Sam Varghese
Tuesday, 20 January 2009 14:20
Opinion and Analysis
Page 2 of 3
Tridgell said the deal that Novell had signed with Microsoft had fragmented the community. This meant that Novell could now include patent-encumbered software into its distribution.
He said the real betrayal was that Miguel swallowed and defended the deal. "I respect him as a developer and Mono is an amazing piece of work. But it was a mistake for Novell to sign that deal, just unfortunate.
"Novell forgot who its suppliers are - they should have consulted people like Eben Moglen and the folks at the Software Freedom Law Centre first."
He said de Icaza had compromised on patents and this had the potential to split the free and open source software community. "We have to stand united, else we will all fall," he said.
"Assume that Samba was allowed to strike a patent deal with Microsoft. Then if, say, HP thought they were likely to infringe on those patents, they would pay Microsoft to use it. And then there would be no incentive for HP to ensure that Samba was patent-free. Common users would suffer and that would fragment the community."
Tridgell said Microsoft needed to be pulled into line when it misbehaved, but it was also necessary to acknowledge the company when it did something good.
He said the relationship which the Samba team had with the company had improved over the last year.
CONTINUED
