ReactOS Forum

Aeneas wrote: ↑Wed Oct 16, 2019 10:05 am The problem, and why their legal department killed the idea: Windows contains a lot of third-party-code which has been licensed by the respective companies to Microsoft, and which MS does NOT OWN. And hence, a release of this code would give rise to claims AGAINST MS by said third parties. - There is one component in the past which you all surely know about: HyperTerminal.

I remember Internet Explorer 6 was from Mosaic (just seeing at a recently installed Windows XP SP2).

Aeneas wrote: ↑Wed Oct 16, 2019 10:27 pm That's the whole point. NOT all core components are THEIRS to "open source", and they cannot cleanly separate them without having to re-develop parts. I just gave an example, but the issue is general. It has to do with the problem that licenses can be given for specific usage manners... but not for "doing whatever they want to".

So ReactOS is now and really will be the only true Open Source Windows OS.

Yeah, some of the components that Microsoft bundles in do come from third-party sources, a lot of times through their "embrace, extend, extinguish" strategy, like Microsoft Defender. But there's a lot of Linux distributions that come packaged with proprietary elements, such as Ubuntu.

Again, I think Microsoft open-sourcing Windows is very unlikely but if they do, they would probably open-source only the components that Microsoft owns and can legally make open-source, and would release a free version of Windows without the proprietary components along side the proprietary version, much like what Chrome OS did with Chromium OS, or Linspire with Freespire, or RHEL with Fedora and CentOS.

Windows XP defragger was also a third party component (from Veritas Software).

Thanatophobia wrote: ↑Thu Oct 17, 2019 5:57 pm they would probably open-source only the components that Microsoft owns and can legally make open-source, and would release a free version of Windows

Which components could be (list)?

-Whole kernel
-All UWP-based components
-WSL 1/2
-Win32 explorer+Regedit+Control panel

But what would the Nazis have done?

Quim wrote: ↑Fri Oct 18, 2019 8:43 pm

Thanatophobia wrote: ↑Thu Oct 17, 2019 5:57 pm they would probably open-source only the components that Microsoft owns and can legally make open-source, and would release a free version of Windows

Which components could be (list)?

Pretty much anything Microsoft made themselves or has the rights to. I'm not sure about specific components but erkinalp listed a few.

Aeneas wrote: ↑Wed Oct 16, 2019 10:27 pm That's the whole point. NOT all core components are THEIRS to "open source", and they cannot cleanly separate them without having to re-develop parts. I just gave an example, but the issue is general. It has to do with the problem that licenses can be given for specific usage manners... but not for "doing whatever they want to".

True. Id Software ran into this. They had unknowingly stepped on a patent owned by Creative Labs and settled by paying royalties on it. It was a way to improve video performance. That was why the Doom 3 engine took so long to release as open source. The developers (likely either John Romero or John Carmack) had to remove the "proprietary" code and put something in its place that worked (though likely slower).

So if Microsoft were to release such code, they could just release only what they own and leave brief comments about what was removed, it's calling conventions, and what it did. Then leave it to the open-source community to wrestle with what to do about it.

Windows open source ...hahahah laughed so hard

Windows CE is open source more or less.

minecraftchest1 wrote: ↑Wed Jun 10, 2020 3:54 am Windows CE is open source more or less.

More or less it definitely is NOT.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_Source_Initiative

I was reading a thread about windows ce and porting it to raspberry pi, and by what I read, when you download and install the toolbox you get acess to the source to make the mods you need to get it to work on the platform in question. Like I said. Open source more or less.

It reminds me of what unity 3d did with their .net libaries. They open sourced it so they could say here is how our code works. Stop using Ildasm on it, and stop disturbing the code, because it is agents the terms of the licence.

minecraftchest1 wrote: ↑Wed Jun 10, 2020 2:22 pm Like I said. Open source more or less.

Open-source software is a type of computer software in which source code is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software to anyone and for any purpose.

Windows Embedded Compact 7 Evaluation toolkit gives you unrestricted access to all of Windows Embedded Compact 7 and includes Platform Builder, the Compact Test Kit and several board support packages for ARM, x86 and MIPs architectures so you can begin evaluating Windows Embedded Compact 7 today. With the Compact 7 Evaluation toolkit you can design, developed, build and show prototype devices.

The Evaluation toolkit includes the full functionality of Windows Embedded Compact 7 and will only expire after 180 days. After 180 days you must uninstall the product, purchase a license for the full version of Windows Embedded Compact 7, install from the full product installation discs.

Paying a license fee for access to only a limited subsection of "shared source code" is not open source.

WIndows will never be Open Source, Microsoft doesn't need it...