Silverlight and Moonlight....

[hansdevr]

I don't know about other countries out there, but here in Holland, almost ALL schools have switched to a web based extranet system that shows your kids homework agenda and grades. Unfortunately, they almost all use a system called "Magister", which is based on the internet plugin Silverlight (Microsoft).

There is a Linux alternative, called "Moonlight". It doesn't work. That's the short story.
Somehow (anyone care to comment on the somehow?), Microsoft takes great care to keep Moonlight development always at least one version behind Silverlight. Whether this is a deliberate action of MS against Linux users, I don't know, but it is downright annoying to say the least. It is SO annoying that I was forced to create a Windows partition, JUST for the sake of being able to see my children's grades online.

Now, who's to blame? The schools for collectively ignoring the wishes of all Linux using parents? Or Microsoft for withholding current Silverlight specs to the Moonlight developers?!?

[Telengard]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

Wow, that's a sad story

Microsoft takes great care to keep Moonlight development always at least one version behind Silverlight. Whether this is a deliberate action of MS against Linux users, I don't know

It is by design. Microsoft created Silverlight, so Microsoft controls which feature sets are available to open source developers. The end result is exactly what you just experienced. You must use Windows to view your kid's grades because the school uses a Microsoft application.

I have a Netflix account, but I can't access it on Linux because Netflix uses Silverlight with proprietary codecs.

What would happen if Microsoft could block OOO (now LibreOffice) from reading/writing Microsoft Word documents? Would the world be a better place?

Edit
http://www.schoolmaster.nl/Default.aspx?tabid=445

Magister 5 is a web application quality, which was developed in Microsoft Silverlight. This brings many wonderful technique (visual) advantages which we Magister 5 ample use of it.Microsoft is developing at a rapid pace Silverlight. Because we are Microsoft Silverlight Partner, we get at a very early access to the latest versions Silverlight

Explains a lot.

[hansdevr]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

So, is Microsoft to blame for not sharing Silverlight specs with Moonlight developers, or is in your opinion the school to blame for forcing the parents to stick to Microsoft Windows?!? And how about the Apple users?!? I'm really contemplating legal action here...

[sithlord48]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

silverlight does not work unless you have windows.

moonlight is a version for us linux/mac os users but never compatible w/ the newer sliverlight stuff...

sliverlight is .net for web , and moonlight is mono for the web.

[Telengard]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

So, is Microsoft to blame for not sharing Silverlight specs with Moonlight developers, or is in your opinion the school to blame for forcing the parents to stick to Microsoft Windows?!?

• Microsoft owns Silverlight and controls use of if through both technological barriers and patent barriers. They deny open source developers full access to Silverlight API.
• The developer of Magister chose to use proprietary, patent protected, Microsoft controlled Silverlight to build their application. They don't allow access to the application by any means other than through Silverlight.
• The school chose to use Magister to manage access to student information. They assume everyone uses Windows and can run Silverlight to access student information.

I would say all three are responsible for denying you access to the student information.

And how about the Apple users?!?

Silverlight works on my girlfriend's Apple iMac computer running OS X for watching Netflix streams. I know that doesn't do much for Linux users though.

I'm really contemplating legal action here...

Whoah!
[me=Telengard]is not a lawyer![/me]

Please do not consider anything I have posted on this topic as legal advice. If you want real legal advice then you must hire lawyer.

[GreyGeek]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

.... I'm really contemplating legal action here...

I'm sure you do not have enough money to contest Microsoft's monopolistic behavior in court, even if you are an independent millionaire or an owner of a corporation with a market cap of several million dollars. First off, you don't have a legal office on retainer in Washington, D.C., or Brussels. Secondly, those coders who jumped onto the Mono train didn't read ECMA 334 & 335, or the "Community Promise" very carefully. The ECMA standards do not include Microsoft's GUI or Data components, yet Miguel de Icaza insisted on including them., even those he stated on two separate occasions that he was taking them out of Mono. That's why many Linux users -- me included --- consider de Icaza to be a Microsoft mole/paid employee. Before those illegal IP technologies were included, de Icaza created C# binders to the GTK+ GUI API, creating what is called GTK# bindings. In other words, Mono was using GTK's API to create graphical user interfaces, until WinForms and ADO were included in Mono illegally. Because it had to use GTK# bindings Mono wasn't really bringing anything useful to the FOSS development table, when compared to Qt or GTK alone. That is why most Linux users consider Mono an IP trap. Neither the ECMA nor the Community Promise give those who use Mono the legal right to use the WinFrom and ADO components, among others, that de Icaza included in Mono... with Microsoft's tacit but unwritten approval I am sure.

