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Silverlight On the Way To Linux
Posted by
timothy
on Fri Nov 21, 2008 06:39 AM
from the howl-at-the-moonlight dept.
from the howl-at-the-moonlight dept.
Afforess writes "For the past two years Microsoft and Novell have been working on the 'Moonlight' project. It is a runtime library for websites that run Silverlight. It should allow PCs running Linux to view sites that use Siverlight. Betanews reports 'In the next stage of what has turned out to be a more successful project than even its creators envisioned, the public beta of Moonlight — a runtime library for Linux supporting sites that expect Silverlight — is expected within days.' Moonlight 2.0 is already in the works."
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Developers: Sun Releases JavaFX 185 comments
ink writes "Sun released JavaFX 1.0 today, in a bid to take on Adobe's Flash and Microsoft's Silverlight technologies. It is Sun's first Java release to include standardized, cross-platform audio and video playback code (in the form of On2 licensed codecs). The lack of a Linux or Solaris release is a notable absence. The development kit currently consists of the base run-time, a NetBeans/Eclipse plug-in and a set of artifact exporters for Adobe CS 3&4." An anonymous reader adds a link to several tutorials accompanying the new release.
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What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Interesting)
While Windows is getting version 2, and the Mac is almost version 2, Linux is almost getting version 1. Awesome job MS.
Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Informative)
A bit of history. Silverlight 1 is a joke as a product, Silverlight 2.0 is the real deal. To start with, Silverlight 1 does not have the CLR (.Net runtime), it was pretty much useless for anything complex. Even back when v1 was released, companies (and Microsoft itself) were releasing all the cool stuff in v2.0 alpha.
So mono never really had to chase v1, which had zero chances of succeeding. Which is probably why Mono is still at v1. However, getting v2.0 running would not be too difficult. It is mostly a scaled down .Net runtime, with some multimedia added.
And if you have ever used Mono, you would notice that they have a remarkably complete implementation of .Net, with compilers compatible with the newest from Microsoft.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Informative)
Well, if you're still "learning" C#, then there's a good chance that 99.9% of what you're writing will already run flawlessly under mono. It's not until you start doing a lot of tricky and OS specific things that compatibility breaks. Simple thing to do: Download the VMWare image of Suse with Mono installed (or install Mono yourself on a Linux or Mac system) and then just try to run your compiled .NET apps directly. There really isn't much more to it than that.
Tips for maintaining cross platform compatibility in general:
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually Moonlight is compatible with version 1.1, and it was a bigger progress from 1.0 then it is between 1.1 and 2.0.
What's really important is that the overall architecture is now in place. And Silverlight 2.0 is shipped with open source controls (under their permissive license) that will be used with Moonlight with little effort, among other components like DLR.
Also, Microsoft may have helped, but responsible for Moonlight, they are not.
Also, please consider that Moonlight will be in a much better shape than any open-source Flash or Java clones available.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Insightful)
What you don't see is that Microsoft wants to have it both ways:
(1) Pretend Silverlight is open and crossplatform and supported everywhere
(2) In actuality, only the Microsoft version works.
The complaint merely states that anyone who buys into this doubletalk will be deceived. If you want a real crossplatform API that's more powerful than HTML+SVG, you really have only three choices:
(1) Java, which is now free software
(2) Pick the subset of Flash that works with Gnash so that your code will work everywhere.
(3) If Gnash is too limited, stick to the minimum version of Flash that supports the feature you need...unless you're extremely advanced, that version should be available on all major platforms.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Insightful)
If that guy wants linux users to view his site, then he should use a technology that linux users can use. Silverlight is not the only technology to do the job. None of them are perfect. but when that guy made the decision to use silverlight, he knew that linux users were not going to be able to view his site. So no, he is not losing viewers because MS doesn't fully support silverlight. He chose a technology according to certain criteria and made the decision that linux users were not the target ones or not relevant enough.
It is exactly the same as writing a site in ways that only IE can display properly ( or the contrary as I have been know to do due to our user base)
Personally I don't really care about silverlight. if a site I go to uses it, then I assume that I am not the target user and go somewhere else. It is neither here nor there, the information will be available somewhere in another more friendly format, and if not, then I didn't really wanted to see it anyway.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Insightful)
I find this the irony of the situation. OSX and Linux basically came out of the gate with the same amount of following. Here we are in 2008, and who has actual market share? OSX...
What that should tell everybody is that MAYBE its not about "freedom". BUT MAYBE its about getting a computer to work when it should...
I am not saying Open Source is bad. Look at Apache, PHP, and co. Those projects work and are VERY popular. Even Linux server side has more damm success.
