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Microsoft Reaches Out To Blender
Posted by
kdawson
on Tue May 13, 2008 12:55 PM
from the first-we-embrace dept.
from the first-we-embrace dept.
dmbasso writes "Continuing its strategy to support FOSS application on the Windows platform, Microsoft mailed the Blender developers asking how they could help improve the experience of Blender users on Windows. Groklaw puts it in perspective using Steve Ballmer's own words."
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How to improve the user experience on Windows? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:How to improve the user experience on Windows? (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft doesn't get it. Most people don't get how open source projects work.
Open source projects improve (or are influenced most) by getting patches accepted to the project.
Microsoft is full of developers, developers, developers. Why not just submit some patches that improve blender's performance on Windows?
Google did that with Wine. They wanted Picasa to work in Wine. Guess what they did. They threw money and patches at it. [google.com]
Take a look at the kernel and how it has changed because companies wanted it to do something and submitted patches. That's how it works.
Microsoft is a software company that somehow can't figure out how to submit a patch. Sad. Patch up or shut up.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
For once, this is actually on-topic (Score:5, Funny)
I'm gonna fucking... (Score:5, Funny)
My first thought .... (Score:5, Funny)
Makes me think of cowboys... (Score:4, Insightful)
Irony, much? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Irony, much? (Score:5, Insightful)
Thanks for your battle plan, MS! It's too bad the Blender folks didn't pull a reverse-409 style scam and draw out a new round of Halloween-style Documents.
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GPL is an Open Source Business's Moneymaking Tool (Score:5, Interesting)
GPL is a capitalist tool! :-) Sounds funny, but it really is. Hey, it worked for MySQL, they sold their company for 1.1 Billion!
So, please don't tell me that the GPL is anti-profit.
Bruce
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Re:!GPL != EVIL (Score:5, Insightful)
You got it completely backwards.
It is the GPL license which induced a lot of people to contribute to the Linux kernel instead of a BSD-licensed ... BSD system, which predates Linux by decades.
The fact that because the BSD license did not guarantee that one's contribution will not end up being sold back to the contributor by some greedy fuck, is what turned a majority of contributors away from BSD and other similar licenses. It is why a vast majority of FOSS is licensed under the GPL.
See above. If it were not for GPL, a "most recent" Linux kernel would be still a version 0.6 curiosum found in cob-web covered corners of Usenet and the most widely known Linux-alike system would be BSD with a fraction of a following of today's Linux. It is the GPL which made all the difference. And we have an empirical proof for that: BSD and its forks.
Skipping for the moment the fact that the Linux kernel is developed using the GNU toolchain and that no Linux system can even boot without a whole core set of GNU libraries and tools, it is the GPL which allowed for the growth of Linux. If linux were to be re-licensed to MIT or BSD today, probably (judging by their words on LKML) 80% kernel developers would drop out of the project instantaneously.
Yes! How dare these bastards stop you from taking their shit and selling it for your profit! I mean the chutzpa they have! Lazy unemployed beggars all!
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Re:Irony, much? (Score:4, Informative)
With Blender, as long as those MS file import/export filters work on all platforms that Blender does, sure, go ahead and add support for these file formats. But if the filters use some library only available on a Windows system, then Blender ends up with functionality that only works on the Windows platform. This is great for MS, but maybe not so good for the entire Blender project.
As someone on the mailing list pointed out, the original email from MS is pretty vague as to what they're looking to help with. There would need to be more discussion before the Blender folks could figure out whether this offer to help is something they want to pursue. Hopefully the help isn't turned down before that part happens. Better to look at the technical merits and other factors involved first, instead of just making assumptions it is a bad idea because it involves Microsoft.
There is good reason to be suspicious, but dismissing them outright before knowing the details just widens the gulf between FOSS and MS, and gives them little incentive to even try working with the community.
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Re:Irony, much? (Score:5, Insightful)
OOXML is very bad for doing its own thing where it could instead be using existing XML standards. I think this makes ODF a better starting point for creating an open XML format for documents than OOXML. From a technical standpoint, ODF has many advantages over OOXML due to a cleaner design. And where it has weaknesses, they are much more likely to be fixed.
OOXML also has no actual implementations yet. The company that pushed the standard may never actually implement it themselves, let alone anyone else. Interop is likely going to be a nightmare. The standard is so large that there are bound to be many rough edges where interpretations differ. And in this case, there is no reference implementation to use. You could try looking at Office 2007 documents, but they aren't actually standard OOXML either. Worse yet, most office suits will want to handle Office 2007 files with the same filter, so the code will need to deal with multiple variants of this "standard".
