EU Had Warned Microsoft that Source Code Release Wouldn't Be Enough

The "Wall Street Journal" has obtained a confidential document sent from European Union (EU) antitrust regulators to Microsoft last month, warning the software giant that a release of its Windows source code would not meet the EU's requirements. Last week, you may recall, Microsoft announced with great fanfare that it would release portions of its Windows source code in a bid to meet its overdue EU antitrust requirements. Microsoft general console called the move "a bold stroke" when it was announced.

The Windows "source code was never asked for nor indeed welcomed," a British computer scientist wrote in a report describing Microsoft's botched attempt to meet European antitrust demands. You may recall that EU antitrust commissioner Neelie Kroes said she was "surprised" that Microsoft made the source code offer last week. Given this revelation, her comments can be put in perspective: She's surprised because the EU specifically told the company that a source code release would not meet its requirements.

Most of the confidential document cited by the Wall Street Journal concerns the EU's efforts to determine whether Microsoft had adhered to the requirements of its antitrust ruling. Microsoft had previously turned over 12,000 pages of technical information describing software protocols that developers could use to interact with Windows Server products. But the EU says that its technical experts spent over 42 hours working on very simple applications that interact with those protocols, and they couldn't get anything to work. The experts called Microsoft's documentation "totally unusable" and complained that it lacks an index, illustrations, or even section headings. Developers at companies such as IBM, Novell, Oracle, and Sun Microsystems also all complained that the documentation was unusable, the report notes.

Microsoft now faces the possibility of fines of $2.4 million a day, retroactive to December 15, 2005, if it cannot meet the EU requirements. Those requirements were made clear in a March 2005 ruling, the EU says.

End of Article

They could just publish the "APIs" MSDN style and the problem would be solved. They do it for all their other "APIs", so why not for these ones that the anti-Americian Europeans and the ex-Nazis are extorting from them?

textstephen January 30, 2006 (Article Rating:

)

Microsoft general console? I don't know Windows very well. Is that like a really pimped-out xterm?

warthawg January 30, 2006 (Article Rating:

)

Interesting, I thought there was more behind the source code release. A sneaky move to garner public favor. "See? We offered the source code and that STILL wasn't enough!"

bonch January 30, 2006 (Article Rating:

)

Excuse me? "anti-American Europeans and the ex-Nazis" ... I think you need consider whether you're anti-European. Im British and my grandfather fought against the Nazis. Even Germans aren't ex-Nazis.

miconmica@hotmail.com January 30, 2006 (Article Rating:

)

This isn't about America-versus-Europe. The EU is simply being stricter regarding Microsoft's monopoly than our government was. Particularly since they're a foreign company to Europe, which makes total sense--we'd hold a foreign company with a national monopoly here up to high standards as well.

bonch February 01, 2006 (Article Rating:

)

You must log on before posting a comment.

If you don't have a username & password, please register now.