But I'd argue that the most used microsoft product in the world (besides Windows) is MS Office. What holds a lot of people back from running Linux is that they don't like dealing with compatibility issues with LibreOffice and MS Office.
Microsoft knows if they open source or port MS Office to Linux, they will lose a massive market share and millions of people will stop using Windows. And I don't blame them, any reasonable business would not do something like that.
But unless they do that, I don't see how they can claim to be cooperating when they refuse to port their main product to Linux.
>Microsoft knows if they open source or port MS Office to Linux, they will lose a massive market share and millions of people will stop using Windows.
That's a huge assumption. There's no real indication that people would stop using Windows if Office existed in Linux.
If that were the case, then porting Office to OS X would've had a similar effect, don't you think?
Ultimately I believe the reason Microsoft doesn't bother porting to Linux is that the market-share is just not worth the cost of re-writing for another platform, and keeping it updated.
Additionally, as a compromise Office 365 runs on browser, which further decreases the incentive to port to Linux. Since you can get a similar experience using Office 365 on Linux, that said I won't be so disingenuous as to imply that the experience is as good as a native application.
In conclusion, Linux has a very small market share, so making a native application for it might not be cost effective. Additionally, Microsoft might see that market share as "served" regardless due to their online Office 365 web application.
> That's a huge assumption. There's no real indication that people would stop using Windows if Office existed in Linux.
Except for basically every thread I've seen about switching to Linux, where people say the only reason they won't switch is because they still want to use Office and Photoshop.
>If that were the case, then porting Office to OS X would've had a similar effect, don't you think?
No. Cost is a major reason people don't switch to OS X. But Linux is free.
> Ultimately I believe the reason Microsoft doesn't bother porting to Linux is that the market-share is just not worth the cost of re-writing for another platform, and keeping it updated.
That is a good point. But as I said, unless they port their main product to Linux, how can they claim to be cooperating when the ONE product that most people agree is a very good MS product is not available natively on Linux?
> Cost is a major reason people don't switch to OS X.
Cost is a lot more than the physical machine.
This is why Linux machines while technically less expensive (no OS license) are actually more expensive in terms of support. Until that nut can be cracked it's hard to get wide-scale adoption (e.g. 50% deskops vs. 5%).
The thing that stuck out to me about the presser was the quote from the VP of Cloud and Enterprise Group, and that someone high up on Azure team is joining the Linux Foundation board of directors. This indicates to me that it's really a desire to compete effectively with AWS and Google Cloud that drives this co-operation, rather than a desire to expand Linux. Nothing wrong with this of course. Azure is a major cloud platform, personally I think it's better for everyone if Linux runs well there.
You can cooperate without having to give up all your proprietary tools.
How do you think the internet was made? By setting aside proprietary protocols and agreeing on open standards. Each vendor's free to do whatever they want so long as they use those standards.