[Mono-dev] crn.com: »Sources: Microsoft In Talks To Acquire Mobile App Development Startup Xamarin«

[Martin Thwaites]

I was actually thinking of posting a question to the list when I saw that
article but had the same reservations about the validity.

Although it makes sense from a Microsoft perspective (imho) to back Xamarin
(through purchase or through funding), I can only wonder whether they would
eventually (not initially) focus Xamarin (more than they are now) away for
mono functionality that doesn't relate to the mobile.  I see this as a
problem for the community in terms of generally running things on Mono.
For me, I only use Mono for hosting websites, so there is really zero
incentive for Microsoft to put money behind that as it would eat into the
there server software sales.

I think there will always be a benefit to the community from whatever
happens with Xamarin.  By the fact that making .net compiled code work on
Android, will have knock on affects to making it work on linux in general,
so I have confident that those things will make it into the community.

That said, as someone else has said, I trust in Miguel's integrity.  From
his past actions, he has shown that he is behind mono, and open source in
general.

In short, I think it could be a good thing, and I trust that when something
is agreed, Miguel will communicate with the community as he has always
done.  Only time will tell.

Martin


On 20 March 2014 13:59, Edward Ned Harvey (mono) <
edward.harvey.mono at clevertrove.com> wrote:

> > From: mono-devel-list-bounces at lists.ximian.com [mailto:mono-devel-list-
> > bounces at lists.ximian.com] On Behalf Of Ian Norton
> >
> > whaat!?
> > article looks far from clear though. does this mean monodevelop is going
> to
> > quietly die? or a license change? :/
>
> LOL, no.   :-)
>
> Here's what it comes down to:  Microsoft cannot deny the fact that they've
> been getting thoroughly spanked in the mobile device market.  They want to
> be industry leaders and not following the lead of Apple and Google.  They
> have moved past the denial phase of several years ago, denying the
> existence or relevance of linux or apple, and now they're motivated to
> adapt to the times and roll with it.  Which means they want everybody
> fricking using .NET and not java or objective C.  They recognize that
> embracing and supporting mono is a good business move.
> _______________________________________________
> Mono-devel-list mailing list
> Mono-devel-list at lists.ximian.com
> http://lists.ximian.com/mailman/listinfo/mono-devel-list
>
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