Microsoft Yanks Windows 7 Download Tool
Microsoft has pulled the Windows 7 download tool from its online store do to GPL allegations.
Consumers wanting to upgrade to Windows 7--and don't have an optical drive--may be out of luck for a while. According to CNET, Microsoft has pulled the Windows USB/DVD Tool from its online Microsoft Store due to allegations that it makes improper use of open-source code. Microsoft said that it is now conducting an investigation on the matter.
"Microsoft is looking into this issue and is taking down the (Windows 7 updating) tool from the Microsoft Store site until its review is complete," the company said in a statement. "We apologize to our customers for any inconvenience."
The allegations appeared last week by Rafael Rivera on his Within Windows blog. He said that Microsoft's tool uses code from the Codeplex-hosted Image Master project which is licensed under the General Public License v2. Rivera says that Microsoft violates the GPL because it did not offer or provide source code for the modifications. Microsoft also "glued in some of their own licensing terms," he said.
Rivera initially reported that he grew suspicious of the tool while poking through its code. "I had a weird feeling there was just wayyyyyyyyy too much code in there for such a simple tool," he said. Currently there's no word on when the Windows 7 tool will return to the online store.
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'due to'
-ed
Netbooks
'due to'
-ed
Used the tool myself to create a Windows 7 setup Flash drive for a system I was working on and the first thing I saw when running the tool was The Microsoft Store label on the dialog window.
The first thing that sprang to mind was WTF!!!
Granted, the tool was easy enough to use, but there was nothing transparent about it.
It was more like a Creating Windows 7 USB/DVD Setup for IDIOTS tool.
'and WHO don't have an optical drive'
Netbooks
If the source code was not offered publicly by Microsoft how did this guy look at it? Some sort of disassembler?
On his Windows Blog, Rivera listed this tool as what he used.
http://www.red-gate.com/products/reflector/
RedGate offers a Free copy on their website.
fail....
Sounds like all of Micrsoft's products
you beat me to it. D'oah!
Microsoft (like many other large corporations) would patent the air we breathe and the water we drink if they could.
And of course, they bitch about anything that remotely or seemingly infringes on their rights and patents, but they don't seem all that bothered with adhering to fair business conduct.
Did m$ offered you their sources, if you're so sure? Binary code depends largely on the compiler, so any comparison is useless.
If micro$uxx was sooo innocent, why did they pulled it?
It wouldn't be the first time m$ "borrows" without acknowledge, or proper credit.
m$ loves licensing terms just it they line up their pockets...
Netbook users
Though I could have saved $30 and ditched the DVD drive on my comp... mighty tempting.