Port 25: The Open Source Community at Microsoft : Media, OSCON

Releasing the Linux Integration Component Drivers...

Sam Ramji — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 01:38:00 GMT

Microsoft on Monday contributed the Linux Integration Component drivers to the Linux community for the reasons stated in our release. Microsoft chose the GPLv2 license for the mutual benefit of our customers, partners, the community, and Microsoft.

Microsoft's decision was not based on any perceived obligations tied to the GPLv2 license. For business reasons and for customers, we determined it was beneficial to release the drivers to the kernel community under the GPLv2 license through a process that involved working closely with Greg Kroah-Hartman, who helped us understand the community norms and licensing options surrounding the drivers.

The primary reason we made this determination in this case is because GPLv2 is the preferred license required by the Linux community for their broad acceptance and engagement. For us to participate in the Linux Driver Project, GPLv2 was the best option that allowed us to enjoy the tremendous offer of community support. The community's response even within a few hours of posting the code was welcoming and we appreciate it greatly.

We arrived at the decision to release the drivers to the community under the GPLv2 through this process. Both Greg K-H and Jim Zemlin of the Linux Foundation have reiterated that this is the same process that other companies follow when deciding how to release new device drivers to the Linux community.

We are looking forward to the positive collaboration and acceptance that has marked the vast majority of our interactions with customers and community members regarding this important project.

Cheers,

Sam

Updated 7/25/2009 @ 11:54 AM Pacific: Dave Roberts of Vyatta posted a blog entry rebutting recent cloims that we were accused of a licensing violation with some detail on the technical issues.

Haskell in the Hallway: Sam Interviews Simon Peyton Jones

Sam Ramji — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 23:35:00 GMT

While at OSCON this year Sam and I got the chance to spend some time with Simon Peyton Jones, researcher at Microsoft Research in Cambridge, England and Honorary Professor of the Computing Science Department at Glasgow University. Earlier in the week Simon had presented a tutorial on Haskell titled: A Taste of Haskell at the O'Reilly event.

Taking advantage of the opportunity to have some time with Simon, we found a (sometimes) quiet hallway to talk about Haskell, functional programming and other topics.

Video: Haskell in the Hallway: Sam Interviews Simon Peyton Jones

Barton George interviews Sam Ramji

Sam Ramji — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 19:57:00 GMT

On the day before OSCON officially kicked off I was heading back from the Oregon Convention Center to downtown and ended up standing on the MAX next to someone who caught my attention for two reasons. First, he was the first person to tell me about the Tim O'Reilly/Eben Moglen conversation from earlier in the morning which I had missed. Second he had a cool flash memory microphone that he used to record podcasts on the fly. Turns out it was Baron George (http://www.blogs.sun.com/barton808/), Group Manager, Free and Open Source Software from Sun.

I had a nice chat with Barton (and we helped each other navigate the heavily under construction Portland downtown) and little did I know he also had a conversation with Sam Ramji that day. The podcast has been posted and you can download it here. Enjoy.

From Barton's Blog:

"Topics: Where the Open Source Software Lab fits within Microsoft; How big is Sam's group; When software technologies compete, you win; What reaction does he get when he turns up at FOSS events; Debating Eben Moglen at OSBC -- no one wants patent Armageddon; Is there a Wubuntu in the works?."

Lessons from OSCON Part 2: Sara Ford interviews James Howison

MichaelF — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 20:42:00 GMT

About a month ago, I did a presentation on What I Learned from OSCON, based primarily on James Howison's talk on OSS Communities. Since James had such great and interesting feedback on my presentation, we decided to do a follow-up podcast. I'm trying to publically capture as much of this journey as possible of a team at Microsoft learning how to go open. Maybe this journey will make for an interesting OSCON '07 talk, I hope. =)

-sara

Introductions:

James Howison is a doctoral student on Kevin Crowston's NSF-funded research team at the Syracuse University Information School and a regular presenter at O’Reilly events. At OSCON '06, James gave a talk on OSS Communities, where Sara Ford took notes until her fingers went numb.

Sara Ford is the Program Manager for the Power Toys for Visual Studio. Her mission is to explore the various ways Microsoft developers can have conversations with the Visual Studio community at the source code level, while providing great after-market solutions to developer pain-points via Shared Source.

Lessons from OSCON: The Power Toys Team Learns How To Go "Open"

MichaelF — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 20:16:00 GMT

Be careful what you write on your blog about having such a great time at OSCON, because the Port 25 team will find it! I mentioned that I had wanted to do a second video regarding everything I had learned at OSCON. I was (almost) embarrassed how my first video interview fell into the category of “common misconceptions about running OSS projects.” Knowing me, I had to correct this at once.

James Howison, a doctoral student on Kevin Crowston's NSF-funded research team at the Syracuse University Information School and a regular presenter at O’Reilly events, gave this incredible tutorial about OSS communities. I couldn’t wait to get back to campus to show my team what I had learned and how we were going to apply it to our power toys. So, we all decided to film the presentation in order to capture the discussions of a team at Microsoft going open and have something to share with other teams that are interested. I think this is extremely cool stuff, and I hope you agree and want to see more like it.

As a follow-up we hope to get James in for a pod cast interview in the near future to provide some feedback and insight on this topic. Stay tuned.