So I agree that ODF does need to be cleaned up. We need to make sure compatibility is actually being delivered. I think the promises and hype from the ODF camp are greater than the reality right now. But it is pretty premature to say that OOXML doesn't have compatibility issues, given there are no implementations yet. Though neither is perfect, I have much more hope for ODF than I do OOXML.
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"support FOSS application"????? (Score:4, Insightful)
There, fixed it for you. Microsoft doesn't want "open sores" (as microsoft shills used to call it), which Ballmer once likened to cancer, on their operating system.
If they could make Windows so it only ran Microsoft programs without losing any Windows sales, they would.
-mcgrew
Re:"support FOSS application"????? (Score:5, Insightful)
Back in the day when 3d applications were on Digital, Mac, and Irix machines microsoft focused on getting them ported to NT. This did a good job of killing Digital, Irix, and Apple. Getting Blender, IMHO the 3d tool with the most rapidly growing community, to run "best" on Windows would help thwart adoption of Linux. Not just adoption by users but adoption by hardware makers. If you can keep hardware makers focused on building for your platform, users will not leave.
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Re:"support FOSS application"????? (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is that, once people start using OO, Firefox, etc., they will eventually realize that they can run that exact same software on a free OS.
The shock of changing the OS and the office suite is a lot. However, if you can transition one little piece at a time, Windows is in trouble.
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And he tells Microsoft... (Score:5, Funny)
FOSS on Windows (Score:5, Insightful)
Interesting example (Score:5, Interesting)
And OOXML.. seriously! Like how about they just release the stndards of OOXML to begin with!
And so it begins (Score:5, Insightful)
So you're moving towards bribery and pollution of international standards bodies and open mockery of the idea of open and standard formats?
Sorry, but after that I would have told him where he could shove it.
It is not going to happen. (Score:5, Insightful)
From what I have read of the original posts on the Blender site, it looks like the Blender project will tell Microsoft to go away.
After the OOXML fiasco — Microsoft must truly be deluded to think this is a good example of their openness policy — it is only right that the Blender project, knowing what would happen to them in the end, should reject Microsoft.
Re:It is not going to happen. (Score:5, Insightful)
Never believe promises when dealing with a company like MS. Require signed legal documents, reviewed by a very good lawyer.
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Natural progression (Score:5, Funny)
2. Get other companies to use your standard
3. ????
4. Profit
But in all seriousness, this is the next logical progression for the OOXML beast. They wouldn't have gone to the trouble of ramrodding OOXML through the standards process if they weren't going to try and leverage it somehow outside of being able to say they have an open standard. Using OOXML would cripple a multi-platform application, but that's not their problem. They've -always- tried to force people into their rut and they've been quite successful at it in the past. I just don't think they "get" that developers aren't going to shoot themselves in the foot by using OOXML.
Have about opening the MS formats (Score:5, Insightful)
What, it's ok for MS to charge people to use their software, but it's not ok to expect MS to shell out some money for other people's software? MS wants the software for free?!?!
mod parent up (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly so. If Microsoft really wants to improve the software... then commit your own programmers to the project and put your improvements back into the community.
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You're crazy! (Score:5, Insightful)
If file formats are not a problem, than a simple, "We're fine for now, but when the issue comes up, I will pass your contact information on to developer with trouble, here's my vCard, let's keep in touch," would be fine.
Microsoft isn't passing any judgment here. Windows competes with Linux in the marketplace, Blender is an application that runs on Windows and Linux, the company that makes Windows reaches out offering to help because they want Blender to run really well on Windows.
It's not about Microsoft WANTING the software for free, the Blender guys GIVE the software away for free, to Microsoft and everyone else. This is simply Microsoft realizing that their competition with Linux and other Open Source PROJECTS doesn't mean that other applications should be supported as well as other third party developers. I'm sure that Microsoft gives Adobe support because they want Adobe products to run as well or better on Windows as Mac OS X, now they are offering support to Blender.
The Blender guys may not need/want that support, but this is Microsoft "getting it," and Slashdot users NOT "getting it." The software marketplace is not proprietary vs. open source, it's not non-Free vs. free, it's product area by product area. I find it unlikely that Microsoft would offer support to the Open Office guys, because OO running better on Windows hurts their market leading Microsoft Office product, but other areas that Microsoft doesn't compete in, they can offer them support.
