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Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

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Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#41

Post by rbanffy »

duck wrote: post #31
kenjackson wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was the problem?

It was a SharePoint issue with the emails it sends out and it ended up being a permission issue (well, not even sure you would call it that - but the fix was resetting the system account's password). There had been no changes in accounts or anything else besides the creation of new sites and to make it even harder no error messages or useful logging. I've seen issues like this more times than I can count over the yea…

I die a little every time I imagine how many companies are putting their lives inside SharePoint black-holes.

OTOH, SharePoint extraction tools seems to me a very profitable model for the coming years.

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#42

Post by abrudtkuhl »

duck wrote: post #31
kenjackson wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was the problem?

It was a SharePoint issue with the emails it sends out and it ended up being a permission issue (well, not even sure you would call it that - but the fix was resetting the system account's password). There had been no changes in accounts or anything else besides the creation of new sites and to make it even harder no error messages or useful logging. I've seen issues like this more times than I can count over the yea…

Sharepoint should not fall under this discussion... that's a product and has little to do with a startup's development stack.. Most .net devs won't touch it

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#43

Post by rbanffy »

abrudtkuhl wrote: post #29

There are tons of startups using the Microsoft stack... Just because they don't live on HN or don't appear on Techcrunch does not mean they don't exist. Microsoft even has BizSpark - a network to provide resources to startups (we are one). All you can eat Microsoft software via MSDN. "Price" is no longer an issue and Microsoft has made a point of building a solid startup ecosystem around their stack.

That "Price is no longer an issue" is a falacy. You are ignoring the cost of patching and rebooting Windows boxes and the cost of the redundant infrastructure required to accommodate the longer downtime Windows patches require.

And price is no issue only if you fail. If you succeed and have to deploy dozens of servers, you will quickly feel the it in your wallet. You can't grow horizontally as cheaply as you can with any free (even free-as-in-beer) solution.

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#44

Post by fleitz »

SkyMarshal wrote: post #33

MS seems to have equalized most of the initial price advantage of FOSS with their free bizspark stuff. Other issues involved: 1. Many startup hackers are good enough customize Linux for their needs, but would lack that freedom under Windows. 2. Open source security model perceived as more reliable than MS's security through obscurity. 3. Performance. Not an expert here, but from anecdotal evidence of running Win7 vs…

1. It's not difficult to customize Windows. There are well defined SDKs and interfaces for most of the kernel points. Honestly, how many web startups are customizing their kernel?

3. The performance differences are negligible in the general case. Startups write their own code so most of the performance differences are going to come from the code they write rather than underlying performance differences. In both cases, python vs. C# / .NET you can always drop down to C. I doubt that whatever their problems are they stem from language / compiler. Most sites are IO bound. IO bound applications are largely a factor of how many disks you have. The throughput for writing a file in PHP and C are identical on machines with less than 10 disks.

4. Licensing costs decrease drastically as you scale on the MSFT side.

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#45

Post by evo_9 »

pg wrote: post #24
evo_9 wrote: post #19

I think it's just 'fashionable' to not talk about your tech if you're using microsoft tools (aka .net framework). Mainly it seems that HN is very pro anything else. I'm actually the lead for 2 Denver start-ups myself (also a BizSpark member); I'm building everything on the back-end in c#/sql and using web-services to consume the data in my web and mobile apps. For me it's just a speed issue since I have 10 years C# e…

I don't think it's just a matter of fashion. Only a handful of the startups we've funded use anything from Microsoft.

Perhaps then it's more of a mindset issue since .Net is used in a lot of traditional business - aka they already have SQL, Windows Server 2008 and Sharepoint running for example.

.Net might just attract personality types that are more risk averse, aka programmers more interested in a steady paycheck than the ups/downs/stress of the startup life.

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#46

Post by viggity »

pg wrote: post #24
evo_9 wrote: post #19

I think it's just 'fashionable' to not talk about your tech if you're using microsoft tools (aka .net framework). Mainly it seems that HN is very pro anything else. I'm actually the lead for 2 Denver start-ups myself (also a BizSpark member); I'm building everything on the back-end in c#/sql and using web-services to consume the data in my web and mobile apps. For me it's just a speed issue since I have 10 years C# e…

I don't think it's just a matter of fashion. Only a handful of the startups we've funded use anything from Microsoft.

