Practical Technology

A friend recently asked me if I really wanted VMware, a company with a former Microsoft guy in charge, VMware, to buy Novell? His unspoken message was “Wouldn’t that be horrible for Novell’s Linux?” Bless his heart, clearly he hasn’t been paying attention to the relationship between VMware and Microsoft. VMware, a semi-independent fiefdom of [...]

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Novell and Microsoft are more than happy to help you bridge the gap between Linux and Windows. Once upon a time, bridging the gap between Windows and Linux in the server room or the office was… difficult. Today, while no one’s going to call it easy, Novell and Microsoft have worked hard on ensuring interoperability [...]

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For years, decades, the big companies didn’t tend to wage patent wars on each other. The reason is simple. Major patent holders don’t tend to target other major patent holders because of MAD (mutually assured destruction). Or, in other words, if you sue me, I sue you, and we can both burn potentially hundreds of [...]

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Microsoft claiming that it loves open source?! What next? Cats and dogs living together?! Seriously, in a recent Network World interview, Microsoft’s General Manager of Interoperability and XML Architecture Jean Paoli said, “We [Microsoft] love open source” and that “We have worked with open source for a long time now.” Really? But what about Microsoft [...]

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When Oracle sued Google over its use, or as Oracle would have it, Google’s misuse of Java intellectual property in Android, the first questions were why and what did Oracle hope to gain? My only pet theory is straightforward and simple: Oracle wants to skim big-bucks from Android. But, even if a miracle happens and [...]

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