A batch of small updates on the Mono/Moonlight situation - NOVELL'S (and Microsoft's) plan with Moonlight is something that we have warned about ever since Moonlight was first announced.

I noticed a comment thread on Groklaw about Moonlight, with a link to the license terms on Microsoft's website. They call it Covenant to Downstream Recipients of Moonlight - Microsoft & Novell Interoperability Collaboration . A comment by Microsoft's Brian Goldfarb on Dana Blankenhorn's article about Novell being a lead pony for Silverlight started the discussion originally.

YESTERDAY we wrote about Moonlight and Mono-based applications getting more tightly integrated. We now see it confirmed by Novell employees Miguel de Icaza and Jonathan Pobst [1 2], so our suspicions were correct from the very start.

Microsoft only produces the Silverlight runtime for Windows and OS X, leaving Linux support to Novell's Mono project, which produces Moonlight. Mono developers argue that Mono is not chasing tail lights, but in the case of Moonlight it very clearly is.

Novell-sponsored Mono software gets extended so as to make it interconnected with Microsoft Moonlight, a "forbidden" component by Red Hat's assessment

Novell made more reliant on Microsoft, then spreads more of its patents-protected technology inside GNU/Linux

The new version of Moonlight is out, and with it, an expanded patent covenant enabling any Linux user to run Novell's open source Silverlight implementation.

AS WE POINTED out early in the week, Microsoft Moonlight is mostly promoted by the Microsoft crowd [1, 2]. This is predictable and consistent with the evidence. Novell just needs to disseminate its DNA inside GNU/Linux and then come along with Microsoft to claim special ownership of it. But who again is Novell with?

Samsung delivers phones that are based on Linux, but Samsung also engages in a Novell-like deal with Microsoft