I would expect MS to be willing to support The Gimp writers as that program gets better, because Microsoft is indifferent between users running Windows/Photoshop and Windows/Gimp, and would like EITHER scenario better than OSX/Photoshop, OSX/Gimp, or Linux/Gimp.
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Like They Never Did with SoftImage (Score:4, Informative)
I was at an animation shop for awhile where we had both the Windows and SGI version of 3.7 and the Windows version *ran* faster, but crashed a whole lot more. Finally the two guys begged for anything, even Indys, to get their work done.
Finally they sold SoftImage to, was it Avid? I can't remember now. It was clear to us, anyway, that Microsoft simply wanted to show that NT could compete with SGI in heavy-duty graphics work, but they did a terrible, terrible job of it.
That said, both Max and Maya work pretty well (I know, Max was always a Windows-only product), but neither were ever owned by the company who actually wrote the OS.
Does MS understand what Blender is? (Score:5, Interesting)
Based on the snip that Ton posted, I get the impression that MS doesn't comprehend what Blender is, or how it works. File formats? That's low on the list of Blender's issues with Windows. Never mind that OOXML's status as an ISO standard is debatable.
If MS wants to support Blender (and lots of other FOSS software) on Windows, they need to put real effort into supporting OpenGL. FOSS developers don't generally bother with supporting DirectX and OpenGL, and most of the time supporting Windows at all is an afterthought.
But, MS won't do it because that would make it easier for games to be developed for Windows and anything else.
how i look at it (Score:5, Funny)
Simple answer (Score:5, Funny)
Does Ballmer really want the answer (Score:5, Insightful)
#1: Fix filenames and filesystem so they match Unix. This means you use the forward slash. Refuse to "microsoft certify" any software that will not accept a pasted or typed filename with a forward slash in it, and change all the OS api that returns filenames to return forward slashes (probably with a registry setting) and again refuse to "microsoft certify" software that fails when this setting is on. And get rid of the damn drive letters (just make "/A:/" be the same as "A:/") and support UTF-8 encoding of the filenames at all times (probably by changing the "a" version of the win32 api to be hard-coded to UTF-8).
#2: Support OpenGL, meaning that by default you get at least what Mesa provides. Supporting OpenGL 1.4 only is not acceptable.
#3: Support C99 standard functions and don't make your compiler spew a lot of bogus "warnings" that you put in there to try to encourage people to change to your windows-specific functions. Remove the underscores you stuck on lots of the functions so that portable useful code cannot be written.
Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Insightful)
here's the thing:
If you can't figure out what stuff does without a video tutorial, then it is *by definition* not intuitive.
I've used 3D application since the late 80's (started with Sculpt-Animate 4D, and have used *many* applications since), and Blender's interface is one of the worst I've ever seen. I'd say it's worse than ever Caligari (the first version) in that at least with Caligari I could actually navigate.
I tried learning Blender recently, and downloaded a video tutorial. The guy presenting it repeatedly used the word "intuitive" - even going so far as to say something like this:
"The buttons don't work the way you'd expect, but once you get used to it, it's really intuitive."
If you don't get how hilarious this is, then you don't know the meaning of the word "intuitive".
Parent
Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Interesting)
So don't use the word intuitive then because its probably the wrong word to use when talking about 3d software. Let's say this instead, once you've really spent some time learning Blender's interface, you will start to think that a lot of other 3d user interfaces have it wrong. At least I did. I used Imagine for years and I thought Imagine made a lot of sense, but after using Blender for 3 months and actually spending time to learn it, I'm so much faster at creating objects in Blender than I ever was in Imagine.
I think what has happened, is that the myth that it is hard to use has preceded the application. Blender is not the only software with this problem.
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Insightful)
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Try Maya (Score:5, Interesting)
Blender is not intuitive, anything but. The iconic interface is confused and the interface is inconsistent. Of the various 3D apps I have had exposure to, only pre-XSI Softimage and Houdini are worse then Blender. Cinema 4D is brilliant for some things, as is Lightwave. Max is a nice app, but getting loaded down with blaot over the years. Again Maya is the best of the best IMHO, while straight modelers like Silo and Modo are pretty nice.