The GUI people need to start shifting gears...
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Insightful)
> OSX and Linux basically came out of the gate with the same amount of following.
Yeah... the "same amount of following".
When was that first version of MacOS again?
Yeah, that's right: 1984.
If you're going to lie, come up with better ones.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Insightful)
He was careful to say "OSX", so his statement is technically true.
I don't think his conclusions are sound, though. The fact is, advertising has a real benefit and Linux advertising borders on non-existent - especially compared to Apple or MS. There are no "Ubuntu Stores", no Ubuntu counter at Best Buy... without this, Linux will not gather desktop market share approaching that of OSX or MS.
Note that Linux products that are advertised can be quite successful... EeePC, phones, routers, TiVo, server products, etc.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:4, Informative)
I'm not sure it is even technically true. I can't think of any year when desktop mac sales were as low as desktop linux sales. The lowest point mac ever hit was well into the OSX era and it still had 2-6% depending on how you counted.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:4, Informative)
Well, sure if you measure sales as opposed to installations. But remember that OSX didn't just take off... I'm pretty dorky, and even I mostly used OS9 for a long time since OSX was pretty raw at first. It took a few years before Apple stopped shipping systems that would boot OS9.
Anyway, by definition, anything starting from zero has to intersect the Linux line if it is going to exceed it - so his comment wasn't all that insightful.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:4, Informative)
How do you measure sales of something that is free?
Linux distros don't have to be purchased, in many cases, so are we comparing the number of Linux desktops in use or the number of desktops sold with a given operating system?
Who knows that I am running Ubuntu on a desktop and a laptop at home? As a Linux desktop user, am I the share of some market? Which one?
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm betting that these places have little Apple presence in terms of ads and Apple Stores, right?
Ubuntu has done a remarkable job considering that they have no real advertising. I mean, grassroots evangelism can do wonders - but look at how Firefox took off after the Mozilla Foundation started advertising in more traditional ways.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:4, Informative)
The problem was the US governments retarded export restrictions on encryption and SSL. Thanks Clinton. Like its going to stop terrorists from downloading the codes illegall...
The result has been that many Asian banks switched to activeX controls for transactions since hackers can easily de-encrypt a 64-bit encryption algorithm. The browsers were all crippled so activeX was the only solution available for true 128 bit encryption.
The result is that activeX is the defacto standard for e-commerce and banking so many users do not want a mac because their bank or ebay asain edition requires activex for authentication. I am not too sure on ebay but plugging in an activeX control for any credit transaction is the norm over there.
The Japanese had a love affair with Apple for some time before the internet took off. But now its useless so this is they do not like anything non Microsoft today. Its amazing what happens when one company gets to decide standards to see a monopoly form in the marketplace. I hate ms for this more than anything as its the only reason they are still around.
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Re:What a surprise... backhanded support (Score:5, Interesting)
The GUI people need to start shifting gears...
Been there, done that. The GUI people on the Linux front need to drop dead and make way for people who care about user experience, not self-glorification.
Me, I tried to punch some sense into the Gnome project many years ago. There was a dedicated mailing list for GUI design. On that list, maybe three people had read any UI guidelines at all. Not a single person was an expert in the field. Very few had an understanding that you can not design a GUI in a laboratory without user-testing.
Unless there was a radical shift somewhere - but I don't see any signs of that in the final products - GUI design on Linux is a total and utter failure.
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Javascript (Score:5, Interesting)
With what is being achieved with Javascript and dynamic HTML, I see less and less need for technologies such as Flash and Silverlight. The only thing they really have going for them are the development environments. To see some of the games already implemented using plain old Javascript and HTML:
http://www.apple.com/webapps/games/ [apple.com]
Re:Javascript (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Javascript (Score:5, Insightful)
Try displaying text in any way other than in horizontal line (i.e. rotated, at least by 90 degrees) in plain HTML+CSS+JS, then we can talk.
May I present SVG?
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Re:you need more than games (Score:5, Interesting)
Compare the user experience of loading a page with a Java applet vs. one with Flash or Silverlight. With the Java page, your browser is dead to the world while the JVM hauls itself up from the disk like a brontosaurus. With Flash or Silverlight, the control pops up quickly and the app loads.
This is one thing that I've always wondered about... why do .NET apps, even running through Mono, load so much faster than Java apps?
Serious question; I'm not really a fan of Java (although I use Eclipse a lot and I've written a few Java articles for IBM's developerWorks site), but I do like using the right tool for the job, whatever that job might be...
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there's one thing I'll stay clear of (Score:5, Informative)
Standards anybody ?
I still think there should be a new standard that would obviate the need for flash, you can keep your silverlight and shove it.
