Microsoft asks for help

Mozilla was surprised when Microsoft suddenly offered to help the company sync Firefox with its upcoming Windows Vista operating system.

Of course, not foolishly Mozilla ignored such rare opportunities. It is surprising that Firefox is currently the most dangerous competitor of Microsoft Internet Explorer. And it's not easy when Microsoft has decided to cooperate with "enemies".

Microsoft's offer of help came over the weekend when Sam Ramji, director of Microsoft's open source research lab, posted an open letter on the Mozilla developer blog. Microsoft offered to open a new open source facility at its headquarters in Redmond, Washington, where Mozilla software engineers could work with Microsoft employees. The world's largest software company also offers to help support Mozilla's Thunderbird e-mail client.

In response to Microsoft's suggestion, Mike Beltzner, a Mozilla spokesman, said the company was very interested in Microsoft's valuable help. However, Beltzner also pointed out that Mozilla has been testing Firefox and Thunderbird with Windows Vista, as well as conducting research to take advantage of Microsoft's Default Program infrastructure.

Also in his blog, Beltzner listed a number of areas where the Firefox and Thunderbird development teams can take advantage of Microsoft's help. These capabilities include: more efficient operation in new application security mode; communication / integration with InfoCarrd; integrated with RSS data storage facility; and integrated services with Vista address book & calendar.

Both Microsoft and Mozilla have rejected the idea that both will conflict when it comes to open source. With Mozilla, open source is natural, but for Microsoft - a company that has always "closed its source" and sees the open source community as a threat, it has surprised many people recently towards open source communities. . However, Microsoft changes are still welcomed by the open source community anyway.