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Microsoft Windows

FSF Sends Microsoft A Blank Hard Drive For Sending Back The Windows 7 Source Code (fsf.org) 144

The Free Software Foundation sent Microsoft a hard drive for Valentine's Day -- along with a petition calling for the release of the source code for Windows 7 (which is no longer supported by Microsoft): It's as easy as copying the source code, giving it a license notice, and mailing it back to us. As the author of the most popular free software license in the world, we're ready to give them all of the help we can. All they have to do is ask.

We want them to show exactly how much love they have for the "open source" software they mention in their advertising. If they really do love free software -- and we're willing to give them the benefit of the doubt -- they have the opportunity to show it to the world. We hope they're not just capitalizing on the free software development model in the most superficial and exploitative way possible: by using it as a marketing tool to fool us into thinking that they care about our freedom.

Together, we've stood up for our principles. They can reject us, or ignore us, but what they cannot do is stop us. We'll go on campaigning, until all of us are free.

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FSF Sends Microsoft A Blank Hard Drive For Sending Back The Windows 7 Source Code

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  • by bobstreo ( 1320787 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @12:47PM (#59731296)

    to a blank hard drive.

    7 was a pretty good release for it's time. 8 and 10 have been nothing but unadulterated trash.

    • by Immerman ( 2627577 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @01:17PM (#59731358)

      Which is why it would be utterly stupid for Microsoft to open source their last really good OS. It would utterly gut their current stranglehold on the OS market.

      The open letter was slightly amusing - now they're just beating a long-dead horse.

      • by rtb61 ( 674572 )

        Well, it is election season, a right of repair is flavour of the month. So do all of us not have the right to repair the software on the systems we own, when the seller refuses to do so. Not asking for updates but to repaid as yet undiscovered bugs, basically it's broken from day 1 and still broken many years later and in a still broken state, they refuse to repair it. Now that's some criminal business, what other product would be accepted in that state. There should be a law, and this is the time to start

      • It's not that that'll stop them, it's legal issues. For starters, the minute they release it every patent troll in the US will be digging through it trying to find things they can sue MS for: use of boolean variables, the addition operation, square desktop windows, all the other stuff the USPTO has rubber-stamped troll patents for. Next, Windows contains quite a bit of proprietary stuff licensed from third parties, none of which can be released without their permission, so someone would have to go through

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        I wonder how long hardware will keep supporting Windows 7 though. Now Windows 7 is officially deal I can't see manufacturers investing the time and energy into testing their drivers with it.

        AMD GPUs dropped support for Windows 8 years ago because no one uses it too, and that's still a current version!

        • Far, far longer I suspect, if it were the basis of a selection of free, Open Source Windows distros.

          Windows 8 was never terribly popular - and even with free upgrades it took years for Windows 10 to claim the majority of the Windows market.

    • I'd pay $50 (Score:5, Interesting)

      by John.Banister ( 1291556 ) * on Saturday February 15, 2020 @03:07PM (#59731614) Homepage
      I'd buy a single user license for a proprietary MSwine that lets users run hardware accelerated Win7 CAD, CAM, and Image editing software on Linux. I suppose within 5 years, the free version will do well enough, but I'd pay for a proprietary version now, for the convenience.
    • All the things people seem to hate about Windows 8 and later exist in user space. The kernel is still (where it counts) the Windows NT we know and love. There are so many ways to run Windows without using the default shell that any experienced user should be able to craft a satisfying experience.
      • Agreed, 8 can be beaten into shape quite easily with a few tweaks. Bought a copy specifically because it's supported (to whatever degree Microsoft obligates themselves to do so) until 2023. Easily achieves sub-10 second boot times (after POST) on decent machines, also. I've never managed anything close to this with 7 (using adjustments made to an OEM/retail installation), but have come somewhat close with 10.
  • by stikves ( 127823 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @12:52PM (#59731302) Homepage

    If you are a big enough customer (with at least 10,000 installations), Microsoft already offers the source code:
    https://www.microsoft.com/en-u... [microsoft.com]

    They also allow governments to audit the code, and I am 99% sure, they would have collaborations with academic personnel on private projects.