Re:there's one thing I'll stay clear of (Score:4, Interesting)
You mean, like this one [eclipse.org] (which is funded by Microsoft [sdtimes.com])?
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I think I'll pass (Score:5, Interesting)
Novell == Microsoft lapdog (Score:4, Insightful)
"For the past two years Microsoft and Novell have been working on the 'Moonlight' project.
Translation: for two years, Microsoft has been using Novell to pretend they're not working on the Linux platform and aren't trying to embrace/extend it.
There ain't no way Silverlight will end up on my hard-drive. Having the Flash player is bad enough already.
Why Is Porting Needed? (Score:4, Insightful)
I would have expected MS to write a new app like that in 100% managed code. I assumed that the Mono project would allow me to run most managed code, maybe with some effort (but not 2 years by two major software houses)
If so, then I would have expected it to "just run" under Mono.
One of my assumptions is wrong.
Re:Why Is Porting Needed? (Score:5, Informative)
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Some remarks and corrections (Score:5, Insightful)
Silverlight is not open source. Moonlight is. It is not a port, it is a sanctioned, but independent, rewrite, which is also related to advances in the Mono support for quite a few things that weren't there 2 years ago.
Those two words are contradictory: you need Microsoft's sanction (permission, as i understand) if you want to develop a 100% silverlight-compatible browser. (by the way, THAT's the difference between JavaScript and Silverlight). So how is it "independent"? Am I missing something here, my fellow slashdotters?
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Re:Why Is Porting Needed? (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Why Is Porting Needed? (Score:4, Insightful)
How else could it be? If you want to open a file, you have to call the system API for opening a file somewhere down the line, eventually. Any high-level API, be it Python, Java or .NET, ends up with wrappers over API calls.
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Would rather Silverlight be GPL than this (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless there was an advantage to the lock in of flash why is there a reason to swap to another propitiatory product? Especially a linux clone that will always be behind Microsoft's offering.
If Silverlight was GPL and available for use by all then there might be a reason to adopt it over flash, but to just swap monopolies, no thanks.
Re:Would rather Silverlight be GPL than this (Score:5, Insightful)
Not just GPL, but GPLv3, because I don't trust M$ not to pull a SCO and try to sue Ubuntu, or Red Hat, or whoever they want to put the squeeze on.
Look - I don't want to be the "GPL is way better troll" here, but I trust those guys about as far as I can throw them.
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People wonder why pro-OSS types have a bad rep... (Score:5, Funny)
*People complain it's not on linux*
*company ports software to linux*
*people complain it's not OSS*
*company GPLs software*
*people complain it's not GPLv3*
*company forces a GPL2 or later licence*
*people complain that the company has a trademarked logo*
*company curls up in the corner, quietly sobbing*
*people complain that the design of the corner it's crying in isn't covered by creative commons*
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Re:People wonder why pro-OSS types have a bad rep. (Score:4, Insightful)
Having companies or people open source their software when not required (ie due to infringements or legislation) should always be treated as a generous act.
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Microsoft developing in Linux (Score:5, Funny)
What about a Windows release? (Score:4, Interesting)
Moonlight is great but it's for Linux only. (Mono itself runs on Linux, Windows and Mac OS X.) That reduces its suitability for making dynamic websites, because Mac and Windows users don't have a free browser plugin to run them with. They only have Microsoft's proprietary Silverlight plugin, and if you're going to require a binary-only plugin then you might as well just use Flash. So I think a Windows version of Moonlight would be cool; just as many people prefer to run the free Firefox browser even though Windows includes the proprietary Internet Explorer, so Moonlight could provide a free alternative for dynamic content.
Re:What about a Windows release? (Score:5, Insightful)
What? Windows/OS X users prefer Firefox because they think it's better than the alternatives, not because they care about propietary soft [that much]. If the did they wouldn't be using Windows/OS X in the first place.
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Re:What about a Windows release? (Score:4, Interesting)
I can't be the only one, surely. But the very fact of being free is some advantage. For example, a free program can support options like 'save stream to disk' or 'block this advertisement' that proprietary software is unlikely to support for fear of upsetting vested interests. If you don't think there is any inherent advantage to free software, and the only criterion should be how well the program works when downloaded as an unchangeable binary blob, then as I said you might as well forget Silverlight and Moonlight, and just use Flash. Its market share is far higher. The biggest reason to be interested in Moonlight is as an open source alternative.