If you read James Plamondon's training manual "Evangelism is War!" you'd understand. Plamondon was the first supervisor/trainer of Microsoft's "Technical Evangelists", using tactics honed in the old CompuServe Forum in the mid 1990s and standardized with his training manual. http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/Comes-3096.pdf
In that manual you will learn about the "Stacked Panel", the "Slog", and later you can see those actions at work in the "Stuffed ISO committee": http://techrights.org/2008/10/07/iso...-by-microsoft/

I'm also pretty sure you are not aware of how Microsoft subverted the EU Open Source Draft Committee.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10193433-16.html

Microsoft has interfered with developer's use of SilverLight on the Mac OS X environment by "upgrading" .NET to 4.0 but refusing to re-license selected .NET 3.x GUI and data components on the Mac platform, leaving those who developed Mono and .NET applications for the Mac OS X on a desert island.

Rather than suing Microsoft perhaps you could sue your school board or gov purchasing agent for requiring citizens to purchase a commercial, proprietary product which is not vendor neutral in order to access websites paid for by tax payers money.

[Detonate]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

There is a petition out there somewhere to convince Netflix to change their system to allow us to use it. I signed it, but no progress so far. My understanding is that with Netflix, it is not a Silverlight issue, Netflix blocks Linux users because of DRM issues. I could be wrong.

[Telengard]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

There is a petition out there somewhere to convince Netflix to change their system to allow us to use it. I signed it, but no progress so far. My understanding is that with Netflix, it is not a Silverlight issue, Netflix blocks Linux users because of DRM issues. I could be wrong.

DRM which Microsoft created for Silverlight. And which Microsoft blocks open source developers from duplicating.

[perspectoff]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

Wow, that's a sad story

Microsoft takes great care to keep Moonlight development always at least one version behind Silverlight. Whether this is a deliberate action of MS against Linux users, I don't know

It is by design. Microsoft created Silverlight, so Microsoft controls which feature sets are available to open source developers. The end result is exactly what you just experienced. You must use Windows to view your kid's grades because the school uses a Microsoft application.

I have a Netflix account, but I can't access it on Linux because Netflix uses Silverlight with proprietary codecs.

What would happen if Microsoft could block OOO (now LibreOffice) from reading/writing Microsoft Word documents? Would the world be a better place?

Edit
http://www.schoolmaster.nl/Default.aspx?tabid=445

Magister 5 is a web application quality, which was developed in Microsoft Silverlight. This brings many wonderful technique (visual) advantages which we Magister 5 ample use of it.Microsoft is developing at a rapid pace Silverlight. Because we are Microsoft Silverlight Partner, we get at a very early access to the latest versions Silverlight

Explains a lot.

Moonlight is not developed by Microsoft. It is developed by Novell.

It is not codecs that are withheld. It is DRM (Digital Rights Management) modules.

Roku is a Linux based player and it plays Netlfix, but it has licensed the DRM modules.

Blame the school. They could have used Flash. They could have used a lot of things.

Moonlight is pretty capable -- I'm rather surprised that something simple like a grade sheet can't be viewed using it. More likely it's their implementation of .NET. It is hard for Mono to keep up with the constant changes Microsfot makes to .NET, but, then again, .NET has been a security nightmare, so Microsoft has to keep making changes.

It's probably sloppy coding at the school. You should complain to the school system, often and vocally.

[GreyGeek]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

In another thread I posted the news released today that Attachmate, who purchased Novell for $2.2 Billion US, LAID OFF "hundreds" of Mono programmers. That may leave de Icaza without a paid development team and Mono between a rock and a hard place. It will, no doubt, fall even farther behind the latest .NET on Windows.

It wouldn't surprise me if Microsoft issued a "cease and desist" order against Canonical/Ubuntu, but since Canonical is moving to Unity based in part on Qt4 it too late.

[hansdevr]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

Rather than suing Microsoft perhaps you could sue your school board or gov purchasing agent for requiring citizens to purchase a commercial, proprietary product which is not vendor neutral in order to access websites paid for by tax payers money.

