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Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

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Re: Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

#121

Post by JunkDNA »

Some points:

- It's annoying in this day and age to be forced into using the entire MS Stack when I need to work with one specific technology. For example: if I want to test a web app on various versions of IE, I have to run Windows. OK fine, even though IE is the only browser that is tied to one OS, I'll let that go. However, if I want to use the Microsoft-provided free MS Virtual Machine images, I have to run them on Virtual PC despite the fact that I have a perfectly good VMWare installation. On my Mac, this means running windows on VMWare, and then Virtual PC inside that virtual machine. This is insanity. I'm trying to support your product, you should be making it as easy as possible for me. Even Apple ported Safari to Windows. As a developer, this just makes me feel hostile to MS. Another case: MS SQL Server. It's a real bear to connect to it from unix since (last I checked) there are no official drivers. You have to use some unix ODBC open source stuff and it's just not suitable for production work. My organization has a huge SQLServer instance I can't use because the Linux support is brittle. Contrast that with Oracle who has official drivers for practically every OS under the sun. The Windows for everything attitude has got to change. MS is a software company, not a Windows company. I know MS doesn't have a strong history of "playing nice with others", but it's sorely needed.

- Figure out a way to get corporate IT departments into regular upgrade cycles. The fact that lots of stubborn companies refuse to upgrade because the costs (perceived or real) are high is madness. It's a drag on the whole Microsoft ecosystem and heavily rate-limits the cycle time for new products.

- The segmentation of different Windows versions is just silly. There should be one version of Windows and that's it. It's simple for people to understand and it makes licensing a breeze. Artificially creating different versions doesn't really help anyone. Having a server and a desktop version is plenty (since they are genuninely different).

- MS needs to really decide how much longer they want to push an OS that is based on Windows/DOS heritage and not unix. I know this is tantamount to heresy inside MS. But if you look objectively at how Apple has used open source and unix, you see they are able to get incredible leverage for their size. Not having do to everything in-house and relying on the broader community is pretty good business for them. It lets them focus on the places where they can add value. At some point, it's not efficient for MS to maintain a parallel universe of "invented here" stuff. A proprietary Windows GUI/userspace on top of a unix core (like Mac OS) could really revitalize the whole Windows brand if done properly. It might even draw some geeks back from Mac OS. I became a Mac user because I was tired of dual booting Linux and Windows. I like having first-class email, word processing, photo sharing, etc... but I also want the unix underpinnings for my software development and scientific computing needs. Geeks aren't a big market by themselves, but they really make an impact on the decisions of others.

Re: Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

#122

Post by motters »

jpr wrote: post #116
motters wrote: post #65

At this point probably the smartest thing which Microsoft could do would be to adopt some Linux distro (perhaps OpenSuSE, which they already have some relationship with) and base all of their future development on top of it. At a stroke this would eliminate many of their security and malware problems, dramatically improving the user experience. Windows remains prevalent, but at present as a software developer I'm not…

Oh my FSM please no! That would remove the one and only mainstreamish OS that isn't an unix-clone from the market, leaving the computing world permanently crippled. Why do people want that sort of monoculture? Also, if you seriously think user experience is better on Linux, I wonder have you used a modern Windows lately?

I expect alarm to be the natural reaction, but at this point I don't think it's an overstatement to say that Microsoft needs to do something fairly radical if it wishes to remain relevant in its traditional markets. In technology you can only rely upon inertia for a limited time. Most users don't care whether they're using a Unix clone or not.

Re: Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

#124

Post by BillGoates »

bad_user wrote: post #101
BillGoates wrote: post #91

I would tell Microsoft to go back to their 90s mindset. Less focussed on big corporations, and more on getting (Windows) Microsoft software everywhere. Back then Microsoft was maybe an evil empire, but at least they did some exciting things from a developers viewpoint. @Balmer: Get rid of .NET. There are people who use it, and some of them actually like it, but it will never become the huge success you thought it wou…

> @Balmer: Get rid of .NET. In Q4 2009 the Server and Tools division had a revenue of 3.5 billion, bigger than their Client division, their online services or their entertainment devices. .NET is one of their best products. It's one of the few reasons developers might develop for Windows Mobile 7. It's the single reason I actually thought about deployment on Windows servers. With a single platform you can target the…

The server and tools revenue doesn't say anything about .NET. I didn't say get rid of SQL server or their server OS.

Compare the popularity of C# + VB.net to other languages to see .NET has less than 1/20th of the market. And that for a company that not so long ago dominated the software market.

.NET is useless for

* desktop applications, since the forward and backward compatibility is not guaranteed.

* Downloadable applications, because a 250mb library pack download is just too much.

* Web Startups and/or social applications, because of the (sql) server costs.

So the only use .NET has is for small corporate applications.

The only thing Silverlight is good for is playing DRM protected media.

Re: Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

#125

Post by bmj »

ern wrote: post #83
nhebb wrote: post #15

I would like to see .NET framework penetration numbers. A lot of .NET developers still target 2.0 for desktop apps because the perception is that that 3.0+ have a much smaller installation base - even though numbers posted on statowl.com and Scott Hanselman's blog suggest otherwise. This is definitely one case where more transparency by Microsoft would benefit both them and the developer community. I would also like…

Talking about penetration numbers on 3.0+, data on WPF and Silverlight adoption would be useful. MS should also consider making Silverlight and WPF more compatible. And if WPF adoption is lagging expectations (as I suspect it is), figure out how to simplify it and flatten the learning curve.

