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Mitchell Ashley
Chrome OS Gets Grade of C-
Written on Tue, 11/24/09 - 10:29am
You either see Chrome OS's all browser OS approach as revolutionizing the PC industry or then next "technology solution looking for a problem" doomed to fail. Google's approach with Chrome OS is certainly radically different from the Windows, Mac OS and Linux approach we've used since the birth of the...
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Microsoft Is Perfect Example Why Executive Pay Is Broken
Written on Fri, 11/06/09 - 8:34am
Text message this morning from CNN: Unemployment hit 10.2% in October. Microsoft announced earlier this week another 800 employee layoffs to the 5,000 previously announced employee layoffs. If you look at Microsoft's financials you see why, a 14% revenue and 18% net income drop for the last reported...
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Will Apple's multi-touch tablet steal Windows 7's multi-touch thunder?
Written on Wed, 08/05/09 - 1:05pm
Rumors about a possible (some say likely) Apple tablet are so intriguing because of Apple's huge success with the iPhone. Gizmodo says its a 90% likelihood we'll see an Apple Tablet within 4 months. One of the more recent debates is whether the tablet would be a MacBook Touch (based on Mac OS X) or an...
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Is Open Source The Enemy Within Chipping Away at Proprietary Microsoft?
Written on Tue, 08/04/09 - 6:47am
Sam Ramji, Senior Director of Strategic Platforms at Microsoft, said some pretty unexpected things during his interview on my podcast this week. I've gone back and listened to the interview with Sam several times, each time picking up a new little tidbit, but also re-enforcing what I heard him say about...
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Sam Ramji: Why Microsoft contributed to open source
Written on Mon, 08/03/09 - 9:50pm
Sam Ramji, Senior Director of Platform Strategy joins us to talk about Microsoft’s recent open source code contribution to Linux. During the podcast Sam Ramji and I dive into details about the GPL'd Linux drivers, talk about how Microsoft worked with members of the community during their development,...
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Did Microsoft Violate the GPL and Were They Forced To Make Linux Hyper-V Drivers GPL?
Written on Fri, 07/24/09 - 4:12am
If what ComputerWorld is reporting and this blog post is saying, Microsoft may have effectively GPL'd the Linux Hyper-V drivers, whether intentional or not. If you link your code to GPL licensed code, your code is then considered to fall under the GPL license also, provided you distribute the combined...
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Microsoft GPL Linux Drivers First Legit Open Source Contribution
Written on Mon, 07/20/09 - 3:47pm
While Microsoft has made some prior moves to be more friendly towards open source (albeit slightly more friendly), Microsoft's GPLv2 contribution of Linux drivers will be seen as the first legitimate Microsoft move by the Linux open source and user communities. Microsoft's cozy relationship with Novell...
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Google Chrome OS Announced. Windows 7 May Have Arrived Just In Time.
Written on Wed, 07/08/09 - 4:11am
If there was any doubt Microsoft and Google were out to eat each other's lunch, both companies have proved they're going after the other's core business; desktop OS+apps and search, respectively. Microsoft upped the ante big time with Bing. Google's responding right on the heels of the Google Wave announcement...
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Should Software Licenses Hold Vendors Accountable? Microsoft and Linux Say No
Written on Tue, 05/19/09 - 3:36am
Over the weekend Microsoft and the Linux Foundation issued a joint letter to the ALI (American Law Institute) objecting to some new draft guidelines.
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Microsoft Trying To Kill Off The Golden Windows 7 Goose
Written on Mon, 05/18/09 - 10:03am
An article by CNET's Brooke Crothers caught my eye about a Windows 7 pricing conversation with Dell's Darrel Ward. Darrel's saying Windows 7 average selling price is set to be higher than either Vista or XP prices. What? Is Microsoft crazy? Are they ready to undo all their good work transparently...
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Netbooks Are All The Rage But Does Anybody Have One?
