back to article Microsoft eyes Ubuntu and Debian love on Hyper-V

Microsoft says that its Hyper-V virtualization stack may soon support the Ubuntu and Debian Linux distros as well as CentOS, Red Hat, and SuSE. The proprietary software shop has told The Register that after adding CentOS support last month, it's looking to support other Linux distros on Hyper-V and also its management software …

COMMENTS

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    About damn time

    "Historically, Microsoft has been aggressively anti-Linux and anti-open source at a corporate level, but those in its Server and Tools biz are pragmatic. They know that they need to work better with Linux and open source or risk losing operating system, virtualization, and management money to VMware. "

    Would be nice if their Windows desktop folks were as pragmatic when it comes to playing in the sandbox with non-Microsoft servers, but I'm not going to hold my breath on that one.

  2. Mage Silver badge
    Linux

    What next

    An MS Linux Distro...

    I remember long ago installing the MS distro of UNIX.

    Stranger things.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Linux

    Drivers

    Does this mean they've finally fixed their flaky Hyper-V paravirtual drivers?

    1. John Sanders
      Devil

      Drivers? what drivers?

      Of course not!

      Hyper-V keeps doing odd things, really odd things with Linux guests, specially when you lose a cluster node (crash or failure) and have to restart many virtual machines.

      1. handle

        Building your house on quagmire

        As I was reading the article I thought how scary it must be to be trying to build Linux on foundations laid by the enemy. You can imagine how they could fine-tune the flakiness just enough to persuade Linux users to dump Linux without dumping Windows. Maybe since Microsoft has been caught employing such fraudulent tactics so many times, the company wouldn't dare do this any more - let's hope so.

  4. nyelvmark

    Microsoft can equip itself with the technical knowledge and driver-level support needed...

    I first read that as "drivel lever support".

    I can't understand what was making me think of leveraging drivel.

  5. Goat Jam
    Windows

    Trust

    I have none.

    This is all fine and dandy until some suit who lives higher up the food chain at MS decides that;

    A) It is costing too much to support

    B) It is threatening their traditional Windows market

    C) They have suckered enough people in and killed the competition off so there is no longer a need to support non MS platforms

    D) All of the above.

    Granted C) is unlikely to happen in our lifetimes but stranger things have happened.

    What does the Windows User icon mean?

  6. lk1d
    Go

    @ Drivers

    Same. And please Microsoft can you include a "enlightened virtualized mouse" driver in the next Integration Services release?

  7. Tom 7

    cart horse

    sorry: cart bill horse

  8. The BigYin

    I see...

    ...Project Embrace is proceeding well.

    We all know which two projects follow.

  9. Tim Boothby

    Good news, but glossing over some ommisions

    It's great to hear MS widening their support for Linux on Hyper-V, but this article seems to overstate the effort going into this.

    The latest release of their Hyper-V drivers is from July of last year. Their support for CentOS didn't come with any new drivers, they just now support the RHEL drivers that many people were already using on CentOS.

    They don't even support the latest release of the supported distributions. RHEL 6 has been out some time but there are no drivers and it doesn't work. CentOS 6 will be out imminently and presumably in the same situation.

    I get the impression this article was based on an MS press release and is putting an overly positive spin on the situation.

  10. handle

    Chairs will fly

    "One request that has come to us time and again is Ubuntu and Debian"

    ...but he had to add, hastily:

    "[er,] We haven't seen a lot of requests"

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Trollface

    That guy's name

    is Sandy Gupta... LOL.

  12. IGnatius T Foobar
    FAIL

    Adding more Fail on top of Fail?

    Seriously, folks, if you're running Hyper-V at all, you're already bathing in boatloads of Fail. No respectable Linux administrator would be caught dead trying to run his rock solid Linux installation on top of a Microsoft Windows based virtualization layer.

  13. h4rm0ny

    VMWare cuts both ways

    Since I got VM Ware, I've actually used my Windows partition more. Sort of. I can now run a Linux box on my Windows 7 platform and use the Windows 7 environment + MS Office, both of which I really like, whilst still having all the Linux tools at the press of a key. It's absolutely the best of both for me and when I get the time to next overhaul my main desktop, I'll be taking the Linux partition off entirely and using the space for VMs (it's on an SSD, so making it a dedicated partition for my VMs makes a lot of sense).

