft will go in licensing technology
under an OSI-approved license. Most of the applications covered under
the shared-source licenses are lesser-known applications found on Microsoft's CodePlex site. It's highly unlikely Microsoft would consider open source versions of Windows or Office, which generate large portions of the company's revenues and represent huge investments in intellectual property. Read more 
community, which it has treated as an adversary for years, experts say.
said Microsoft's latest move is an indication that the company recognizes that open source is more than just Linux
and other software that compete directly with Microsoft products. "It
has assumed that any direct investment or interaction with OSS (open
source software) would send a false signal to the industry regard its
long-term business strategies, (which is) a heavy focus on intellectual
property investment and control," Driver said. "Consequently, Microsoft's messaging regarding open source has been inconsistent and confusing."
