madison

Google Chrome has Microsoft's code inside, says MS manager

Rupert Goodwins, ZDNet.co.uk | September 12, 2008 6:03 AM PDT

Summary

A senior program manager at Microsoft claims that Google took some open-source code from Microsoft and used it in their Chrome browser. And it's perfectly legal.
From Rupert Goodwin's blog on ZDNet UK:

And furthermore, he says, that's a good thing.

A great post over at Scott Hanselman's blog goes into some detail of the Microsoft code Google has included in Chrome. It's all street-legal: the code was made available under a very permissive open source licence back in 2004, and may be the first of Microsoft's steps in that direction.

Hanselman is a senior program manager at MS, and clearly enthusiastic about the whole business. He also writes a mean blog--if you've got any curiosity about some of the gnarly bits inside Chrome, including how it works securely with multiple versions of Windows, then give this the once-over.

Even more interesting than Chrome's internals is this statement:

"One of the reasons I wanted to work for ScottGu was because of Microsoft's always improving attitude about releasing source. It's a big company and sometimes moves slow, but more people "get it" now than before."

I do so hope this is true. Can't happen quickly enough.

Talkback Most Recent of 50 Talkback(s)

  • Google Chrome has Microsoft's code inside, says MS manager
    What a black eye for Google and a victorious win for
    Microsoft. Here we have Google who supposedly has the
    best programmers and they had to take code from
    Microsoft (who everyone says can't write code) to use
    in their browser. It makes you wonder just how much
    actual code did Google employees write? I'm guessing
    very little to none considering all they do is sit
    around playing with office toys.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Loverock Davidson
    12th Sep 2008
  • Clearly, Google didn't write any code for Chrome
    All they did was stitch a bit of IE onto WebKit and
    ta da! it was done.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Fred Fredrickson
    12th Sep 2008
  • Another sucker.
    Jeez guys, at least read the reference material before you make such comments. Rather than coming accross as sarcasm, which is often quite funny if done intelligently, it makes you come accross as ignorant. Or worse; plain thick.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Bozzer
    12th Sep 2008
  • Yeah baby!
    "Rather than coming accross as sarcasm..."

    Yep.

    "...it makes you come accross as ignorant"

    Nup. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Fred Fredrickson
    12th Sep 2008
  • I could believe that
    And they did a poor job of it no less.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Loverock Davidson
    12th Sep 2008
  • Explains many things...
    The first is you know nothing about software.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Bruizer
    12th Sep 2008
  • No
    You know nothing about software!
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Loverock Davidson
    12th Sep 2008
    • Flagged
  • That would be a bad thing.
    And you may never want to fly again. All you have to do is
    read your many posts and realize you have a remedial
    understanding of software engineering concepts.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Bruizer
    12th Sep 2008
  • My many posts
    My many posts highlight the trends and facts of
    today's IT industry.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Loverock Davidson
    12th Sep 2008
  • Your many posts...
    Show a lackluster understanding of computers, software and
    the industry in general.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Bruizer
    12th Sep 2008
  • That would explain why you think Chrome sucks...
    You think it's all IE code. That would certainly
    explain your disdain for the browser considering how
    much disdain you feel towards Internet Explorer.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    jasonp@...
    12th Sep 2008
  • That is not why chrome sucks
    Chrome sucks for reasons I stated prior. Now you can
    start your little name calling tantrum like you always
    do. 3..2...1..go!
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Loverock Davidson
    12th Sep 2008
  • Childish...
    You're response to genuine criticism shows that you
    always take the higher road, Lovey-D. I'm so
    impressed by your vast knowledge of the IT industry.
    In fact, that's why I read ZDNet at all; I love to
    read your insight and wisdom. It's always as if the
    Microsoft gods have been appeased and have seen fit to
    rain wisdom down on us clearly inferior Google-using
    mortals.

    As a side note I haven't used IE in two years (except
    to test my web projects since it's not standards
    compliant) and I have been using Chrome almost
    exclusively since their launch. It hasn't crashed
    once.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    mattnico
    16th Sep 2008
  • LOL!
    Dude, you really didn't read Scott Hanselmans blog at all did you. But then, you are only here to provoke a reaction.

    Anyway, Scott explains it quite elequantly. Here, let me summarise the main point.

    "The Windows Template Library (WTL) is MFC on template-based steroids - after a successful stretch on the slimfast plan. WTL provides the user-interface frameworks that we need to write proper GUI applications without resorting to the bloated MFC or complicated pure Win32 API programming. A number of the "must-have" classes from MFC are also available as WTL utility classes too, welcome back your old friends CPoint, CSize, CRect and most importantly CString! WTL produces small executables that do not require the MFC run time libraries - in fact if you stay clear of the Visual C++ runtime functions (strcpy and friends) you can dispense with msvcrt.dll as well - leading to really small programs, which run fast too"
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Bozzer
    12th Sep 2008
  • Ok..
    and they used Microsoft code instead of Google code.
    Still a punch to the face for Google and win for
    Microsoft.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Loverock Davidson
    12th Sep 2008

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