I suspect one of the problems with WPF/Silverlight adoption is the requirement to learn another layout language. I'm working on a rather large Silverlight 4 app, and am generally happy I don't have to work on many UI layouts. I can't muster up the desire to learn another markup language.

Re: Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

#126

Post by cmars232 »

I'd like to see Microsoft reach out and genuinely contribute to more open source projects, Microsoft has great technologies, lots of smart people, a few pockets of progressive change, but overall, I feel like everything Microsoft gives away or open sources is still part of a grand strategy geared towards locking us all into Microsoft Windows OS and expensive products.

As an open source developer, this was a major factor in shifting my focus from .NET to Java and Python. Even though I still miss real generics :)

Lock-in is a major turn off, and we can smell it. In the long run, I know from experience that open platforms will eventually win, and my expertise there can be more valuable than some certification in a captive technology. Because otherwise in order to sell my services as a developer, I'd have to sell your stuff. I see what you did there... but this may not be best for my customer. No thanks...

Instead why not sell products that we want to use and pay for, that is so customizable and modular that it is simply a better technical choice? Stop trying to trap us!

And please start using the same OSS licenses everyone else is using. Even if it's not the intention, your special MS OSS licenses make us suspicious of your motives. First think that comes to mind when I see a special MS license is "uh-oh, is this another 'shared source'?".

Re: Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

#127

Post by gizmomagico »

I suggest you do the following:

- Make sure that you at least quadruple the amount of incompetent middle managers at Microsoft.

- Ensure that all important decisions are made by douchey sales guys.

- Maintain bass-ackwards-compatibility as long as you possibly can.

- Make IE 9 not conform to any standards, especially now that you've said it would. This will allow you to force everyone to make web-apps on your terms, and help you maintain your death grip on the entire industry, and there will be much rejoicing.

- Start more projects that don't go anywhere. I really liked the Kin. Kin One. Kin Two. "vahn-tah-iihm, tooh tah-iihm". It was possibly the most magnificent product you've ever had.

- This reminds me, I think the world is just itching to get their hands on another Zune. Name it something like "Zune For Portable Music PlayersForSure". If you build it, they will come!

- Spend even more exorbitant amounts of money on inane ads. The butt-wiggle was a nice touch, but not enough. Something even more eccentric will help you connect with today's youth. Imagine Lady Gaga in her flesh-attire, licking a Kin 3 prototype while staring intently at the camera. No words, no background music. It will be perfect, and vast quantities of units will be shifted once Kin 3 comes out five years later.

- Whatever you do, please don't write a new OS from scratch. Just keep on keepin' on.

There. That should work. Do it for, you know, the greater good.

Actually I wanted to write something somewhat different, but that would have been downvoted into oblivion.

Re: Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

#128

Post by unexpected »

rakkhi wrote: post #109
unexpected wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We'll see how ChromeOS does! It seems to me that you won't see any netbooks labeled Google - you'll see them marketed as "Acer", "Asus", or "Dell". Focusing on the web experience and printing (to combine your reply to my other comment) seems like a very narrow niche to me. It seems like ChromeOS is trying to position itself between Android and something like Windows 7. Surfing the web and wanting to print is a common…

Keep a notebook for just 3 days, list out every activity that you do on a computer/computing device (tablet, smartphone etc) in just broad terms, personal and work: e.g. read hacker news, write report, review y, code x, watch movie, read magazine, listen to last.fm, gaming, print., scan, take photo, edit photo, check email, check social network, IM etc. Then put a +1 next to everything you did on the web (or could ha…

You are right - but I could also do everything on Android! I'm not saying that there's a market for a "web-based" experience - I just think Android already fills that gap.

There are very few cases in where having ChromeOS would be superior to a device with Android. Flash? Flash seems to be a processor issue. Android has Flash, and it should get better as mobile chips get more powerful. The whole flash thing may be moot if HTML 5 really takes off.

Printing? This seems marginal to me. "Buy this device so you can print from it" - that does not seem to be a very appealing sell.

Those were both of the features mentioned above. In contrast, if I have Android, I have access to all those Apps. Will Android apps be compatible with ChromeOS. I don't think so - this seemed to be a "feature" of Chrome.

It just seems that Chrome's functionality is a subset of Android functionality. With Android, I don't have the browser open all the time, but I can click a button and get there. Web pages should display the same on both devices - what's the advantage? The keyboard? Android works with a keyboard as well.

I guess what I'm saying is that the market for an Android netbook (vs. tablet - this whole issue is moot to me, they're both "mobile" devices) seems to be larger - it would do so much more than a device that's just limited to the browser.

Re: Ask HN: What do you want to tell Microsoft?

#130

Post by ern »

crad wrote: post #95

When it comes to Internet related technologies, Microsoft should stop trying to innovate in a Microsoft centric view of the Internet. Of couse this view does not help Microsoft promote their operating systems and tools but it does open them up to be more about standards everyone cares about and not just the Microsoft circle. There is so much innovation in web development in an ongoing basis, it doesn't make sense for…

I would say that Microsoft-focused web developers' attitudes have changed a lot in the last few years.

I was at a DevDays event a few years ago, when ATLAS beta (now ASP.NET AJAX) was demoed. There was much snickering when it failed to work perfectly in what the speaker derisively called "the other browser" (Firefox).

Today, I can't see that happening. If a Microsoft web framework failed to work on a non-IE browser, they wouldn't dare demo it, because most of the audience would blame Microsoft, and not the browser.

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