Written on Wed, 04/22/09 - 8:56am
Netbooks, netbooks, netbooks. You'd think we'd miniaturized 3.0 Ghz quad processor machines down to a $300, 1.5 lbs. footprint or something. I'm still quite puzzled about the whole "netbook thing" since everyone's proclaiming its the undisputed future of the PC. Debates about Linux vs. Windows dominating...
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Oracle's Sun Is Blinding In Microsoft's Eyes
Written on Tue, 04/21/09 - 8:55am
I couldn't just stand back idly by and not comment on the Sun / Oracle deal. The industry always accused Sun of not knowing what it wanted to be when it grows up and now we know, Oracle. Oracle has just gone from sideline participants in the race to build the cloud software layer and cloud generation...
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Storm Customers Left To Run Unsupported Software
Written on Wed, 04/08/09 - 4:05am
Seems like yesterday's rant about my Blackberry Storm kicked up quite a firestorm (pun intended.) One thing's for sure: taking sides about Smartphones (Blackberry, iPhone or Windows Mobile) and computer operating systems (Windows, OS X or Linux) will get you plenty of comment flames, and...
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Microsoft: The Platform and Open Source Company?
Written on Wed, 03/25/09 - 7:53am
We keep seeing some mighty strange talk from Microsoft these days. Not only is Microsoft a platform company now for Microsoft-based applications through the Azure platform, but Microsoft is embarking on two new strategies: be the web platform and cozying up to open source, from Linux right up to and...
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Will Tom-Tom Lawsuit Further Distance Microsoft From Linux Crowd?
Written on Thu, 02/26/09 - 2:26am
Steven Vaughan-Nichols over at ComputerWorld posted about Microsoft's suit against GPS device maker Tom-Tom, and how this is one of the few times Microsoft's taken legal action in regards its patent infringement claims against Linux.
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Comments On The Windows 7 / Linux Debate
Written on Fri, 01/16/09 - 5:34am
This whole Windows 7 crushes or doesn't kill Linux deal has really sparked a lot of comments and raging debates here and on Digg. I thought I'd recap and talk about some of the comments readers have posted (thanks for reading, btw) that I found most interesting. First from taridigrade...
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Why Windows 7 will never kill off Linux
Written on Wed, 01/14/09 - 2:24am
My Network World blogging colleague Ron Barrett has whooped up a firestorm with his blog post "Why Windows 7 will crush Linux". I have to say he's one brave soul for taking on the open source and Linux crowd. They're a passionate and vocal bunch, and the only thing higher on their...
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Linux: Chrome's endgame OS to beat Windows
Written on Tue, 09/09/08 - 1:15am
Last week's announcement of Google Chrome had every armchair blogger speculating about the same thing: Google is out to replace Windows with Chrome as the desktop operating system. I initially had the same thought but, given that everyone pretty much had that same, obvious idea, I didn't see...
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Development Costs In The Cloud
Written on Tue, 08/05/08 - 10:31am
As more of our applications migrate into the cloud, some interesting questions for development rise up. What about development? How will developer use cloud services in the development process? How do you attract developers to develop on your cloud services? How much will cloud services cost you...
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Linux Not The Savior For Our Economy
Written on Thu, 07/17/08 - 3:46am
You knew the argument had to come up sometime: survive the economic downturn by using open source to help you save money. Now ComputerWorld blogger Steve Vaughan-Nichols makes that claim in his Linux Will Save Us blog post. The title almost has religious overtones. I found Steve's article thanks...
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About Converging on Microsoft
Mitchell Ashley has a diverse background in software development, network engineering, information security, mobility, collaborative technologies, and IT management and operations. An early adopter of social media in business, he began blogging about security and information technologies in 2006 at theconvergingnetwork.com. Mitchell is VP of Information Technology at CableLabs in Louisville, CO, and previously held positions as CIO, CTO and VP Engineering at prior companies.
 

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