“Microsoft and Sun redrew the battle lines in the computing world Friday, with news of a 10-year pact designed to better integrate the leading proprietary Unix and Windows platforms and unifying the rivals against a common enemy–IBM and Linux,” Paula Rooney and Barbara Darrow report for CRN. “During a brief press conference, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and Sun CEO Scott McNealy–megarivals whose companies have battled fiercely in the operating system market for more than 20 years–pledged to make their platforms and respective development tools interoperate.”
Rooney and Darrow report, “The wide-ranging pact calls for seamless interoperability between Windows and Solaris Unix operating systems and Java and .Net development platforms. It also ends Sun’s aggressive antitrust litigation against Microsoft and transfers $1.6 billion of the $55 billion in Microsoft’s war chest to Sun, which has seen its profit margins battered by the growth of Linux on Intel servers.”
“‘The deal is an unholy alliance that spells the end of Sun Microsystems as we know it. This move makes Sun the Apple Computer of the Unix world. Apparently, McNealy thinks the enemy of his enemy–Linux–is his friend. They couldn’t possibly be more wrong,’ said Ron Herardian, CEO of Global System Services, Mountain View, Calif. ‘It’s just an unbelievable disaster for the industry. This won’t stop Linux; it just puts Sun on the losing side of the battle line,'” CRN reports.
Full article here.
MacBuddy, OpenOffice for OS X is at version 1.1.1 already. K, needs an X11 window manager since it is not aquafied, so?
Install X11.app from Apple – not real need for XFree86 now and other wm – and use OpenOffice at ease. Works as advertised.
In case you’ve all forgotten, it was only after Microsoft announced their alliance with Apple that a lot of people saw buying Macs as a possibility again. If you’re in trouble, announcing that MS is an ally is good for business. Give it five years, and Sun will be bigger than today. Then, like Apple, they will cut the strings between them and Redmond.
McNealy is being clever here. I guess he’ll take the money, but keep MS at arm’s length.
Reminds me of when Apple bought NeXT. Sounds to me like MS has realized that (Longhorn = Copeland) and is going to copy Apple again by basing it’s revised OS on UNIX.
Who says ya can’t buy friends? Or is it that the Microsoft think tank is desperate for a brain transplant? The much-heralded release of Longhorn is now a major embarrassment to Microsoft and is fueling the flames of the critics and the cynics. Gotta wonder if Sun is feeling a bit smug about the whole deal. If things don�t work out as well as planned with Microsoft and Sun will Sun have to return the 1.6 billion dollars?
Hey, XABEX. So what if I copy Apple? What are you gonna do about it? Cry? Whimper? Call yo’ mama? If I hafta copy Apple’s brilliant model of OS then who cares? I will still own the market place. Ha, ha, ha. You guys are dead! Dead! Do you hear me? My little trolls will have to buy my new and beautiful Unix wonder. Hee, hee, hee. I rule the world!
Love, Bill
Maybe J.D. Rockefeller (Standard Oil Trust) was reincarnated as Mr. Bill G himself. Where is Teddy Roosevelt ,”The Trust Buster”, when you need him?
You Microsoft bashers have no clue. The pundits have no clue. Did you all know that Scott McNeely and Steve Ballmer are friends? They went to the same High School in Detroit and were at Harvard together. They have their differences. But a year ago, McNeely called Ballmer and they’ve been hammering out differences since them. (How do I know this? I saw the video of the two of them saying this stuff).
It does not mean the end of Java. It does not mean the end of Solaris. It means Sun’s X-86 servers can now have Windows certification. Their networking will work together. Java and .Net will interoperate.
Why? What miracle brought this about? Heck, that’s easy. Microsoft losing in Europe finally sealed the deal and forced them to agree to the terms that Sun wanted. They had to pay Sun what they owed them for Java.
It only goes to show that Europe knows what to do with monopolists. And when you do what you should with them, they start acting differently.
Would that the U.S. Department of Justice applied their rules equally. DeBeers can’t operate in the US, but Microsoft can. And it has nothing to do with DeBeers being in South Africa and MS in Redmond. It’s incompetence and selling out to the highest bidder.
Bottom line, enforce anti-trust laws, and even the worst monopolist falls into line rather than be destroyed.
Okay,
So does this mean that Office for Mac will be no more and Office for Solaris will be released shortly.
Will Microsoft turn SUN into their “proof of a non-monopoly” plaything. Leaving Apple by the curb-side.
I tell you if there was ever a need for AppleOffice 1.0 (or whatever Steve wants to call it) the time is now.
Please excuse me as I continue with my Keynote lesson …
Thanks,
CDL
[MacBuddy, OpenOffice for OS X is at version 1.1.1 already. K, needs an X11 window manager since it is not aquafied, so?]
My point was that there’s no NATIVE version.
[Install X11.app from Apple – not real need for XFree86 now and other wm – and use OpenOffice at ease. Works as advertised.]
Running WordXP thru VPC on a Mac works as advertised too. But, not natively, correct?
Yes, there’s a work-around for OO, and yes it’s free. But, that wasn’t what was originally offered. Of course I probably shouldn’t have confused a very slight passing comment that ‘it could be made available’, into ‘it will be available’. But as they had the Windows version (before the SO/OO split) and ‘did’ the Linux version FOR FREE, why not do a Mac version. Chances are, we’d even have paid for it. (No, really)
I really should stop jumping to conclusions
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Anyway, this news was like a kick in my teeth yesterday. I swear it was Friday the 13th. Too many ‘problems’ biting at my backside, and I cracked. (Note to self: Just say no to internet, when you’re already upset.)
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After some pizza, I took a look at the video of McNealy & Ballmer. Interesting body language. Ballmer was too talkative, even for him. Scott seemed very, “uh, let’s get this over with”-ish. (Or was it the mushrooms?
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It is strange that Apple, Sun or any tech company could seem to do better after being validated by the twice convicted ‘illegal monopoly’ M$. But, whatever works. Whatever keeps true competition alive.
I guess Scott will – like a true soldier- be all smiley, until M$ makes their deposits. Besides, in order for Sun to win, M$ doesn’t have to lose.
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This is the true axis of evil….
If Microsoft thinks adding Sun somehow makes them more potent against IBM/Linux, they are once again bent. It’s a hail mary, nothing more.