Microsoft's Open Source 'Oops'

Sometime last week, Microsoft Codeplex users noted that a project called Sandcastle had been published to the page under the OSI-approved Microsoft Permissive License, but none of the code had been made available for download, which the license requires.

internetnews.com's Sean Michael Kerner notes that when the users made Microsoft's open source point man, Sam Ramji, aware of the situation, he responded immediately. In his blog at Port25 on Friday, June 6, Ramji said, in part:

This is unacceptable and represents a violation of Microsoft's open Source policy. I take it extremely seriously... I apologize to the OSI on behalf of Microsoft for this mistake.

He then explained that the project had been taken down and would not be published on CodePlex or use the MsPL unless the project leaders found a way to make the source code available.

Sandcastle is a "a documentation compiler for managed class libraries," according to internetnews.com.