openAdmin
09-12-2009, 05:44 PM
Microsoft (http://www.opensourcegroups.com/www.microsoft.com) is announcing a new foundation and is donating $1 million to this initiative for enabling code exchange and support open source communities.
According to foundation documents and published reports, the group will be known as the CodePlex Foundation (http://www.codeplex.org/index.aspx) and will be led by Sam Ramji, Microsoft's senior director of Platform Strategy. Ramji will be the interim president of the foundation.
According to the foundation's site :
"The CodePlex Foundation will complement existing open source foundations and organizations, providing a forum in which best practices and shared understanding can be established by a broad group of participants, both software companies and open source communities. Initial funding for the Foundation comes from Microsoft Corporation."
In addition, the CodePlex Foundation will be an extension of the CodePlex brand established by Codeplex.com, Microsoft's community development site where the company hosts open-source, shared source and other technologies. The site hosts more than 10,000 projects.
A foundation charter will determine the types of projects that the foundation works with and the types of relationships projects may have to the foundation. The endeavor will address software projects with the licensing and intellectual property needs of commercial software companies in mind, according to the foundation.
"We believe that commercial software companies and the developers that work for them under-participate in open source projects," the foundation said. "Some of the reasons are cultural, some have to do with differing software development methodologies, and some have to do with differing views about intellectual property. In general, we are going to work to close these gaps. Specifically we aim to work with particular projects that can serve as best practice exemplars of how commercial software companies and open source communities can effectively collaborate."
Ramji said there will be a “straightforward contributor agreement” available on the Foundation’s Web site (http://www.codeplex.org/) for individuals or groups interested in providing any kind of open-source code/projects.
Ramji said commercial software companies who contribute source won’t be required to provide any kind of broad patent-portfolio transfer as part of their contributions. The CodePlex Foundation, in turn, will extend derivative-works rights to all “downstream” developers and users of the contributed code. And the organization will be “license-agnostic,” allowing contributors to work with a broad variety of open-source licenses, Ramji said.
Microsoft, for its part, has released a number of its own pieces of technology under a variety of bonafide open-source licenses . The Foundation is looking for other commercial vendors to join and, ultimately, dilute the Microsoft domination of the organization, Ramji said.
According to foundation documents and published reports, the group will be known as the CodePlex Foundation (http://www.codeplex.org/index.aspx) and will be led by Sam Ramji, Microsoft's senior director of Platform Strategy. Ramji will be the interim president of the foundation.
According to the foundation's site :
"The CodePlex Foundation will complement existing open source foundations and organizations, providing a forum in which best practices and shared understanding can be established by a broad group of participants, both software companies and open source communities. Initial funding for the Foundation comes from Microsoft Corporation."
In addition, the CodePlex Foundation will be an extension of the CodePlex brand established by Codeplex.com, Microsoft's community development site where the company hosts open-source, shared source and other technologies. The site hosts more than 10,000 projects.
A foundation charter will determine the types of projects that the foundation works with and the types of relationships projects may have to the foundation. The endeavor will address software projects with the licensing and intellectual property needs of commercial software companies in mind, according to the foundation.
"We believe that commercial software companies and the developers that work for them under-participate in open source projects," the foundation said. "Some of the reasons are cultural, some have to do with differing software development methodologies, and some have to do with differing views about intellectual property. In general, we are going to work to close these gaps. Specifically we aim to work with particular projects that can serve as best practice exemplars of how commercial software companies and open source communities can effectively collaborate."
Ramji said there will be a “straightforward contributor agreement” available on the Foundation’s Web site (http://www.codeplex.org/) for individuals or groups interested in providing any kind of open-source code/projects.
Ramji said commercial software companies who contribute source won’t be required to provide any kind of broad patent-portfolio transfer as part of their contributions. The CodePlex Foundation, in turn, will extend derivative-works rights to all “downstream” developers and users of the contributed code. And the organization will be “license-agnostic,” allowing contributors to work with a broad variety of open-source licenses, Ramji said.
Microsoft, for its part, has released a number of its own pieces of technology under a variety of bonafide open-source licenses . The Foundation is looking for other commercial vendors to join and, ultimately, dilute the Microsoft domination of the organization, Ramji said.