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Microsoft open-source NT: Linux's nemesis?

malebolgia   on 03 July 2003 - 17:55 · 38 comments & 2158 views

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Munir Kotadia: Microsoft has killed off Windows NT, but it should now release its source code to the open-source community in order to fight off the challenge from Linux.

On 30 June, 2003, Microsoft withdrew support for Windows New Technology (NT). Windows NT users no longer have the right to download updates to Internet Explorer and will not get a patch when new security vulnerabilities are discovered in this version of Microsoft's operating system.

Very few companies are still using NT on critical systems, so the withdrawal of support is unlikely generate any real anger or resentment. However, now that NT has been retired, what is Microsoft going to do with the ageing operating system's source code? There will not be any new applications created for it, and it's difficult to display software in a museum or gallery. So after spending so many billions on development, what will happen? I can't imagine the code will be simply deleted.

However much the software giant would like us to forget that NT ever existed -- and push everyone into a Windows Server 2003 upgrade -- there are thousands of developers out there who would love to have the opportunity to turn the ageing OS into a masterpiece. So why not let them have a go by releasing NT 4.0's source code into the open-source community?

News source: ZDNet |UK|


"But the ironic thing," says Anthony, "is it wasn't supposed to be anti-war. It was mean to make six people laugh. I'm not pro-war but I think it was justified."

"It's just easier to take a potshot at George W Bush than anyone else."

Register fan Anthony says that this was no Googlebomb.

But the most notorious Googlebomb of recent vintage has also been Iraq-related... and was helped the top by the assidious manipulation of one of Google's own employees, one Jason Shellen. Type "French Military Victories" into Google and hit I'm Feeling Lucky and you're told that no web pages match the search string. Not by Google, of course, but by another prank page, this one.

There's an interesting analysis of how Shellen helped this to the top of Google's page results by Namebase founder Daniel Brandt, here. Brandt asserts that Shellen used "cloaking" techniques to achieve this result. Cloaking is the term for feeding Google's website crawlers specially modified pages. Shellen loaded 33 of his archive pages with links to the prank page, links which are not present on the regular pages. So the bot saw them, while we can't. Naturally, Google frowns on such practices and in its FAQ for webmasters warns that "Google may permanently ban from our index any sites or site authors that engage in cloaking to distort their search rankings."

In an official response, Google said that Shellen had not used cloaking but declined to say if any disciplinary action had been taken against him.

Shellen has recently spoken out to assure a panicking tech-blog circuit - a giddy social whirl of conferences and and other airmile aggregation opportunities - that Google has no plans to remove weblogs from the main index. However the problem of downgrading the unwelcome results of blog noise - what one reader called "the lint of the Internet", referring to the low quality of information represented by empty trackback pages and mindless links - is a problem that continues to tax Google's celebrated phalanx of PhDs.

By contrast, Cox's prank has a much simpler genesis. He posted to the Usenet group uk.humour and word spread from there.

"I even heard from a marketing company. But I couldn't see how they could use it," he mused to us.

Congratulations to Anthony, for inadvertently finding a Googlebomb of mass hilarity. ®

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#1 RobertH on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:06
That would rock I hope it happens.
#2 Quick Reply on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:07
nice idea but it's not gonna happen

a lite version of nt going open source would be nicer (minus the password protection algorithm for security protection), but again, not gonna happen
#3 JaggedFlame on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:17
Yeah, right. If anything, it'll take away market share from Windows 2000/XP. Dumb idea.
#4 Unforgiven on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:17
lol, I think M$ will kill itself rather than doing that!
#5 kairon on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:19
Uh, yea, like MS is going to release source code for an OS, and expose all Windows' inside secrets. We haven't forgot about their trickery and schemes have we? Oh yeah, and MS doesn't like open-source either.
(3 replies) #6 gosh on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:26
I think the phase "when hell freezes over" applies here.

-gosh
#6.1 Knight' on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:29
Over my dead body =/
#6.2 Tom Servo on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:31


Ok, where's the sourcecode?
#6.3 Knight' on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:34
LMAO!
(2 replies) #7 memNOC on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:37
QUOTE
On 30 June, 2003, Microsoft withdrew support for Windows New Technology (NT).

doesnt NT stand for N-10, the processor codename on which it was developed/tested?
#7.1 Sawyer12 on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:44
I think it does mean New Technology. It says Windows 2000 is based on NT.
#7.2 Quick Reply on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:50
it does mean N-Ten but that was too technical so marketing called it New Technology which has stuck
#8 zivan56 on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:41
Yes it was named after the processor, but its dubbed New technology
#9 Mr. Black on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:42
This will NEVER happen. Period. Zip. Nadda.
(1 reply) #10 Skyfrog on 03 Jul 2003 - 18:58
QUOTE
Microsoft has killed off Windows NT