    However *why* would they want to share the code with *you* (or me)?
    At best, it is a liability,
    Worst case it opens them to litigation (due to third party licenses they have to share along).

    • I doubt that comes with build tools though.

      I bet the build process for Windows is insanely complicated, even if they did give FSF the code I doubt they'd include the build docs and then FSF could spend the next decade figuring out how the build the fucking mess. I'm sure MS has things automated to an extreme degree (build farms etc) but there's no fucking way they give out that kind of infrastructure code.

      Stupid PR Stunt is Stupid.

      • by Eravnrekaree ( 467752 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @03:13PM (#59731644)

        The build procedure is not too complicated and not something which is hard to overcome. If they did decide to open source, they would include any build scripts. Why wouldn't they? The compiler is just the usual C/C++ compiler.

        I don't know why people are complaining about FSF making a harmless request, using all of these nonsensical and absurd arguments. I can't make any sense of why people are so upset over this.

        • Two words: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Grog6 ( 85859 )

          Microsoft Shills.

          These guys will go bankrupt is someone releases a real Windows OS, that doesn't need "Specialized Developers" to make programs that run decently.

          The OS as written has multiple paths, ones that work well, and ones that are slow on purpose; pay lots of money, they'll tell you how to write programs that use the Fast path, and don't crash with some indeterminable error.

        • by King_TJ ( 85913 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @04:07PM (#59731732) Journal

          Personally, I don't care much either way. But I can see why people would be upset by this request, considering Windows 7 was a commercially produced product costing untold millions of dollars in development money (all the salaries of programmers who helped code it, QA test it, etc.) -- not to mention the money spent to market it.

          Just because Microsoft doesn't actively support it anymore doesn't mean they "owe" anyone a free copy of the source code to it.

          Sure, it would be a great gesture for Microsoft to hand it over. But the FSF seems to be framing it as, "Either give us your source code, or we're going to bash you and any commitment you claim to have to the community until you change your mind!" That's a pretty hostile attitude to take!

          It's the entitlement attitude of it all that leaves a bad taste in my mouth, more than the suggestion itself. I can see a lot of great things that would come of Windows 7 getting open sourced. But I also feel like the FSF deserves a big fat, "Hell no!" response from Microsoft, just for bringing the attitude they've got over it.

      • I doubt that comes with build tools though.

        This was Windows XP days but a friend was a PhD candidate doing operating systems research. His advisor had a secured lab with the XP source code. They built from source all the time. A full/initial build took a long time to build. A go home and come back tomorrow morning sort of long. After that it was OK, at least for the parts they were tweaking.

        So complete source and build environments have been available to select parties.

    • "they would have collaborations with academic personnel on private projects" - and then a student walks in with a cheap thumbdrive and copies the data. I'm sure the W7 source code had been leaked on the net years ago, but it can't be used legally. I am reminded of the Doom 2 Massmouth TC which you have to break in and steal the super secret Windows source code CD that's under guard by ninja-clad mercinaries repeling down on ropes. If they wanted realism, they would have had it in a university building behi
      • "they would have collaborations with academic personnel on private projects" - and then a student walks in with a cheap thumbdrive and copies the data.

        Windows NT source was kept in secure labs on campus. Access to project members only. This included students but we are talking select MS or PhD candidates. Someone doing research with, for or under the supervision of (ie MS or PhD advisor) the professor whose lab it is. Needless to say, this was for people doing research related to operating systems. These students tended not to be religious regarding their operating system and not interested in flushing their careers.

        Memory sticks and external drives we

    • Nonsense. There is no liability because it would go under an open source license, and already is under various other licenses that include waivers.

      Third party code components do not have to be released.

      • Some of the Windows code isn't owned by Microsoft. It's owned by other companies, which Microsoft then licensed it from. Without the right to redistribute in source form.

