Saturday, September 16, 2006 7:08 PM
I’ve been catching up on my news since coming back from holidays and I found this little gem.
Microsoft has made a rather low-key statement which it has entitling the OSP or Open Specification Promise, basically what the statement says is that Microsoft will not pursue you for legal recompense for patent infringement for many of their core web services technologies. This for me and anyone involved in the SOA world is a big deal.
This is fantastic news for SOA as it basically means that Microsoft will allow anyone and that means the open source community to develop these core web service technologies further.
The OSP includes SOAP, WSDL, WS –Addressing/Eventing,/Coordination and Discovery etc. All non-trivial specifications.
Now many analysts are saying this is a surprising move from Microsoft but I just think it’s a further demonstration of how Microsoft has changed and is continue to change.
For me this is a move that goes against the grain of how the industry is moving as many players are moving towards proprietary standards disguising as ‘value adds’ on top of the existing standards. Ok so the ‘value adds’ may well become standards in themselves eventually but not after that player has had it’s product out for a considerable while.
Its moves like OSP that do restore my faith in the SOA market a bit. I do hope that this is a move that will basically mark Microsoft’s return to the SOA fight which may be a fight it never really left but I felt that it’s focus was blurred, perhaps muddled or just else where, which was is a shame as Microsoft has a strong set of compelling products and this WCF and WWF on the horizon has a lot to shout about … but just doesn’t, well not as loudly as you would expect from them.
Anyway if you want to know more about Microsoft’s feelings on Open Source, Bill Hilf has a good video on C9 here.