Video: The PowerToys Team Learns How To Go "Open"

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Links:

Presentation Outline: http://port25.technet.com/videos/transcripts/sfosconoutline.pdf

Presentation Slides: http://port25.technet.com/videos/transcripts/sfosconslides.pdf

Distributing the Future: Open Source at Microsoft

jcannon — Tue, 29 Aug 2006 15:58:00 GMT

Last week, O'Reilly Media posted portions of two conversations that took place at the O'Reilly Radar Executive Briefing. One between Tim O'Reilly and Brian Behlendorf about lessons from Apache and CollabNet, and the onter between Bill Hilf and Danese Cooper of Intel about Open Source at Microsoft. O'Reilly was kind enough to allow us to re-post these discussions on Port 25 - we're hoping you enjoy the lively, and frank discussion as much as we did. Details below...

From O'Reilly:
Distributing the Future August 21, 2006: "Open Source at Microsoft"
Total running time: 33:40

0:50 Software as Service
There's a lot of software that you use each day without downloading to your own machine. From the O'Reilly Radar's Executive Briefing at OSCON, CollabNet Founder and CTO Brian Behlendorf talks to Tim O'Reilly about the lessons he's learned from Apache and CollabNet. (9:42)
10:32 Microsoft on Open Source
It can't be easy being the person who speaks for Microsoft about its Open Source strategy. Microsoft General Manager for Platform Strategy Bill Hilf talks to Intel's Danese Cooper about licensing, the Open Document Format, and more generally, about Open Source at Microsoft. (22:26)

Production Notes
The initial montage is from Tim O'Reilly, recorded at OSCON '04 in a phone interview with Doug Kaye of IT Conversations, and used with permission. "The future is here, it's just not evenly distributed yet" is a quote from author William Gibson that Tim used with attribution.

Credits include special thanks to David Battino for composing and performing the theme music. David can be found at Batmosphere.com, and he also edits O'Reilly's Digital Audio site. David provided a lot of help and feedback getting this program launched. We used Soundtrack Pro, Bias Peak, and Audio Hijack Pro to put it together.

Daniel H. Steinberg is a developer, a longtime technical writer, and currently spends most of his time podcasting for O'Reilly.

Bill Hilf interviews Matt Asay at OSCON 2006

MichaelF — Mon, 31 Jul 2006 18:33:00 GMT

Matt Asay, formerly of Novell, now VP of Business Development at Alfresco and co-founder of OSCON took some time out of his busy conference schedule to sit down with Bill for an interview. Matt, author of the AC/OS Blog (Matt Asay on OS) is a vocal supporter of Open Source Software and has some interesting insights on where commercial Open Source Software is headed.

In this interview Matt and Bill discuss Open Source business models, monetization opportunties for open business apps, and thoughts on the first days of OSCON.

Here is a link to a recent blog post by Matt that further explains some of the concepts he mentions around Open Source business models.

Big Thanks to Matt for taking the time to join us on Port 25!

Video: Bill Hilf interviews Matt Asay at OSCON 2006

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Tim O'Reilly sits down with Bill Hilf at OSCON2006

MichaelF — Sat, 29 Jul 2006 03:09:00 GMT

While we were at OSCON this week we were fortunate enough to get some time to sit down with Tim O'Reilly. I dare say Tim, author of the O'Reilly Radar, needs no introduction but just in case: Tim is an Open Source Software advocate as well as the Founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media, Inc. He is also one half of the duo that founded OSCON along with Matt Asay. While this is his first time on Port 25, Tim also joined Bill Gates at Mix 06 for a conversation and Q&A session.

In this interview Bill and Tim discuss the redefinition of "Open Source", Web 2.0, and some other topics that arose in the first two days of the conference.

Stay tuned: Monday we will post another interview from the conference between Bill and Matt Asay wherein they discuss mixed environments and commercial OSS trends. If you haven't already, sign up for our RSS feed and we'll notify you when this interview is published.

Video: Tim O'Reilly sits down at OSCON 2006

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Mindtouch: Open source approach to Collaboration and Wiki's

MichaelF — Fri, 28 Jul 2006 19:01:00 GMT

On day two of OSCON we snuck into the vendor fair during setup time and spent some time with Mindtouch, a Microsoft partner looking at new ways to leverage Wiki's to enhance data sharing and collaboration. Interestingly, at the same time that we met them, Mindtouch was making some announcements (CNET, NYT) regarding their company and their Open Source solution: OpenGarden, built on Mindtouch Dream.

Jamie Cannon makes his first appearance on camera to conduct the interview with Aaron Fulkerson (Co-founder, COO) and Steve Bjorg (Co-founder, President and CTO) from the floor of OSCON wherein they discuss Mindtouch, wiki's and the start-up's recent announcements.

Video: Mindtouch: Open source approach to Collaboration and Wiki's

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Shared Source, CodePlex and Powertoys

admin — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 17:10:00 GMT

Sam Interviews Sara Ford, former Computer Science and Mathematics double major and Shotokan Black Belt, to discuss Power Toys, Shared Source and CodePlex.

Sara will be at OSCON with the Port 25 crew. If you are attending and interested in meeting Sara, look for us. We'll be the ones with the video camera, more on that later.

Video: Shared Source, CodePlex and Powertoys

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Related Links:
Sara Ford’s Power Toys as Shared Source @ Microsoft RSS Feed – join the conversation with a team learning how to do open / shared source at Microsoft.

Currently-released Power Toys for Visual Studio

MSBee
TFS Administration tool
Managed Stack Explorer
Best Practive Analyzer for ASP.NET (Alpha Release)
Power Toy Homepage – coming very soon!

Link to VRML Laser demo that Sara mentioned during the interview, but she is most proud of the Reflection and Refraction module.

Note from Michael (Port 25 Admin): Sam's shirt in this video is in no way an endorsement of post Sammy Hagar Van Halen. For the record we would sign the "Bring Back David Lee Roth Petition", if such a thing existed...

Video: Shared Source Development Contest