  14. maxpowers43
    Megaphone

    whatever

    as far as the US and friendly nations(you know, countries that still have hope we'll get it together over here) are concerned...i hope ms and apple are reduced to 10% market share each with various linux distros and any new os' making up the remaining. imagine if your local banks, schools and businesses all ran polished open source software instead of the outdated, useless, unsafe, expensive crap they run now and kids came out of high school marketable,intelligent and creative. one can dream!

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Very interesting...

    I don't think they will see Linux as a threat at all, more like another business opportunity which I could imagine also finding its way onto the desktop...

    For example; I used to run Sun's virtual box but now that its been overrun by (wh)Oracle stopped caring about it. Yet my Windows 7 professional also comes with a virtualization feature; MS Virtual PC. One of its key features is being able to run XP in Windows 7, also natively. iow: I click on "Windows XP mode" and soon XP appears. Better yet: I can "publish" applications. Now I simply click on one of those applications and... Granted; it takes a little longer to start, but the XP program will look and feel as if it were a natively installed program with a different look.

    The advantages here should be obvious; I can try, test or even use software without it messing up (polluting) my main OS. And without having to worry that uninstalling will leave some bits and pieces lying about anyway (granted; restoration points also excell here).

    Now imagine running Linux X applications like this; as if they were part of the Windows OS....

    It wouldn't surprise me one bit if that scenario has also been looked into and considered. Yet for that to work out you'd need to know more about the OS in question. And what better way to start with both Debian and Ubuntu ?

  16. Cyfaill
    Linux

    Never, ever trust Microsoft. They will bite your backside every time

    Microsoft is never to be trusted.

    It is a predatory company. It will devour everything in its path and will corrupt all in its wake.

    Microsoft's goal is the death of Open Source or its capture.

    The only way to prevent that is to never give this "company" any margin of acceptance.

    People always want to assume the best in others, that is natural enough.

    However, sometimes the reputation and history of something, is its truth.

    Nothing about Microsoft has changed... It is on the ropes now, its market and energy is draining... keep it up with relentless pressure and it is just barely possible that this blight on the face of humanity can be relegated to the dustbin of history.

    The metaphor of how this company operates has done its part to bring the US and most of the world to its knees technologically. They don't innovate anything, they destroy innovation in all that they touch. look at how they act. Are they a neighbor you want living next to you. When you hear kind and friendly words from them, look behind the words and know that they have a (figuratively speaking) 10 inch dagger just waiting to plunge into your Company's heart at the first moment of viable option.

    Watch Steve, the chair throwing potty mouth and see the truth.

    They realize that if they get a toe-hold on Debian and Ubuntu... They win.

    Why else are they interested.

    Microsoft is the proverbial "One Ring to rule them all"... and it is something that needs to be thrown into the fires of Mt Doom. Microsoft *is* entirely evil.

    Point of proof... How many company's have they destroyed with Microsoft being all that is left standing when all is said and done.

    Point of proof... Do you or Microsoft own the documents you create with their encrypted code in office products... They do... every time the code changes... you had best pay the piper or you can't read what you wrote.

    Not archival, not by a long-shot.

    Is that the world you want. Everything digital under their control.

    Not a byte left unencrypted. Intellectual Property... from their point of view is a and the mechanism of destruction. They want to tax the universe that they did not create one way or another. Microsoft is All Or... Nothing is left standing without Microsoft as the overlords.

    It stops when one is committed to just not using their contaminated code.

    It stops when enough people say "No, not this time".

    It stops when People see them for what they are, not how we would like them to be. Open your eyes. Is Microsoft what you like to see as the example of good behavior.

    If not, take the effort, to use anything but Microsoft for digital anything.

    Its OK to let Microsoft make Analog toasters... not much to corrupt there.

    But if you see a digital toaster and you can't see the code... you know what they are up to.

    Never take your eyes off of them.

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