        There's also a good chance that somewhere, deep in the Windows source, are big chunks of code which have been shamelessly copied from open source projects or answers on stackoverflow. Microsoft's legal team would never allow it, of course, but... busy developers, time pressure, who is to know if they strip the comments and move a few indent

  • I appreciate they're trying to pull of a PR stunt but this seems a little disingenuous to MS. Alright they've done very iffy stuff over the years but they've been a little more open for at least the last 5 years, they're not perfect but the MS today is not the same MS as they were 25 years ago. Much as I love FOSS, the source code MS wrote is theirs by rights and MS get to decide whether others get to see it or not.

    I'm a Linux fan, I my main work desktop is Mint which I use for managing several thousand sys

  • by TurboStar ( 712836 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @01:06PM (#59731328)

    "It's as easy as copying the source code, giving it a license notice, and mailing it back to us." said the organization which has obviously never dealt with copyright law. Wait. Wut?

  • by jfdavis668 ( 1414919 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @01:07PM (#59731330)
    and send it back. Somewhere in there will be the source code. You just need to figure out where the 0s are supposed to go.
    • and send it back. Somewhere in there will be the source code. You just need to figure out where the 0s are supposed to go.

      That would be awesome. We'd get *half* of the source code...

  • by williamyf ( 227051 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @01:12PM (#59731344)

    And they are right not to do it. OpenSourcing Windows would require time, people and resources.
    Let's say, for the sake of argument, that Microsoft decided to devote those to OpenSource Windows...

    The people (programmers, lawyes and PR) devoted to the project need to clean the code so that:
    1.) The code is readable and useful.
    2.) There are no unasvoury comments (sexist, racist, SJW, swear words, etc.) so that MS does not get a media shitstorm. Think of Disney movies like Song of the South. What was "normal" in 1946, is an embarrasement now. Think of some of the comments on code dragged from Win3.0 in 1980s would look like today...
    3.) There is no 3rd party licensed code released.
    4.) There is no patented code released.

    Do you believe that these people will do a 100% correct job and absolutely positively no instances will slip by? Judging by last patch tuesday (with 99 fixes), highly unlikely.

    But, let's say, again for the sake of argument, that indeed, the work is 100% correct, and absolutely no patented code or licensed code sliped by.

    Are you all certain that, in the litigious society that is the USoA, no company will make a mistake and 'honestly believe' that their code/patent was infringed? And are you all sure that less scrupulous players will not frivolously sue Microsoft hoping to get someting?

    And, if the lawsuits come, are you 100% sure that the juries of your peers (peers who do not know how to program) will make no mistake and rule in favour of Microsoft, including legal costs?

    And, again, please remind me what does Microsoft win from releasing the Windows Source....

    So no, Microsoft will not release the source code of Windows, and, as much as I like Open Source, I can understand perfectly why not.

    • 4.) There is no patented code released.

      This is the real crux of the matter, IMO.

      Esp. if it's someone else's patent(s).

      It's said that confession is good for the soul. But there ain't no way MSFT is going to risk showing their code to the world so that patent holders can start suing them for infringement.

    • You make some valid points, but what does that say about the Windows development process that such delineation isn't already in place? That this is a problem in general speaks to the omelet that's proprietary development where everything is just thrown together and hope for the best.

      • It says that they focus on the things that are more important?

        Clean up suitable for third party release is at best useless, and most likely not even possible. MS surely licenses either code or patents, you can't 'clean up' the third party code and still have the product they want to ship.

      • Not really. There's a big difference between code for private and public consumption. Points 2 3 and 4 go away when you keep your code to yourself. Point 1 at worst gives you an inefficiency, at best it is actually a case of proprietary documentation systems that hold it together which may or may not be openly published (think software specifications and coding guidelines).

        That this is a problem in general speaks to the omelet that's proprietary development where everything is just thrown together and hope for the best.

        Ironically that pretty much defines open source. Yeah sure there's a chef checking to see the ingredients are somewhat correct, but an o

    • by alanw ( 1822 )

      +1 on this.

      About 20 years ago I was responsible for taking the code for OpenSTA [wikipedia.org], a web/database server performance measuring tool and releasing it under the GPL. As the OP points out, 3rd party code, and unsavoury comments, plus all the personal names/IDs needed to be removed. Not an quick or easy task, even for (sloccount) 235k lines of code, never mind a full OS.

