Posted by the ManGeek

Thursday, July 21st 2005 2:57 pm CDT

It's no large secret that Microsoft harbors a desire to eliminate the threat of Open Source software to their products. They are feeling the Linux competition white-hot with regards to their servers and the free operating system is even making in-roads on desktops. This recent interview [news.com.com] with their general manager of platform strategy illustrates their viewpoint.

The best assessment I can provide of this article is that it's a strong marketting spin geared towards middle corporate management. Their goal is obviously to state that total cost of ownership, reliability and security is improved by using Microsoft products. Ironically, Martin Taylor continues on in reference to new Windows features saying "this new feature tool we have would allow me to tunnel directly using HTTP into my corporate Exchange server without having to go through the whole VPN (virtual private network) process, bypassing the need to use a smart card." This is a direct violation of the intended security provided by VPNs and two-factor authentication.

Additionally with regards to future innovations, he states "From a competitive standpoint, take Linux, for example. There's really nothing innovative today that Linux does that we can't do." My thoughts drift to the functions of GRSecurity, flexible and secure administrative level access (something scratched at through their recent "Least-Privileged User" strategy), and the 20-year old concept of shell scripting which Microsoft is only now approaching with their project Monad.

Wishing I had an ear to turn at Microsoft, I'd recommend less time spent attacking and defacing their direct competition, and more focus on using their incredible market share and vast amounts of spare cash to invest in improving the industry. If they take the lead and bring everyone else (and I do indeed reference everyone including Sun, IBM and their dreaded nemesis Linux) with them on the journey, they'll find less animosity, more support from the market and dramatically improved products.

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