Linux Will Eat Itself

If there’s one thing that can be said for my favorite operating system it’s that it certainly knows how to get itself into trouble. We just got through the not-ready-for-desktop-use arguments but now we’re on to licensing arguments and deals with the Beast of Redmond. In each case, some pundits are decrying it as the end of Linux.

In the case of the GPL, we have zealots versus realists: the guys who want every scrap of code in Linux to be 100% free (as in speech) versus the guys who understand the owners of the patents on things like Flash, Windows Media formats, MP3, and so forth, are never going to make their code completely Free. It’s freedom versus the free market (and I realize in this sense the latter sounds like an oxymoron).

Now the Beast has struck a deal with Novell, the comany behind the SUSE Linux distribution. The claim is to develop greater interoperability between Microsoft products and Linux, and of course there’s the covenant not to sue Novell customers if copyright-infringing code appears in Linux.

On the surface of it, that sounds great. As I’ve previously stated, I’d love to bring Linux into my workplace, but there will always be at least some Microsoft software floating around. It would be nice if all my systems would play nice together, no?

But once again there’s doom and gloom. For example, there’s this Linux Journal editorial by Nicholas Petreley. Though many of the comments that follow refute some of what he says and this Linux Watch column by Stephen J. Vaughan-Nichols is less than apocalyptic, none of this is the real problem.

The real problem is a further fracturing of the Linux community.

I’m betting the Beast is loving every minute of this. Not content (or perhaps not patient enough) to let Linux kill itself with license issues and possibly forking, they pull this “partnership.” Is it as bad as Petreley paints it? Perhaps not, but Microsoft is no doubt out for its own gains, not to make nice. Let’s not forget Steve Ballmer once called Linux a cancer. I certainly don’t believe he’s had a change of heart and has come to realize the benefits of Open Source.

Best case solution, this is just a way for Microsoft to keep a grasp on customers already considering Linux. As Petreley states, there’s the psychological factor of making a C-level executive take a step back and rethink things after seeing there’s a covenant not to sue on Novell products; said execs will wonder what could be in Linux that they’d need such protection. It may also make tech staff (or at least their overseers) wonder why they need to dump Windows altogether if it will interoperate with the shiny new Linux boxen they and/or their peers want to purchase.

Again, that’s just best case. I think Novell best grow some eyes in the backs of their heads so they can keep watch for that knife.

More importantly, the Linux community needs to stick together. Distro zealotry is bad enough, but now we’re dealing with things that will change the course of Linux entirely. If it continues, Linux will eat itself and the Beast will win.

Update: the Samba team has spoken out against the partnership, too.