Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead • Hacker News Board

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#211

Post by 0x0 » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 10:34 PM UTC

kough wrote: post #152

Negative1 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Unless Microsoft rebuilds Skype for the ground up" This. This exactly. Is it really unbelievable to assume Microsoft wouldn't attempt to build their own IRC+ clone and save a few billion while they are at it? I do agree with you, Slack is much better than Skype, but I would add that Lync is just as good. I went from Lync to Slack (after changing jobs) and I would say that Lync not only works just as well but has mor…

When I was forced to use Lync (due to an acquisition) in 2014 it was absolutely fucking terrible. The OS X client failed to report online status correctly, couldn't participate in most group chats or video or audio calls, and crashed regularly. Also weirdly non-native UI. And, no linux client to speak of - for a startup like the one I worked for where many devs used linux, that was a nonstarter. Has the story improve…

LOL, "lync.exe" a.k.a. "Skype for Business".

1. The worst brand management this side of 1984. "Skype for Business" has nothing to do with Skype and the .exe is still called "lync.exe"

2. SDK: Trying to use the C# SDK for even simple tasks leaves your app deadlocking or spinning 100% CPU in threads you didn't create or throwing native exceptions that doesn't make any sense as they are referencing raw hex 0x12345678 pointers or COM objects you never even touched. And if you try to watchdog all that have fun with 5 orphaned lync.exe's claiming your USB audio/video device.

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#212

Post by jhasse » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 10:39 PM UTC

rokhayakebe wrote: post #158

chubot wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I agree, I think people routinely underestimate the level of quality and amount of time you have to put into a consumer product. A good example is Yahoo Mail... this product is used by so many people, and was supposedly overhauled a few years ago, yet it is mediocre in so many ways.

What email product isn't mediocre? This entire vertical needs an upgrade. Perhaps Email is Hard.

Fastmail!

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#213

Post by _delirium » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 10:40 PM UTC

v64 wrote: post #76

ForHackernews wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does a tool display clickable hyperlinks? That's all the integration I (and I suspect many other people) care about. I can't even imagine what it might mean for " Stripe, Github, Trello, and Zendesk streams" to be integrated into Slack, or why I might want them to be. Want to share a gist with somebody? Just send a link to the gist to the chat channel, and people can click it.

I can't speak for the rest, but I personally use the GitHub integration to be notified in chat when builds have failed, pull requests are submitted and commented on, etc. Otherwise I end up having to keep GitHub open in a tab and refresh every minute.

Fwiw this is pretty common on IRC too (and has been for a long time). Dev channels pretty often have a bot that's periodically messaging some info on new bugs, build failures, etc. So I think does reflect a common developer desire that even predates Slack.

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#214

Post by 0x0 » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 10:40 PM UTC

The day MS buys Slack and assimilates it into "Skype for X" is the day I cancel our business subscription and rotate our credit cards.

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#215

Post by baddox » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 10:42 PM UTC

Klathmon wrote: post #177

baddox wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's all about integrations. We have all sorts of server messages and errors in a couple of our Slack engineering channels. Slack provides almost no way to visually distinguish these messages based on importance. In Hipchat, we had red/yellow/green background colors that worked great. To be clear, I'm not dead set on having background colors. I just really miss having a good visual distinction between messages.

I came on a little strong there, it's just saying things like "how could they not have [insert niche feature here]?" drives me up a damn wall! But that makes sense, and it would be a nice to have. In the meantime can you "hack it in" via different icons per status?

We do it with icons. It's still nowhere near as immediately recognizable at a glance, but I suppose it's fine. I just had a thought: you could embed an image preview that's just a solid red square. That would be very noticeable for important errors.

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#216

Post by swivelmaster » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 10:56 PM UTC

Negative1 wrote: post #138

cdnsteve wrote: post #93

We initially used Skype on our team to communicate with others. However, the software was horribly buggy on OSX. Slack has become part of our main toolchain. It works, has the basic features you need and doesn't get in our way. The integrations are great and we'll continue to use them. Unless Microsoft rebuilds Skype for the ground up, I don't see us leaving Slack for it. They had their chance, and they dropped the b…

"Unless Microsoft rebuilds Skype for the ground up" This. This exactly. Is it really unbelievable to assume Microsoft wouldn't attempt to build their own IRC+ clone and save a few billion while they are at it? I do agree with you, Slack is much better than Skype, but I would add that Lync is just as good. I went from Lync to Slack (after changing jobs) and I would say that Lync not only works just as well but has mor…

Here's a good one: When my system upgraded to Skype for Business from Lync, it didn't overwrite the old Lync or turn off its 'start app on startup.' Then, when the computer starts up, Lync opens, complains that it's out of date, and then clicking the button to restart as Skype for Business actually just restarts the Lync client... which then complains and asks to restart again.

Brilliant.

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#217

Post by area51org » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 10:59 PM UTC

kough wrote: post #152

Negative1 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Unless Microsoft rebuilds Skype for the ground up" This. This exactly. Is it really unbelievable to assume Microsoft wouldn't attempt to build their own IRC+ clone and save a few billion while they are at it? I do agree with you, Slack is much better than Skype, but I would add that Lync is just as good. I went from Lync to Slack (after changing jobs) and I would say that Lync not only works just as well but has mor…

When I was forced to use Lync (due to an acquisition) in 2014 it was absolutely fucking terrible. The OS X client failed to report online status correctly, couldn't participate in most group chats or video or audio calls, and crashed regularly. Also weirdly non-native UI. And, no linux client to speak of - for a startup like the one I worked for where many devs used linux, that was a nonstarter. Has the story improve…

Between the two I'd pick Slack, hands-down. Lync is awful, and I have to use it—so I use the Adium with the OCS plugin instead. It doesn't do audio calls or video, but it is stable and fast. (For video, hangouts are much better anyway.)

Slack? I use it, but I don't see the attraction. It's just another chat client with a couple of cute features. I'm really not clear on why the world seems so enamored with something that's really not much of an improvement on something we had in 1995.

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#218

Post by area51org » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 11:00 PM UTC

mitchty wrote: post #170

kough wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was forced to use Lync (due to an acquisition) in 2014 it was absolutely fucking terrible. The OS X client failed to report online status correctly, couldn't participate in most group chats or video or audio calls, and crashed regularly. Also weirdly non-native UI. And, no linux client to speak of - for a startup like the one I worked for where many devs used linux, that was a nonstarter. Has the story improve…

Lync actually starts for you? Mine just segfaults on startup. I've given up on it entirely.

Adium has a plugin available (OCS) that lets you connect. No video or audio, but if you just need IM to work, this'll do the job.

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#219

Post by trott » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 11:10 PM UTC

AngrySkillzz wrote: post #68

cissou wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it could cost more than 8bn to build one, and would take time too. Slack is right there, already built.

If it costs you more than $8bil to write a chat app then you're doing something wrong.

I'd like to know what people think developing something like Slack should cost, and why MS thought $8e9 was a potentially reasonable valuation.

Re: Source: Microsoft mulled an $8B bid for Slack, will focus on Skype instead

#220

Post by drdaeman » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 11:19 PM UTC

gisenberg wrote: post #208

pmlnr wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is IRC + ZNC + Andchat + bots...

This echoes the "couldn't you just replicate Dropbox with x + y + z ..." mindset of the past.

Why the past?

I tried to use Dropbox but it just didn't have what I wanted it to have. So, I find it to be not only replaceable, but awfully inferior to the x+y+z-style solutions.