ZDNet: Microsoft and open source?!

"So imagine my surprise when I recently discovered that Microsoft is apparently contemplating (nota bene: there is no announcement or commitment, just consideration) making available an open-source reference implementation of its recently-announced C# (pronounced "C sharp") language as well as CLI (Common Language Infrastructure), the language-independent bytecode interpreter that works similarly to a Java VM."

"All this and more can be found in the minutes of a meeting held two weeks ago in Orlando as part of ECMA's previously obscure TC39 technical committee...."

"If CLI becomes an ECMA standard, this could provide a very interesting toolset for software developers on multiple platforms who want to take advantage of the strengths of multiple languages. And if C# and CLI are successful as a combo, they could put a pretty serious crimp in Java's future."

Complete Story

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