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Now it's clear (Score:4, Funny)
Form Wins over Function Again (Score:5, Insightful)
"Web 2.0" seems to be nothing more than a non-stop assault of useless animations, personalized/targeted advertisements, and automatically-loading and starting background music to make up for poorly-organized sites. Animated .gif banners, despite often being gaudy, were not so offensive as scripts that scour for statistical data about me to offer localized advertisements. The addition of new, non-standardized software to each user's browser is the worst way to embrace "The Cloud"; it focuses on style alone while only marginally catering to the needs of companies and their clients.
Silverlight will see some adoption by Linux users who cannot bear to browse the internet without clicking monkeys to win iPods. I doubt it would hit even that level of popularity before its current audience becomes so fed up with its more obnoxious aspects. The process of understanding Silverlight will be akin to that of installing Flash:
1) Install Silverlight/Moonlight to be amazed by a few useful applications
2) Install advertisement blocking add-on to avoid the droves of awful applications
3) Tweak blocking black/white-lists until Silverlight loses its appeal
4) Remove Silverlight/Moonlight
On the fringe out here I'll stick to elinks where I can get a majority of my information while avoiding information overload.
Re:Form Wins over Function Again (Score:4, Insightful)
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I enjoy the web less and less every day (Score:5, Interesting)
It's a real treat when you find a site that is static html. It's fast, clean, and refreshing. Flash and Ajax have their place, but more often than not they just irritate me. I'm tired of sites that peg my CPU and crash my browser.
Maybe I'm just getting old and cynical, but I'm sure Moonlight will only contribute to web bloat and add to my frustrations. And that is being generous and not bring up that MS is part of the equation.
I just hope this fails to catch on and people forget about it.
can anyone elaborate (Score:5, Insightful)
I have flash in linux, and spend more time blocking it than enjoying it. i have javascript but also spend more time blocking that from shooting popups, redirects, and ads to me than actually enjoying it.
id enjoy java, but its been embraced and extended by MS to the point that no Java on the web works well, if at all in IcedTea (and icedtea explicitly meets all the requirements for java!)
activeX has turned into a security laughingstock...so perhaps this is why we're seeing silverlight?? if thats the case, i recommend linux stay the fuck away from it.
and imho, i think CSS has been the only tech offered to the web i've really enjoyed. the point of the web is to offer something everyone can share, and the megacorps seem to be diligently working to ensure we cant do that.
Re:can anyone elaborate (Score:5, Interesting)
Lists the different approach Silverlight takes over flash. It's mostly about making it better for developers than the end user.
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No printing support (Score:5, Informative)
If we are looking at silverlight as a flash replacement, it is just a flash clone with no market share, so that makes it a non starter. Also, flash comes installed by default this days on every operating system and browser. Silverlight doesn't. That is enough of a show stopper on itself.
If on the other hand, we are looking at it as a way to code the client side of business apps with a rich interface using a strongly typed, compiled language, it could have some potential, except for one thing. No printing support. Printing support is essential for business apps and Silverlight doesn't provide it, at all.
Silverlight ported, nobody cares (Score:5, Funny)
Microsoft today announced the release of version 2.0 of its world-beating Silverlight multimedia platform for the Web [today.com]. As a replacement for Adobe's Flash, it is widely considered utterly superfluous and of no interest to anyone who could be found.
"We have a fabulous selection of content partners for Silverlight," announced Microsoft marketer Scott Guthrie on his blog today. "NBC for the Olympics, which delivered millions of new users to BitTorrent. The Democrat National Convention, which is fine because those Linux users are all Ron Paul weirdos anyway. Major League Baseball, er, forget that one. It comes with rich frameworks, rich controls, rich networking support, a rich base class library, rich media support, oh God kill me now. My options are underwater, my resume's a car crash, Google won't call me back. My life is an exercise in futility. I'm the walking dead, man. The walking dead."
Silverlight was created by Microsoft to leverage its desktop monopoly on Windows, to work off the tremendous sales and popularity of Vista. Flash is present on a pathetic 96% of all computers connected to the Internet, whereas Silverlight downloads are into the triple figures.
"But it's got DRM!" cried Guthrie. "Netflix loved it! And web developers love us too, after all we did for them with IE 6. Wait, come back! We'll put porn on it! FREE PORN!"
Similar Microsoft initiatives include its XPS replacement for Adobe PDF, its HD Photo replacement for JPEG photographs and its earlier Liquid Motion attempt to replace Flash. Also, that CD-ROM format Vista defaults to which no other computers can read.
In a Microsoft internal security sweep, Guthrie's own desktop was found to still be running Windows XP.
In other news... silverlight getting dumped... (Score:5, Insightful)
why didn't this make it onto slashdot then???
Netflix compatible? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:FUCK MICROSOFT! (Score:5, Funny)
In capitalist America, Microsoft fucks you.
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