Microsoft Posts Tool as Open Source

Anyone who thought Microsoft's recent settlement with longtime nemesis Sun Microsystems seemed surreal was in for another shocker Monday, when the software giant made some of its source code freely available on the Internet. Microsoft released the code on SourceForge.net, a Web site that provides free hosting for open source software development projects. The Microsoft tool set, called WiX, for Windows Installer XML, is intended for building Windows installation packages from XML source code.

WiX is being offered under the Common Public License, an open source license originally authored by IBM, says Jason Matusow, Microsoft's manager of shared source initiatives. The license, one of many approved by the Open Source Initiative and listed on its opensource.org Web site, allows developers to modify the code and use it in commercial products, he says.

"It's the first time we have posted a project under an open source license, meaning one that is approved by the Opensource.org folks," Matusow says.

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