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When the Microsoft guys came over to Linux Bangalore 2003 Conference


Believe me, unbelievable as it may sound it was true and they had come as usual to promote a proprietary software, something that allows all kinds of Unix/Linux programs to run over Windows (SFU or something...) with support in the windows kernel itself - these guys keenly dissassemble and take a close look into competing technologies. They actually, frankly speaking, did a good job and the supporting 'non-violent' ;-) crowd was a great thing to see.
The three days went off very well with non-stop lectures by some of the top open-source developers. Naba Kumar of the feature-rich Anjuta IDE for C/C++ and GTK development on creating projects and maintaining them.The extremely funny antics of Miguel de Icaza (founder of GNOME) on Mono (Open source .Net platform) and and a more sober Nat Friedman on Web-services. Sirtaj Kang on KDE, Jeremy Zawodny, Rasmus Lerdorf (creator of PHP) on PHP optimizations and basics and many others.
Talks ranged from business to kernel and networking development to desktop environments, web-centric, server and enterprise issues on Linux.
The evenings were also a lesson in infotainment the first day ended with a documentary film on Linux and open source called 'Revolution OS' featuring the rise of open source software with the doyens and stalwarts such as Richard Stallman, Eric Raymond, Linus Torvalds, Bruce Perens and others. The second day concluded with a brilliant performance by a fusion group called Laya Taranga � amazing stuff.
The community is a really happening thing.
Stalls of HP, Yahoo and Novell kept people busy with their events and quizzes and other activities. The Encore Simputer was explained and demonstrated at their stall � Neat hand held device with tons of features, a mini computer - true to its name.
Ill write more about the event later . . .

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