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Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

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Re: Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

#71

Post by statictype »

olalonde wrote: post #56
jsz0 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience even small businesses often believe their data/privacy is too important to hand over to someone else.

I'm sure Google does a better job at securing their server than most small businesses.

I'm sure most small business can secure their servers from Google infinitely better than Google can secure their customers' data from themselves.

Point being, maybe companies are not worried about Google's ability to protect them, but are worried about Google.

Certainly, there are horror stories about Google's customer support.

Re: Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

#72

Post by corin_ »

AlexMuir wrote: post #16
patio11 wrote: post #12

A desktop OS my mother can use. Sorry Ubuntu. You've sudo apt-got my-heart but, well, reality isn't coextensive with our aspirations.

This was what I thought until I installed ubuntu. Maybe it's the honeymoon period, but it just works. I doubt your mum is doing heavy graphics work or playing games and those are the only two things that are keeping me on win 7. The interface ubuntu is nice, it's stable and programs can be installed in one click. I'm not saying its perfect, just that it's much, much better than I thought.

The problem with linux, for my parents, is that neither of them are really computer literate, everything they know how to do is because they've been told how to do it, not because they've picked it up themselves. There are classes in how to use Windows, their family/friends use Windows and can give advice...

If they moved to linux, then not only would I have to spend a fair bit of time getting them into it, but I'd then be the only person for them to call with issues in the future.

Re: Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

#73

Post by duck »

AlexMuir wrote: post #18
duck wrote: post #15

Exchange - gmail I see this comparison so often, but it really is apples and oranges. I love gmail and use it daily, but it isn't a replacement for Exchange. First, gmail is just a client... you have no control over the server aspect with Google. That is fine for a lot of small businesses, but for most mid to large companies that isn't an option. Does Exchange cost a lot of money? Yes, but with that you get a first c…

I just don't get this insistance on control over utility servers. If we take sensitive businesses out of the equation there's really no argument for it. How many times has gmail been down for me? Never. What about exchange/lotus notes? At least once a month. And even when they work they're shit.

Things like email retention and recovery are two big features regarding control that I don't think Google gives you (at least last time I looked at it).

Re: Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

#74

Post by lelele »

Have you been blown away by Ubuntu? Wait until its next release and watch your hardware and/or software stop working.

If I was Microsoft, I wouldn't be worried that much. GNU/Linux is not a business, thus MS products will keep having a grip on gray suites for a long time. Microsoft has the resources to look after its OS. Startups thrive on free-software, but once the pointy haired bosses outnumber the hackers in them, the switch to enterprise friendly software is unavoidable.

Re: Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

#75

Post by stoney »

kenjackson wrote: post #36

Can Open Office and/or Google Apps access OLAP datastores as well as Excel can SSAS? Do either versions of their word processor have programmability layers so we can develop workflows directly in our office documents? Across all departments we have probably close to a million lines of VBA, COM, and VSTO code that we use most in Word and Excel. And a little for Outlook. And I just recently, like last week, seen some i…

IMO it has always been Office that has been the key to MS dominance

I completely agree. Excel is the thing that keeps me tied to Windows (and no, the Mac version of Excel isn't the same). It is by far the best software I have used for small to medium complexity data analysis (at some point you have to pull out the really heavy lifting number crunching tools, but they have even less open source competition), and it is the only software I have used that meets most of my needs and is also approachable to relative beginners.

Re: Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

#76

Post by gmac »

trezor wrote: post #42
byoung2 wrote: post #3

I'd be worried if I was Microsoft. I'd be worried too: Windows Mobile - Android IIS - Apache .NET - PHP, Java, Python, Ruby, etc SQL Server - MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc

While Windows Mobile is in a sorry state, I'm not really too convinced by the rest of your list. IIS is believe it or not a very good webserver, fewer exploits than Apache and just as extensible. And you can extend it with .NET-code. No need for that icky C to do that. .NET is a very good development platform with lots of stuff happening. PHP? Really? Of all things horrible, you mentioned PHP? Microsoft at least had…

You're setting up a straw man if you argue that the least good item on the FOSS list is less good than the MS equivalent. You need to show that for the best item on the list.

For example, my experience with MySQL is mixed, but PostgreSQL is a beautiful, beautiful thing. So here it seems to come down to the tooling you need (I can't comment on this: I've no SQL Server experience).

Re: Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

#77

Post by byoung2 »

trezor wrote: post #42
byoung2 wrote: post #3

I'd be worried if I was Microsoft. I'd be worried too: Windows Mobile - Android IIS - Apache .NET - PHP, Java, Python, Ruby, etc SQL Server - MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc

While Windows Mobile is in a sorry state, I'm not really too convinced by the rest of your list. IIS is believe it or not a very good webserver, fewer exploits than Apache and just as extensible. And you can extend it with .NET-code. No need for that icky C to do that. .NET is a very good development platform with lots of stuff happening. PHP? Really? Of all things horrible, you mentioned PHP? Microsoft at least had…

I was following the logic in the original post:

I'd be worried if I was Microsoft. And I know their profit is driven by enterprise, but today's startups are tomorrow's enterprise customers.

I think that's very true, and for that reason, Microsoft should be worried. For a young startup, free and open source is a more economical way to get up and running quickly without eating into your ramen budget. For 2-3 guys in a tiny apartment, setting up a few LAMP boxes in a closet is basically free.

Even if Microsoft is actually better than the free alternatives, the fact that it costs money is a deterrent for many startups, who in a few years will become big enterprise customers.

Re: Ask HN: what does Microsoft sell that you can't get for free?

#80

Post by petervandijck »

duck wrote: post #15

Exchange - gmail I see this comparison so often, but it really is apples and oranges. I love gmail and use it daily, but it isn't a replacement for Exchange. First, gmail is just a client... you have no control over the server aspect with Google. That is fine for a lot of small businesses, but for most mid to large companies that isn't an option. Does Exchange cost a lot of money? Yes, but with that you get a first c…

Experience with typical large company email: regularly unavailable. Silly limits on attachment size. Limited control. Crap UI. Down regularly. Takes days to get a new email set up. Takes day to troubleshoot problems (ie. emails that become unavailable). Costs heaps, need dedicated "IT Support staff" (don't get me started on that).

Experience with Gmail: pay 20$ for heaps of storage. Very large attachments no problem. Almost never down, and when it is, it's taken care of pretty soon.

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