If you looked at Microsoft two decades ago you would understand why they are saying they love Linux. They did everything in their power to crush Linux in the 2000s so that they could sell their Windows Server OS, including smearing it in advertising campaigns, spreading lies and trying to use patents to bully companies into avoiding Linux. ^1

If it weren't for their embarrassing defeat in the server space, it would be unlikely that we would be seeing the same slogan touted now. So what is this change really? Microsoft's president said it was on the wrong side of history. Wow that is putting it really mildly. The shady, evil bully tactics that they used can't simply be excused by saying something like that? Apparently that is exactly how it works. Microsoft found a way with Azure to make lots and lots of money with Linux and now it "loves" it. I think this love is how a farmer loves his tractor. Once the thing is no longer useful the love will vanish. It's odd that nobody even raised an eyebrow when a massive corporation used the term love to describe a competitor.

And yet the fights in the online forums between IT professionals always had 2 sides. Either Microsoft is hiding something and still planning to be evil later, or Microsoft is now basically the hero of the Linux world. I would say neither is true. Microsoft never stopped being evil and a company embracing something that makes them lots of money is not some heroic or praiseworthy act. The <3 was a PR masterstroke for a company known to use evil instead of good quality to compete, and they were finally deciding that being dastardly was perhaps more effort than to just do the thing that they claimed they were doing, which is building useful software for their customers.

It's really easy to see however that Microsoft hasn't changed to become the heros of Linux. All you have to do is look at the Linux desktop. If Microsoft truly loved Linux like Linux users do, then why do they do everything in their power to try and sideline the Linux desktop? Only two applications from Microsoft run on the Linux desktop natively: Visual Studio Code and the Edge browser. They introduced a Team desktop application for a while after Linux users threw a collective fit, but then neglected it, claimed it was bad and aborted the application for a "better experience" with the web app. Not a single Microsoft Office Application has been ported to Linux, ever! After neglecting the Skype application for Linux for years, they finally dropped support for it in 2019. If you think this is love, you are mistaken.

Furthermore, Microsoft has not invested a single penny into application compatibility for windows applications on Linux using wine. If they loved Linux, why wouldn't they want it to thrive in all its forms?

They have done even worse by trying to destroy the Linux desktop entirely. They know that programmers like Linux but often also need to use it for work. They invested in the Windows Subsystem for Linux, which allows windows users to have a nested instance of Linux running in windows. You can even run desktop applications. There doesn't exist any kind of Linux Subsystem for Windows built by Microsoft to allow you to run an inline version of Windows in Linux.

It would be perfectly valid to say that this contradicts their business interests. That's the whole point of this post. Microsoft loves money because that's what corporations are meant to do, and as IT professionals we need to kind of not fall for their marketing BS and think that now they are our friends. Corporations are never your friends. WSL Does not exist to make your life easier. It exists so that you as a programmer don't jump ship to a Linux desktop. I've heard a fellow dotnet developer say that the Linux desktop is pointless because you can run WSL. This means that Microsoft is succeeding in oppressing Linux and trying to keep it in its lane. This is once again not the behaviour of a company that loves Linux. It is the behaviour of a corporation that needs to feed its salivating investors the corpses of everything it steam rolls and acquires. That is the economic system we have committed to. Microsoft is behaving purely and selfishly in its own interests, just as we should expect it to. It's not the good guy. They don't love Linux. They love money that Linux can make on Azure. They hate the Linux desktop because if it succeeds they will be forever pushed out of the operating system market, because desktops are the last place where Microsoft has absolute market dominance and push their lead foot down on the PC industry. Their tactics have changed from the good old FUD and EEE models to the continued strategic neglect of the Linux desktop along with the appropriation of Linux as just a developer feature in Windows.

The tools that the Linux desktop can offer programmers are just as powerful as the terminal and even augment the powers of the terminal. Microsoft likely knows that the user experience for developers is better on the Linux desktop, but they don't want you to use it, so they give you a sub par alternative and make it harder for you to use Linux because they don't make their applications work with it.