      Its a noble, yet futile gesture.

    • These are all nonsense arguments.

      Microsoft has already released significant and massive sections of code including the entire .NET system.

      1) Most Micosoft code is quite readable. Even if its not readable, its hard to argue that its better for it to be closed source than open source. No time has to be spent fixing it up because there is nothing to lose from it being released, readable or not.

      2)If found, can be revised out. Very little of this exists, if at all. Again, refer back to the millions of lines of M

    • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      Windows, or significant parts of it, is already open source.

      What it's not is Free Software.

      The difference is important - Microsoft has provided the source code to many companies and agencies, however many of the licenses are open-source, but not free software. The typical license doesn't even let you compile the code - you can certainly look and study it, but you are prohibited from compiling it. Other people have license to compile, but not to distribute, so they could customize a component , but not give

  • It would be simple for some sympathetic employee at Microsoft to run a git checkout on a hard drive and upload it somewhere on ipfs or bittorrent. even if a court case happened it would be streisand effected all over the internet. It happened to Opera and their old presto engine.
    • It would be simple for some sympathetic employee at Microsoft to run a git checkout on a hard drive and upload it somewhere on ipfs or bittorrent.

      I don't think you realize the levels of security they go through to prevent exactly this. I assure you that no developer is going to walk out the front door with a hard drive in the backpack.

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • by cusco ( 717999 )

        I set up the security on a good chunk of the buildings in Redmond where the developers work. People walk out of there with desktop computers and monitors, I'm not sure where you got the idea that they're hermetically sealed.

        The main obstruction would be access to the repository. Almost no one has global access to everything in the software repository, your access is limited to those portions which you actually need. There are procedures to get access to more if you can show valid reasons, but there would

    • by ledow ( 319597 )

      There are governments and organisations the world over in possession of the Windows source code.

      Good luck fighting the people who convinced the US that they weren't a monopoly, and dragged out a lawsuit with the EU for 20+ years, after being found to have uploaded their source to a public repository.

  • Windows 10 is just Windows 7 and Patched Windows 8, which is just Windows XP, which is just Windows 2000, which was just Windows 98, which is just Windows 95, which is just Windows 3 for Workgroups, which was just Windows 3.1, which was just Windows 3.0--so they are likely not going to release anything. I think that Windows 2000 was overall the best and most coherent version, with Windows 7 and XP, tied for 2nd. Windows 10's best feature is: It's dark.
    • by cusco ( 717999 ) <brian@bixby.gmail@com> on Saturday February 15, 2020 @05:31PM (#59731824)

      Nope, Win2k is a whole different development thread than Win98. It was based on the Windows NT kernel developed by Dave Cutler and a couple other refugees from DEC.

      IIRC Win 3.0 was an abandoned development fork, Win 3.1 used the task switcher developed in DOS 5.1. Windows for Workgroups (Win 3.11) was Windows 3.1 with networking added on (and TCP/IP was a couple more optional disks). All three were just shells that sat on DOS and enabled task switching and a shared clipboard. Win95 was a kernel rewrite, an incomplete break from DOS, and Win98 was the collection of patches and extra goodies that had accumulated in the previous couple of years.

      Everything since 1998 has descended from the NT kernel. Learn some history before making sweeping statements. MS might open source DOS and its descendants, but I rather doubt many people would be interested. There are several free OSs that replicate DOS and its functionlity.

      • Windows 3.11 and Windows for Workgroups 3.11 were not the same thing. There was a minor kernel update to Windows 3.1 that set the version string to 3.11 that had nothing to do with networking or WfW 3.11. But yeah, most of the time when people are talking about Windows 3.11, they're actually talking about WfW 3.11.
        • by cusco ( 717999 )

          I was never clear what the difference was, and IIRC the WfW networking pack still worked on Win 3.1 and 3.11 so I didn't really care. We went to NT 3.51 shortly after that anyway, so it was never important enough to me to really get under the hood and investigate.

  • Because it would eat into their market share of windows 10 licenses.

