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Some folks have wondered why I think it's such a bad thing that Novell is doing the Linux port of Microsoft's Silverlight, instead of well, Microsoft.
From "Novell, Microsoft Readying Moonlight":
BOSTON—Novell will be delivering a Linux-based version of Microsoft's Silverlight cross-browser, rich Internet application technology within six months.Silverlight 1.0 is out now for Windows and Mac OS X, but Linux users don't even get the 1.0 runtime for six months, and that's assuming no problems. Actually, it's Linux and Solaris users:
De Icaza said that under its agreement with Microsoft, Novell's role is to deliver a 100 percent compatible Linux version of Silverlight in the Moonlight technology, which will support the major Linux distributions. Contractually, Novell has agreed to support the top three Linux distributions, but de Icaza said the company will go beyond that to support all major Linux distributions, as well as Sun Microsystems' Solaris operating system.(As it turns out, *BSD too. Thanks Miquel for the better information!) Furthermore, what about the Moonlight 2.0, the follow-on to Silverlight 2.0?
Microsoft recently changed Silverlight 1.1 to Silverlight 2.0; following suit, Novell has done the same with Moonlight. Silverlight 2.0 is based on .Net, thus Moonlight 2.0 will feature Mono.I know I'm a pessimistic misanthrope, but how is this good by any stretch? Anyone not on Silverlight's Favored Platforms, (and considering that 2.0 is a relabled 1.1, I'm still waiting to see how long it takes Microsoft to drop Mac OS X support. The record for such things outside of the Mac BU is not good), is going to be six months to a year behind in perpetuity.De Icaza indicated that he expects Silverlight 2.0 to ship around March 2008, around the time of Microsoft's Mix '08 conference. Moonlight 2.0 will then ship anywhere between six and 12 months after Silverlight 2.0.
This is why when Microsoft, Apple, or really, any platform vendor says "That's a third party opportunity", what you should be hearing is "Anyone who wants that is fixin' to take it in the shorts."
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Microsoft Silverlight, Moonlight
Posted by John C. Welch at 12:08 | Permalink
Comments
The eWeek article did not mention that during my talk I also said we would support the BSDs. The reality is that since it is open source, it will support really any X11-based system.
At the Mono Summit some people wanted to port Mono to MacOS and get a native Quartz port, it took a couple of hours and its done.
Flash for Linux is usually lagging behind Flash on the mainstream platforms, so this is not a terrible delay. The upside is that we will be delayed, but we will be open source.
Miguel.
Posted by: Miguel de Icaza | December 6, 2007 1:49 PM
I'm glad to know that the BSD support is there, but again, the delay in Flash for Linux is part of the problem I'm talking about. Linux is not a "favored" platform for Adobe, so it gets left in the cold for flash et al. So now, you're an entity with a lot of Linux users. Who do you trust? Both suck, but at least one has something for Linux. (also, to be fair, if you go to the Flash player downloads, the Linux version(s) are in line with the Mac/Win versions, and even the Solaris versions are not far behind the others. And while the Flash tools are officially only Win/Mac only, that's still 2x what you get with Silverlight, and the Flex 2 SDK is available for Java Win/Mac/Linux/Solaris
I have no doubt that Silverlight is potentially very cool, but based on past history, I'd certainly not take it seriously as a cross - platform tech. Adobe is rapidly becoming just as bad as Microsoft here, esp. the Acrobat team, but who knows, maybe with Chizen gone, we'll see some improvements from that company.
But would I bet a company on Silverlight's cross-platform features? Not for a few years and a couple more versions. Given Microsoft's history, that's the only sane view.
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John C. Welch 
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December 6, 2007 7:50 PM
