Why Mono and Samba Are Patently Different
Submitted by srlinuxx on Wed, 10/08/2008 - 07:03.
Here's a very good question: why are people (including me) nasty to Mono, but nice to Samba?
The Samba project, like Mono, provides a cross-platform alternative to closed Microsoft technologies. It is equally vulnerable to the (increasingly toothless) Microsoft patent threats and arbitrary changes in the protocols. Yet Samba is admired. Perhaps the difference is merely in the words of each project's leaders-- the Samba team have never praised Microsoft's technologies, while Miguel de Icaza, the leader of Mono, has.
The PR aspect may have something to do with it, but I don't think it's the main reason. To understand the principal difference between Samba and Mono, we need to explore what they do, and how they do it.
Samba grew out of a classic hacker's itch.
What did I tell you...
Mono people just 'perfume' it to themselves that all is well and attack those who say the truth. I've seen rapid attacks on anyone who 'dares' to question Novell's Mono. Some of these attacks seem to come from Microsoft employee, who are also seen in the press openly lobbying for Mono.
Mono is not a threat to Microsoft. It helps Microsoft. By association, it harms GNU/Linux. Only a Microsoft fan like Miguel de Icaza can refuse so stubbornly to see this and admit that it's selfish -- for him, for Novell, and for .NET developers who want to go cross-platform.