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Microsoft takes a page from the open-source playbook

Microsoft is creating an internal start-up called officelabs that will develop …

Microsoft has long held a skeptical view of open source, but the Redmond-based software company is trying to change some of those attitudes with the establishment of officelabs. officelabs is a new internal start-up that is attempting to use some of the methodologies of open-source software development to invigorate the company and generate excitement about new Microsoft products.

Specifically, the people behind officelabs want to adopt the "release early, release often" approach that has worked well for open-source projects such as Linux and Firefox. Instead of having a fixed release date and product launch, the idea is to get early versions of new products into the hands of the public through web-based distribution. One aspect of open source that Microsoft isn't planning to adopt is the actual open source part, as it remains incompatible with the company's business model. However, the code for officelabs products will be available to anyone within Microsoft itself.

The move echoes the announcements of Office Live and Windows Live, which both attempt to release lots of software on the web as often as possible. Much of this shift in focus is due to the views of Bill Gates' heir apparent, Ray Ozzie. Ozzie is big on Internet distribution and delivery, and has already outlined a plan to move Microsoft more in this direction in the future.

The concept of starting small "incubator" groups within a large company has been around for a long time. The idea is to gain all the advantages of a free-wheeling startup company within the confines of a large, established business. Typically, such "intrapraneur" divisions do not do very well. Either they fail to attract the type of employees that like to do startup projects, or the products they develop fail to get noticed by management at the parent company. The ones that do succeed are usually those that have a very clearly defined goal: such as the small team that developed Internet Explorer 3 at Microsoft, or the Intel group in Israel who created the Pentium M (which went on to become the basis for all Intel's future processors).

With officelabs, the goal is much less clear, other than "create a bunch of stuff that works with Office." It remains to be seen if this experiment will produce viable results for the software giant, but the fact that the company is even considering such a project shows that the ideas behind open source are here to stay in the software world (not that anyone really had any doubt). Microsoft is not likely to abandon their monolithic development model for Windows and Office any time soon, but they are anxious to prove to the world that a company of Microsoft's size can still be flexible in its outlook.

Channel Ars Technica