Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft Only Gave 14,010 Lines of Code

Source code



Summary: 14,010 lines of actual Linux code, not 20,000 as Microsoft claimed

Microsoft has claimed that its self-serving loadable module for Linux [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7], which only advances Microsoft's interests by polluting the kernel with Microsoft APIs, comprises 20,000 lines of code. Not quite the case, alleges Slated, who has taken a look at the code. Last night he wrote about this patch (managed by a Novell employee by the way):



For those who might want to keep an eye on what the Vole is injecting into the software we use:

http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/gregkh/gregkh..

The consolidated patch is here:

http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/gregkh...

This is essentially what it adds:

. Microsoft Hyper-V client drivers . Microsoft Hyper-V virtual storage driver . Microsoft Hyper-V virtual block driver . Microsoft Hyper-V virtual network driver

The kernel config options are listed as:

. CONFIG_HYPERV . CONFIG_HYPERV_STORAGE . CONFIG_HYPERV_BLOCK . CONFIG_HYPERV_NET

Here's the license:

Copyright (c) 2009, Microsoft Corporation.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms and conditions of the GNU General Public License, version 2, as published by the Free Software Foundation.

This program is distributed in the hope it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA.

Authors: Hank Janssen <hjanssen[at]microsoft.com> ######



Oh and BTW, after removing all the non-Microsoft copyrighted code from the above consolidated patch, all the diff declaration headers, and all the empty lines, the number of lines remaining (i.e. the actual code Microsoft generously "contributed") is 14,010, which is a good six thousand lines short of Microsoft's claim.

That's OK though ... it's six thousand fewer lines for me to remove.


Microsoft contributes nothing to Linux, except lawsuits for the most part. Microsoft funded SCO's lawsuit against Linux (more than once) and right now Microsoft is suing companies for using Linux (also more than once). People who do not yet know all of this ought to wake up and get the facts. Microsoft is always attacking Linux and the code mentioned above is no contribution. If Oracle writes a new file system for Linux (btrfs as the example in mind), then that file system is valuable also to IBM, to H-P and even to us home users. It really enriches Linux. Microsoft's patch, on the other hand, is helping nothing but Windows, turning GNU/Linux servers into just a virtual appliance running under Windows.

“Microsoft funded SCO's lawsuit against Linux (more than once) and right now Microsoft is suing companies for using Linux (also more than once).”Whenever Microsoft claims that it "contributes" to Linux, remember that its long-standing CEO, Steve Ballmer, said: "Linux is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches."

Ballmer never retracted that statement and under his leadership Microsoft has also paid SCO, as confirmed in the courtroom under oath. For background about the past month's SCO developments (a little from June too), see:



More bizarre twists in the SCO case have only led to the point where, according to Pamela Jones, SCO is nearly finished for good.

So those are the various possibilities I see. Do you see any good ones, if you are SCO management? I don't see even one. If we are marking on a curve, SCO's suggestion in its letter is the least toxic, but none of the possibilities now are really ideal from SCO's point of view, and how realistic do you think it is as a suggestion at this late date, considering all that came out in discovery and at the hearing?

I think this may be the very first time in the entire SCO saga where SCO seems to have no really good options on the table that I can see.

And that's probably why after the hearing on the 27th, I was overwhelmed by the incandescent realization that we had just turned a real corner, one that changes everything, and that we're in end-game territory, at last.


Microsoft may have moved on from SCO. Now it has Novell at its disposal -- the company which is the real owner of UNIX. SCO -- like Microsoft and Novell -- also used to contribute to Linux before chaos began.

"Pamela Jones [...] has told Infoworld that Microsoft will be the next SCO Group"

--Heise



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