    Besides, as a current windows 7 user, i can see the writing on the wall. It only takes a few features that become ubiquitous to make even die hards like myself switch. Things I have noticed personally as a windows 7 user at home, and windows 10 at work user are:

    - win10 has better multi monitor support period.

    - (related) usb-c docks which are becoming more and more popular "just work" with windows 10. Windows 7 and 8 take lots of fussing. Th

  • by Sebby ( 238625 ) on Saturday February 15, 2020 @01:36PM (#59731416)
    I get it that FSF wants to put MS under the microscope for its "support" of opensource software, but I feel like this stunt will ultimately just make them look silly (PETA-type silliness), as it's obvious that most of Win 10 is based on all previous versions of Windows, including 7, and they're not gonna simply "give the source" for it all because support for it has ended (and "EOL" does not imply "public domain").
    • Yes they do look silly. Supporting Open Source and releasing your product Source code are not the same thing and you can absolutely do the former without doing the latter.

      I lost a bit of respect for the FSF today. But only a bit since it's nothing more than a silly publicity stunt.

  • But MS is so far up their own backside with that abomination that is called Windows 10 to do anything.
    Besides, if by some freak of chance they did release the source, we'd all get to see just how bad and spidery the code is...
    All those patches on top of patches on top of patches.

  • What I would be interested in understanding from the FSF, is what do they consider to be "Windows 7" and what does it comprise of?

    Is it the kernel? If that's the case, how much of it was written by Intel and/or AMD? Is there another third party involved?

    Does it include Windows and Internet Explorer? I know that for XP and 7, they're pretty well integrated into the OS, but I suspect that they are developed/maintain by separate teams.

    What about built in apps, like Wordpad, Notepad and Paint? Then there ar

    • It would have to include Aieeeeee! since so many Windows functions depend on it. But you wouldn't need literally any of the other bundled applications like notepad or Wordpad. You probably need regedit, but not many other graphical apps. (You likely couldn't even install without regedit.) You obviously also need mmc.exe. I really don't think it would be that difficult to make these determinations.

  • This is some first class shade.

  • Stupid stunt that achieves nothing... except I suppose they get a free hard drive, but I don't they would trust it enough to plug it in
    • Why not? Microsoft *WROTE* fdisk.
      • yes they did, however sections of windows they do not own the rights to open source, they would be in violation of a plethora of licensing agreements and would get their arses sued.
  • :rolleyes: (Score:2, Insightful)

    Windows 10 is mostly Windows 7 with some changes. People who don't understand software engineering might be fooled by the Windows 10 shell into thinking it's something different, but is FSF claiming it doesn't understand software engineering? Or that everybody doesn't know Marketing lies?

    FSF is acting like an aspie petulant child, not like a leader. This hurts the community.

    • Linux 5.6 is just Linux 3 with some changes as well. People who don't understand software engineering might be fooled by the Linux 5.6 version identifier into thinking it's something different, but does Slashdot know Marketing lies?

  • I suspect that the main reason why most Windows 7 users don't upgrade is because they depend on old hardware and/or software that don't work with Windows 10. It would be nice if Microsoft could do something for those users.

    While FSF's request for the whole Windows 7 is more or less bonkers, maybe there is an outdated subset of Windows 7 that could be released as open source. Perhaps that would be parts of the hardware driver framework for Windows 7, so that Open Source counterparts to Windows such as ReactO

  • There rarely has been a single piece of code, with that many bad ideas combined.

  • Windows 7 is still supported with paid support.

  • We want them to show exactly how much love they have for the "open source" software they mention in their advertising. If they really do love free software -- and we're willing to give them the benefit of the doubt -- they have the opportunity to show it to the world.

    This sounds eeriely similar to when my abusive ex girlfriend told me that if I really loved her I would buy her a car with my savings.

  • The FSF should know that it will never be that simple. MS, itself, doesn't even have the rights to distribute all of the source code to Win7.

  • In a big source-code-base like an operating system like windows 7, there will be lots of subsystems that are licenced from other software companies. Even if Microsoft has a software-lincence for that code, that doesn't mean they can release it to the public.

I've noticed several design suggestions in your code.

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