But Mono is a totally different story.
Leaving .net
91–100 of 221 posts
Re: Leaving .net
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, wait a sec. A good share of people is complaining about the lack of Microsoft's willingness to push the new shiny stuff - how much time did it take for them to come up with a MVC framework? - the other share of people is complaining that Microsoft pushes too much of a new stuff. C'mon, people, give me a break - yes, there're lots of new frameworks coming from MS. Well, that's what I would expect the company to do…
Apples and oranges: 1) Microsoft is both the tool vendor and the platform vendor. The Ruby community can go ape-shit forking each other on github, but at least the underlying OS remains constant. 2) Microsoft tools cannibalized each other. There is nothing laissez-faire about its offerings: the new kills the old and the entire company, developers, reference materials, publications, marketing, and retail are in lock s…
(1) - I don't see the problem here. Somehow old DOS stuff still works in Windows 7. You need new features? They're coming with the newer OS, but your old features rarely go away. Contrast this with upgrades from PHP 3 to 4 or 5, stillborn Perl 6, great divide between Python 2 and 3.
(2) - Please... Your old frameworks are still there. You are discouraged to use them, but they didn't go away. I seriously don't understand how this is a problem?
(3) - Again, technology is not frosen. Competitors are coming out with new shinier things - why Microsoft should stick to only what was there back 20 years ago? So they push their shiny stuff into the limelight. But given that old frameworks are still in place, it's not a problem.
"The push to COM and machine generated stub code." - I don't understand your grudge here. Why didn't you ask yourself: do _I_ really need to use COM? COM solves some particular problem - was it _your_ problem? Did ole-good Windows API and C++ classes just go away with the advent of COM? I for one am a C++/Win32|64 and .NET dev. Last few years I'm asking myself a question - do _I_ need to use WPF, just because it is there? My answer is no - I'm just ignoring it, as I ignore other shiny things that don't solve _my_ problem.
BTW, maybe this will sound like a blasphemy here, on HN, but Microsoft could teach a thing or two to the "platform vendors" out there. The pace of change and amount of inconsistency that is being introduced by everyone and their dog with web service "APIs" is astounding. Compared to that, MS' approach of keeping of old stuff while introducing new one is simply a god-send.
Re: Leaving .net
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
Customers will not worry about "alien" technologies, unless you sell the latter as such. This is a basic sales principle. Don't ever say you develop applications in Clojure, just say you develop in Java. Clojure is just a Jar, isn't it? Then you are just using a Java library, aren't you? Prototypes usually end up in production, don't they? Then develop such prototypes in an agile language and just make them follow th…
> Don't ever say you develop applications in Clojure, just say you develop in Java. That would be lying though, and it could get you in to a whole pile of hot water. Such 'technical tricks' may work a few times but eventually you'll have a real problem.
Although it bears more truth than you might think. As of Clojure 1.2, you can implement Java types from Clojure and you could build a plain old Java interface to the system if you needed to. And you'll likely be making use of many standard/community Java libraries.
Re: Leaving .net
#94What do people here think of .Net as a choice of platform for startups?
The tools are great, and there are a variety of MS programs available to get you using them at low (and sometimes zero) cost - Websitespark and Dreamspark (for students) are both good. From my perspective, the major drawback is that hosting is more expensive.
Not merely playing the devils advocate here, but what exactly do you mean by "the tools are great"? I have heard that numerous times about MS stuff, but I don't really get it.
I find that the oss/linux/socialist camp has some excellent tools available. But maybe you mean something different by "tools" than I do.
Re: Leaving .net
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Don't ever say you develop applications in Clojure, just say you develop in Java. That would be lying though, and it could get you in to a whole pile of hot water. Such 'technical tricks' may work a few times but eventually you'll have a real problem.
I think the safe way, if you want to follow that policy, is to say you develop for the JRE or for the JVM. Neither of these are lies, but they keep with the original idea of keeping peoples focus on "Java".
JRE and JVM are technical terms. Unless you are talking to techies, I think "Java technology" and/or "Java platform" are a better choice.
