Microsoft makes a real open source move

Sometimes it's under a bogus unapproved license written by Microsoft lawyers. Sometimes it's under a Microsoft license its lawyers got through the OSI, after much wailing-and-gnashing-of-teeth.

But this is the real deal. This is Apache 2.0 licensing.

And this is pretty cool code, too.

Specifically we're talking about Web Sandbox, which aims at securing Web content through virtualization. OK, that's not a cool thing, but wait.

As Ray Valdes of Gartner Group has noted, this can also protect against cross-site scripting, an increasingly common attack of hackers against Web sites of all types. So it is a cool thing.

It's a framework that works under Javascript, requires no plug-ins, and offers consistent support for Web objects, writes Peter Galli. He also notes that Microsoft is a sponsor of Apache and Sam Ramji delivered the keynote at their last conference.

If this move is followed up by others along the Apache line it will be a very good thing. It would not help my traffic if Microsoft becomes a non-controversial word in the open source community, but it will help open source.