The Foss
Linux Format|December 2017

In a deliberate act of provocation, Jonni Bidwell road-trips to Microsoft’s UK HQ to talk open source with the most hospitable Martin Woodward.

Martin Woodward
The Foss
Readers, prepare your pitchforks! Actually Interview don’t. We all remember the Halloween memos, but they were two decades ago. Certain trenchant views about Microsoft and its opposition to Linux still prevail, but we live in different times now. Nobody wants to extinguish desktop Linux. Under Satya Nadella we’ve seen that Microsoft hearts Linux. Hearts us enough to give us Skype and SQL server, even.

As is the case for many commercial organisations, open source now plays a key role at Microsoft, and Principal program manager Martin Woodward has been instrumental in effecting this change. At October’s 2017 O’Reilly Software Architecture conference in London he gave a talk outlining his Herculean efforts migrating 65,000 engineers to a single platform, based on none other than our beloved Git. We know some people’s views on the Redmondian Empire won’t change, but we hope some people will be encouraged to rethink things…

Linux Format: How did you become part of the Microsoft family?

Martin Woodward: I was part of a small startup that produced plugins for Eclipse, and we created a plugin for Microsoft’s Team Foundation Server, which did source control and stuff like that. Microsoft ended up buying us in 2009, so that’s how I joined the company.

When it was buying us, it was very much, “What’s all this open source stuff that you use?” So then we had to figure out what the processes were for doing open source things inside Microsoft, at that time. Once we’d been in the company for a while, we began to ask, “How do we help the company use more open source? How do we fix the company to work with open source better, rather than fighting against it?”

هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة December 2017 من Linux Format.

ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.

هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة December 2017 من Linux Format.

ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.

المزيد من القصص من LINUX FORMAT مشاهدة الكل
Create your first WebSocket service
Linux Format

Create your first WebSocket service

Mihalis Tsoukalos explains how to use the Go programming language to work with the WebSocket protocol.

time-read
9 mins  |
April 2023
Fantastic Mr Firefox
Linux Format

Fantastic Mr Firefox

Nick Peers takes a trip down memory lane to reveal the story behind the rise - and slight fall - of Mozilla's popular web browser.

time-read
9 mins  |
April 2023
Set up your terminal and email like it's 1983
Linux Format

Set up your terminal and email like it's 1983

Jump in the hot terminal time machine with Mats Tage Axelsson who emails from the command line using the latest technology.

time-read
8 mins  |
April 2023
Universal layer text effects with GIMP
Linux Format

Universal layer text effects with GIMP

Posters use them, films and presentations are hard to imagine without them: text effects. Attract attention with Karsten Günther and GIMP.

time-read
8 mins  |
April 2023
Jump to a federated social network
Linux Format

Jump to a federated social network

Nick Peers reveals how you can get up and running with this free, decentralised and non-profit alternative to Twitter.

time-read
9 mins  |
April 2023
Free our SOFTWARE!
Linux Format

Free our SOFTWARE!

Taking anything for granted is dangerous, so Jonni Bidwell and Mike Saunders revisit how the free software movement got started to help free us from proprietary tyranny!

time-read
4 mins  |
April 2023
Master RPI.GPIO
Linux Format

Master RPI.GPIO

Les Pounder goes back to the early days of the Raspberry Pi - and his career with this classic library! -

time-read
5 mins  |
April 2023
Waveshare Zero to Pi3
Linux Format

Waveshare Zero to Pi3

Transform your Pi Zero into a Pi 3, they promised Les Pounder, but it's more like adding on go-faster stripes.

time-read
2 mins  |
April 2023
The Best OPEN SOURCE Software Ever!
Linux Format

The Best OPEN SOURCE Software Ever!

In an attempt to trigger controversy, Michael Reed and Neil Mohr unequivocally state these are the greatest free software apps ever. Probably. We’re just trying to be helpful.

time-read
10+ mins  |
April 2023
Linux-Mandrake 7
Linux Format

Linux-Mandrake 7

Simplicity and a wide range of applications make this a great distribution for all Linux users.

time-read
2 mins  |
April 2023