The company joins Linux Foundation as platinum member

Nov 16, 2016 20:17 GMT  ·  By

Microsoft has announced today that it’s joining the Linux Foundation as a platinum member, no less than 15 years after former CEO Steve Ballmer described the open source platform as “a cancer.”

Microsoft has slowly but surely migrated towards the open source world, but the icing on the cake has been announced today when Redmond confirmed that it’s becoming a platinum member of the Linux Foundation.

Unsurprisingly, the software giant made this announcement with much fanfare and officials of the Linux Foundation applauded Microsoft’s involvement.

“By becoming a Linux Foundation Platinum member, Microsoft is better able to collaborate with the open source community to deliver transformative mobile and cloud experiences to more people,” said Jim Zemlin, executive director of The Linux Foundation. “Microsoft has been a key contributor to many projects, and we see the company intensifying its involvement and commitment to open development.”

With Satya Nadella at the helm of the firm, Microsoft gradually increased its focus on Linux and the open source world. Projects such as PowerShell, Visual Studio Code, and the Edge JavaScript engine have one by one been open sourced as part of a broader effort that pushed the company closer to a world that it once hated.

Furthermore, with Windows 10, Microsoft is stepping closer to Linux, as the operating system comes with Ubuntu built-in. Earlier this year, Microsoft also released SQL Server for Linux.

Microsoft says that it started focusing more on the open source community “in part through the popularity of its open source and cross-platform application framework .NET Core.”

Google’s surprise announcement

Also today, Google has announced that it’s joining the .NET Foundation as part of the Steering Group. The surprise announcement was made at the Connect()’ developer conference.

“Wednesday’s addition of Google to the .NET Foundation’s Technical Steering Group further reinforces the vibrancy of the .NET developer community as well as Google’s commitment to fostering an open platform that supports businesses and developers who have standardized on .NET,” Microsoft concludes.