If someone applies for YC intending to use MS tech, do you count that as a point against?

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#47

Post by kogir »

Loopt is based on Microsoft's technology stack. We use:

Windows Server 2008 R2, SQL Server 2008 R2, IIS 7, C#, ASP.Net MVC 2, WCF, AppFabric and more. We also use Ubuntu, Apache, PostGRE SQL, and many other open source technologies and libraries.

I'd imagine most people don't use Microsoft's offerings because they're expensive (but affordable with volume licensing). They're also rarely on the bleeding edge, but sometimes that's a good thing. They offer some things you can't easily get with open source offerings, like:

SQL Server: Mirroring, Transparent Data Encryption, Spatial, Partitioned Indexed Views, and Full Text Search (all in one offering)

IIS 7: Ability to host transport independent services. That means the same code can be accessed over TCP, HTTP, MSMQ, or custom protocols you write yourself, and all be monitored and managed (lifecycle, health, etc) from one place. The closest open source offering I've heard of is Mongrel 2 (which looks awesome).

And so far, I've only encountered one bug that's affected our production code. It's really quality stuff that just works.

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#48

Post by mahmud »

Zak wrote: post #14

I don't hear of many startups using Oracle, IBM mainframes or proprietary Unix either. I think there is a general aversion among startups to using expensive technology, and I think the reasons are fairly obvious. If you're interested in the startup world, learn another software stack or three. Startups generally need people who learn new things quickly and use the best tool for the job. Flexibility is key; don't be a…

I actually heard of a "green energy" startup that listed Oracle and Crystal Reports as a requirement. It was one of those grotesque things started by lawyers and energy veterans.

I usually latch on to people with extensive domain expertise outside of computing, just to see where things might lead, but that particular one felt very FAILy and the people too unreachable and bureaucratic (i.e. "fax the requirements to my office and I will tell the girl to embed them inside the spreadsheet" -- horrible.)

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#49

Post by abrudtkuhl »

rbanffy wrote: post #43
abrudtkuhl wrote: post #29

There are tons of startups using the Microsoft stack... Just because they don't live on HN or don't appear on Techcrunch does not mean they don't exist. Microsoft even has BizSpark - a network to provide resources to startups (we are one). All you can eat Microsoft software via MSDN. "Price" is no longer an issue and Microsoft has made a point of building a solid startup ecosystem around their stack.

That "Price is no longer an issue" is a falacy. You are ignoring the cost of patching and rebooting Windows boxes and the cost of the redundant infrastructure required to accommodate the longer downtime Windows patches require. And price is no issue only if you fail. If you succeed and have to deploy dozens of servers, you will quickly feel the it in your wallet. You can't grow horizontally as cheaply as you can with…

In our case it's as cost effective to light up a Rackspace Windows VM than it is a Linux VM... There are maintenance costs on both sides.

If you have to deploy dozens of servers on any platform you will quickly feel that in your wallet.

Re: Ask HN: (No) Microsoft based start-ups?

#50

Post by evo_9 »

abrudtkuhl wrote: post #32
fleitz wrote: post #30

It's just not trendy and the release cycle is very long compared to open source. The long release cycle contributes to the tech side being less newsworthy. Also, the stack is fairly standardized so if you are making a website your stack is going to be either ASP.NET or ASP.NET MVC and it's going to run on the sanctioned VM, and you'll likely be running SQL Server. Contrast this with the ruby stack you might be runnin…

I must take this opportunity to note that the ASP.Net MVC release cycle is far more aggressive than Rails. Secondly... SQL Server is by no means required in the stack. We are using MongoDB as our datasource in an ASP.Net MVC app. You can use ANY database.

Yeah that's a good point that I think non-.Net dev's aren't aware of - you really aren't that locked into doing it the 'MS Way'. Like you mentioned you don't have to use SQL - it's up to you, really, on the DB.

Similarly, you don't have to use ASPX/WebForms either; a lot of people I know are switching to MVC and not using any of the .net ms usercontrols on the front-end, instead going with open standards and using something like jQuery to handle a lot of the UI and web-service interaction. This is the approach I've taken in recent years, and it makes it a ton easier to create clients for other platforms like iPhone, Droid, etc.

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