Re: Leaving .net
#96Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep. That's why I bailed back in '99. You needed an MSDN subscription just so your apps could tread water. Phone rings "Hi, we upgraded our NT server and now your software is broken". Many hours later "Oh MS changed the DB connection pooling to OFF" Me: Hmm, this Personal Home Page things looks ok, I'll give that a try. And as horrible as PHP is, it behaves itself.
I don't see how this is any worse than trying to keep up with the latest version of some OSS library. Whether it's MS that's revving or open-source developers, changes happen, and if it's a breaking change in a shared library, sometimes you get hurt. Just yesterday there was a "goodbye python" article posted here, that blamed the fact that so many Linux installations have old installations of python, and so many thin…
I see what you're saying but upgrading an OSS library is usually undertaken by somebody that thinks beforehand "I wonder if upgrading this will have any implications" whereas clicking "Express" on update.windows.com is billed as pain free, just like all things point and click.
Plus I had followed the advice in MSDN concerning connection pooling which was a registry setting for ODBC NOT part of the framework I was using (VBscript in ASP). Responsibilty for pooling was pushed into the framework.
The goodbye python article was about assumptions one could make about what would be available before one's code arrived. I bet php3 code still runs just fine.
Re: Leaving .net
#97Out of curiosity, are people building their own for-fun-projects using .net or even Java? All I seem to hear are people using Python, Ruby and Javascript.
Yes, I built http://ihackernews.com (a mobile version of HN), along with http://api.ihackernews.com, and http://viewtext.org, all with ASP.NET MVC. I've built these projects just for fun.
Re: Leaving .net
#98A sizeable chunk of .NET development happens in the corporate/enterprise world. That sort of environment isn't interested in collaboration, open source, etc.--they're interested in the guaranteed support the MS stack provides, and the idiot-proof web basics provided by ASP/webforms/MVC. If shit hits the fan in the .NET stack for a big enough corporate project, someone in the office can phone/email MS and get support…
If shit hits the fan in the .NET stack for a big enough corporate project, someone in the office can phone/email MS and get support for their problem. That's the canard, but it has seldom worked out that way for me. Whenever I've encountered a problem that can be traced to a flaw in their products, the suggestion of calling for support is usually met with riotous laughter. (In other words, everybody says it's a selli…
...or start with the official documentation coming from - gasp! - Microsoft:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd208104(PROT.10).as...
Re: Leaving .net
#99Earlier quoted context omitted.
Google makes him say it ;)
Yeah, Google, for the most part. You are not using an agile language, you are using some of the technology Google relies on, aren't you? ;-) Google, and beyond it. You could easily have a case for Python: Nokia has made it available for Symbian, Microsoft endorses it via ActiveState, and so on. My friends, if we want to be effective entrepreneurs, we must learn how to repackage things in a way customers will find att…
I'm sorry, but I don't agree. There is no reason why my customers need to know in what language the solution is developed in.
Besides, Ruby powers many highly visible websites and web apps. If I'd be losing a sale because I develop in Ruby and NOT Python, chances are I don't want that sale in the first place.
Re: Leaving .net
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it's great. Get BizSpark or WebsiteSpark to cover your licensing costs during development; start with el-cheapo $20/mo hosting which gives you reasonable bandwidth and MS SQL option - and you are all set. If three years down the road (that's how long *Spark lasts) you will find yourself thinking about licensing costs - you aren't doing it right: in three years of startup it's either you're getting enough prof…
I hear this often, but I don't buy it. The implications [seems] to be that most startups either succeed or fail within 3 years. Does anyone have proof of this? My personal observation is that most companies will still be around and they'll neither be millionaires nor broke. In such a situation, the bizspark bait-n-switch can be significant. Picking technology today on the basis that you'll either crash and burn or be…
My point is: if you're doing a startup, you want to have a business, not a hacking hobby. If three years down the road your business isn't generating enough profit one way or another, it's a "busyness" and you seriously should consider doing something else.