WSJ: Microsoft forms Linux attack team

According to a report late last week in the Wall Street Journal, MicrosoftCorporation has finally recognized Linux as a threat and formed an in-houseteam to "keep tabs" on Linux. The team, which currently consists of lessthan 10 people, will evaluate the Linux threat and come up with measures tocounter the open source sensation, which caused Windows NT to lose itsgrowth momentum for the first time in 1998. Microsoft established a similarteam for Java two years ago, the report says.

"Getting inside the heads of our competitors is one of our best practiceshere at Microsoft," says Jim Ewel, the director of marketing for Windows2000.

Jim Allchin, who is responsible for Windows 2000 at Microsoft, concurs.

"I have now upped the focus on [Linux]," he says. "I've got the performanceteam prepared to benchmark it every which way."

Indeed, Microsoft has gotten into some hot water lately trying to make Linuxlook bad compared to Windows NT. Though the Linux community never questionedthe fact that its OS would beat NT, Microsoft's own tests--and the tests itcommissioned from Mindcraft show NT blowing Linux out of the water. Morebalanced tests from PC Week and others, however, show that a properly tunedLinux system can at least compete with NT. Microsoft's job, then, is towiden the gap with the successor to NT, called Windows 2000. But open sourcenever sleeps: All around the world, programmers are working to make Linuxbetter every day.

In any event, Linux has achieved a certain debatable goal: They've gottenRedmond's attention big time