That's ridiculous, what do you call Windows 2000 and Windows XP then? I assume the article is referring to NT 4.0, but then there is NT 5.0, NT 5.1, and 5.2 with Server 2003. Just because they don't have NT in the name, it doesn't mean the OS line is dead. If they released the source code for it wouldn't that also include a large part of what makes up Windows 2000 and XP? Sorry but I just the whole article is insane.
#10.1 Techo on 03 Jul 2003 - 21:49
Right. I was thinking the same thing. MS are not that stupid. Win2000/XP are based on NT. So if they open source NT they are also actually giving away pieces of code from those OS's aswell.
#11 corrosive23 on 03 Jul 2003 - 19:04
Hmm lets release the base for todays current operating system. Think the **** is insecure now? Let every 14 year old wannabe hacker see whats under the hood.
(1 reply) #12 HuRR on 03 Jul 2003 - 19:06
does that include Win NT Server
#12.1 roadwarrior on 04 Jul 2003 - 20:54
NT Server support ends the end of this year (it got an extra 6 months to allow time for companies to migrate to Server 2003)
(1 reply) #13 d1301 on 03 Jul 2003 - 19:17
C'mon M$... "Open Sesame"
#13.1 Jason on 03 Jul 2003 - 20:29
Pay up what is cost to develop then.
#14 y_notm on 03 Jul 2003 - 19:21
NT? no way. 9x is far more plausible for going open source, but that's not gonna happen anyway, and even if it did, who would care?
(2 replies) #15 NeoMayhem on 03 Jul 2003 - 20:04
It was suck if they did this, it would lead to more stuff being based on MS's crap

Linux/BSD has everything anybody needs to make a Good OS, if anybody wanted or tried to base an OS on windows, they would be on CRACK
#15.1 Jason on 03 Jul 2003 - 20:42
I would much sooner have an NT based OS than Linux/BSD and when I say NT I mean 2000 / XP.

9X was rubbish but NT based OS's are the in my opinion the best OS's made.
#15.2 NinjaOfLove on 04 Jul 2003 - 17:21
Yep.
(3 replies) #16 Knight' on 03 Jul 2003 - 20:10
I bet NT is really UGLY under the hood....
#16.1 ss1 on 03 Jul 2003 - 20:25
The NT Kernel is pretty portable for all sorts of platforms, but the Userland applications would prolly not be a pretty thing to see.
#16.2 Sawyer12 on 03 Jul 2003 - 20:39
i wonder what language its mainly written in, C or C++ maybe ?
#16.3 KayMan2K on 07 Jul 2003 - 19:08
I would assume NT is written in C and Assembler (for the targeted platform).
#17 Jason on 03 Jul 2003 - 20:27
They should charge the people that want it, what it cost to develop, I think thats fair.
(3 replies) #18 dotnetxtremist on 03 Jul 2003 - 21:20
The NT 4.0 code is going straight to the recycle bin, like it or not.
#18.1 Jason on 03 Jul 2003 - 22:07
So you don't like 2000 or XP then ?, they are NT OS's.
#18.2 FuhrerDarqueSyde on 03 Jul 2003 - 23:09
umm, read again, he said NT 4.0 not 5.0 or 5.1
#18.3 JaggedFlame on 03 Jul 2003 - 23:13
NT 4, 5, 5.1, whatever. It's all sharing the same code.
#19 Hatez on 04 Jul 2003 - 22:09
open source blah blah blah. They're doing this to fight off competition from *nix?! when will they understand that people use nix because they dont like/havent got features that windows has, not because it's not open source...
#20 djze on 05 Jul 2003 - 23:50
Even if this would happen the Windows NT code is overwhelmingly complex, it would take years until any open source project could do anything with it
#21 lj300 on 06 Jul 2003 - 16:58
that would be awesome
#22 KayMan2K on 07 Jul 2003 - 19:12
"Surely there cannot be even a small amount of NT 4.0 code in the latest version of Windows, can there?"

Oh, how wrong this is. Windows XP is Windows NT 5.1 (as we all know). If it wasn't based on NT 4.0 code the name would not be a version number from NT. XP has TONS of code from NT 4.0 - including boot screen and icons! - Microsoft rarely cleans out their code - for compatability reasons. Not to mention the technology would launch several new operating systems that could run MS apps - and Wine could be perfected.

This will NEVER EVER EVER happen (to the public).

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