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't doubt that Blender is a helpful and powerful tool if you use it daily, but the user interface has a learning curve like the cliffs of Dover. As a veteran user of PovRay and a raft of other 3D tools I am more than happy with the array of tools Blender offers to create, bend, sculpt, distort, warp, arrange, and otherwise mangle 3D objects, so at an abstract level it is quite clear what to do to create 3D objects. In that sense I am even willing to grant that Blender is `intuitive'.
However, HOWEVER, the Blender user interface is totally unhelpful in explaining how to use these tools. Blender throws at the user a collection of panels and buttons and windows that is different from what anyone else is doing, and requires you learn a vast number of keystrokes, slang terms, magical pixels to click or drag, and all that with little or no handholding. Where are the tooltips, popup menus, help windows, or even just nods to standard user interfaces? And can you please make some of these magical areas to click or drag a little more obvious and a little larger, please? Optionally then?
You could argue that editors like vi and Emacs do exactly the same: they require you to learn magical keystrokes with little or no handholding. However, there you can get by with a limited set of magic that let you do your thing, although perhaps not in the most efficient way. Precisely because 3D editing is so difficult, that is not possible in Blender. You have to learn quite a lot of the Blender magic to do anything meaningful.
I've tried to learn Blender at least three times, and one time I even bought a book to learn it. Every time I gave up in disgust because I just didn't have the time to learn all that magic and got disgusted by the unhelpful Blender UI that clearly has no time at all for newcomers. Every time I decided that I was better off spending my time writing PovRay code. (And $DEITY knows PovRay has its own interesting collection of quirks, weird limitations, and cranky developers.)
In short: yes, in one sense Blender is intuitive. However, at another level it is just a impenetrable jumble of buttons and dials that is more complicated to use than an airplane.
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Funny)
You've clearly never seen how much time and effort new mothers put into teaching their babies to breast feed. It's difficult enough that most hospitals offer classes.
I know, I was surprised too.
So much for intuitive interfaces.
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Insightful)
"The buttons don't work the way you'd expect, but once you get used to it, it's really intuitive."
If you don't get how hilarious this is, then you don't know the meaning of the word "intuitive".
I've never used Blender and can't comment on whether or not its UI is intuitive. I intend only to reply to your comments about the meaning of "intuitive".
To an extent, I agree with you. However, being "intuitive" doesn't necessarily only mean that it's immediately obvious how to use it. Sometimes your initial perception of the basic UI concept doesn't match that of the developers, but once you shift your perception accordingly, then it become intuitive.
Basically, you may encounter a UI that makes no sense to you. Then you learn how it works, but each time you go to do an action, you have to stop and think about how to do it, and rely on memorized steps. This is not an intuitive interface.
On the other hand, you may encounter a UI that makes no sense to you, but once you grasp the UI's concept, you find that you don't have to rely on memorized steps, they just make sense based on your new understanding of the UI concept. That's a UI that has become intuitive.
In other words, it's intuitive to a person who understands the concept. All you have to do is learn the concept.
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a message directed towards all people who are not familiar with 3d applications. Most 3d applications have historically had interfaces that deviate from the standard application interface. Get over it.
As someone who has been toying with various 3d applications since 1990 and having taken some time to learn Blender recently I can say this. Blender's interface is actually quite intuitive and effcient.
Keyboard shortcuts often make for a more efficient workflow, but *having* to use them makes for a much steeper learning curve.
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Insightful)
The problems with the interface for beginners is that not much is apparent - for example, I could create a cube/cylinder/monkey, and with a bit of fiddling managed to make it red and clear, I could sometimes move random nodes. But this was essentially it.
The problem comes due to the heavy reliance upon keyboard shortcuts and unnamed icons, which once learned are certainly efficient and easy to use, but they don't facilitate easy learning.
Good documentation will carry a mediocre interface better than poor documentation will carry a great interface.
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Re:Message to people who gripe about interfaces (Score:5, Insightful)
This is called "consistent" not "intuitive".
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Re:Dumb corporation directive (Score:5, Insightful)
Result: people might have better experience working with those formats when they use Blender on Windows. -> That would make it more attractive to use Windows as underlying platform (if support for those file formats matter to you).
In other words: give a competitive advantage to using Windows, make it less attractive to move to a FOSS operating system.
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MS philosophy towards "openess" in a nutshell (Score:5, Interesting)
http://antitrust.slated.org/www.iowaconsumercase.org/011607/3000/PX03020.pdf [slated.org]
That's MS's philosopy about "open" standards in 1999, and it's their philosphy in 2008.
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Re:They don't really need Microsoft (Score:5, Informative)
LetterRip
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