I might be pissed off by Microsoft, but I'm a realist at the same time. I'm not wasting a dime on the bloody Microsoft software mafia. They have cost me enough money as it is. But I do see some light in that last statement - in fact, I had come to more or less the same conclusion. I noticed that just sinking my teeth in my kids' school doesn't do any good, because they immediately hide behind the purchasing agent's back.
It wouldn't all be such a biggie, when grades would still be handed out on (that good old) paper regularly, but the schools have collectively decided that paper is not "green" any more (yeah, right... But money paper still is...). So, apart from Magister, there is NO WAY to see your kids progress on a regular basis. The way I am now actually forced (read: tricked) into installing Microsoft crap on my computer (with all of the security risks involved to my system's integrity), which I really don't need, let alone want....

[Goeroeboeroe]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

I'm not sure if this is the kind of answer that's helping, but who knows.
If you really think about doing some legal action, maybe you could contact a specialist. This kind of juridical things are very complex. As far as I know a school in the Netherlands is free to force students to use Windows. Arnoud Engelfriet, a well-known Dutch lawyer (specialized in internet, software, etc.) and a friend of open source etc., blogged about it:
http://blog.iusmentis.com/2010/12/06...windows-eisen/
It's in Dutch, but he says a school is free to force students to use Windows, just as they may forbid students to wear a t-shirt of a certain color. The text of this blog is very, very short. That's not a good sign, because when a lawyer uses only a few words, the question is usually very clear.
But maybe it's possible to force the school to hand out grades in another way because some kind of freedom of information act of something like that. Maybe as a parent you have a RIGHT to know how your kid's doing.
You could ask that lawyer. On that page above is a link 'contact' and behind that is a form to ask questions.
I don't know if you've heard of the new site http://clinic.nl/ It's a Dutch site where you can ask juridical questions about ict etc. for free.
Sorry is this is not very interesting for not-Dutch people, but I happen to be Dutch too, so I can only say something for the Dutch situation
Not only schools, but almost the whole government here is completely Windows. So I don't think you can count on any support form government, city, etc.

[el_koraco]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

They have a right to make online software as they please and tie it to any kind of operating system, but they cannot make that the only alternative. Especially with the EC. If I found myself in such a situation, I'd raise some noise. We're not talking about commercial applications, but pretty basic things.

[Goeroeboeroe]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

You're absolutely right. But I think the Netherlands is the country that's (almost?) the number one Microsoft-addict. In theory there are lots of nice rules. In practice they just don't work.
We had a government office here to promote open source and open standards (NOIV). It's just been closed. Finished. Gone.
Parliament here has said a few times unanimously (all 150 members!) government should at least use open standards. The first time they took that decision is about eight years ago (out of my head, maybe it's six year).
Every workplace of the government has to get new software (I think about 120.000 workplaces). They have to ask every firm because of the EC. So they made specs only Windows could fulfill. Problem solved: all 120.000 workplaces are going to get Windows, and Microsoft Office, etc.
The city of Amsterdam decided to switch to open standards and open source. The ceo of the itc department just said: that's impossible, technically. She just flat out lied about a lot of things. Got fired. But the result: Amsterdam is going to standardize every workplace on Windows. Even the experiments with Linux are stopped. They've kept one very important thing of the whole plan: officials (I mean people working for the city of Amsterdam) are allowed to use Firefox!
Some universities here force their students to use Windows. That's allowed by the ministry.
Etc., etc.
A friend of me is teacher. About three years ago every teacher in Holland could get a computer for almost free. They only had to take some free courses and make a test at the end. They HAD to use Internet Explorer for the Internet test. Even Firefox was not allowed. And Microsoft Office for text editing. Etc. That project was sponsored by the government.
That's the situation here in reality. We have lots of beautiful rules, but the managers just do what they want and that's Microsoft, backed by their political bosses.
That's why I think legal action on technical/monopoly grounds against the school probably won't be successful. But maybe it's possible because a parent has the right to know how the kid is doing at school. Maybe, I'm no lawyer. That's a different approach (freedom of information or something like that) then the technical anti-monopoly route.

[el_koraco]

Re: Silverlight and Moonlight....

None of that matters. Denying parents to use any other OS than Windows to have acess to their children's grades is questionable, but passable. Denying them any other kind of access to the notes other than one kind, which is bound to a proprietary system one has to pay good money for is in contrast with a host of EU citizen's rights. This is the kind of thing that can easily go to the ECHR, or even ECJ if the EC gets furious enough.