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This isn't your father's Microsoft

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61–70 of 94 posts

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#61

You can’t judge a company only by its shiny new things; you also have to judge how they’re handling what’s already there. And right now, there are some exceedingly-common things that are far too broken considering how many decades Microsoft has had to fix them. I’m sure we all have our lists but just off the top of my head... - The complete inability of an OS named Windows to remember where any of its windows were a…

Your comment regarding network outages is an issue on macOS as well with certain apps. FileMaker is a good example. Just putting my laptop to sleeps breaks its network connection to the FileMaker server I need to use for $Employer to the point I have to restart FileMaker and login to my $Employer’s system every time my laptop wakes up. I wonder it your issues is more to do with crappy apps rather than windows itself?

One of my first software roles was working with a legacy FileMaker database where most of the business logic was built directly into different GUI elements. I do not envy your work.

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#62
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But I would still endorse Apple over Microsoft until MS shows that it cares about user privacy by publicly distancing themselves from Facebook. Plus, Apple stuff just works. You still end up being an unpaid IT support for MSFT when you buy Windows machines for your loved ones.

They care about privacy and still have a massive connection with China? Idk but if you're willing to break your privacy for one state, what's stopping you from breaking it for another?

How is this different than every other company doing business in China, including Microsoft?

>Keep your data within datacenters located in China with an Azure China account and stay compliant with international and industry-specific compliance standards. Access to your customer data is controlled by an independent company in China, 21Vianet. Not even Microsoft can access your data without approval and oversight by 21Vianet.

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/global-infrastructure/chin...

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#63
post #39

I think the pendulum has been swinging from Apple towards Microsoft for developer friendliness for some time now. This is definitely an active strategy on MS's part, and a huge misstep by Apple. Some key parts of the MS strategy: - Embracing Linux. Beyond what's mentioned in the article, there's the Windows Subsystem for Linux, and the new Terminal app. Being able to run Ubuntu (or whichever distribution) natively on…

MS has always been super developer friendly as far as I can remember. The difference was in the past you had to buy into their ecosystem and way of thinking. Once that was done, VS was by far the most superior experience. Now MS embraces a greater variety of developers, not just those who bought in. Anyone remember DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS...? EDIT: found a clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vhh_GeBPOhs

Personally I never found the heavy IDE approach compelling and I'd much rather just build up a Makefile than rely on what VS and co are offering. MacOS used to be better in that case because you had native POSIX on top of a machine with excellent driver support and good ergonomics.

But now the winds really have turned. MacBooks turned to crap, Windows laptops improved and we have WSL with perfect VS code integration. I recommend anyone to try WSL, install VS code, install its remote extension and then go to a git repo in bash and type "code ."

It's magic...

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#64
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MS has always been super developer friendly as far as I can remember. The difference was in the past you had to buy into their ecosystem and way of thinking. Once that was done, VS was by far the most superior experience. Now MS embraces a greater variety of developers, not just those who bought in. Anyone remember DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS...? EDIT: found a clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vhh_GeBPOhs

How times have changed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5164635 > Why should I invest in the Microsoft stack? I'm done. Microsoft is no longer a platform I will work on and I will recommend open source products and frameworks from now on. > The Windows tech hegemony is a graveyard. XNA. Silverlight. WPF. DirectX. Managed C++. C++/CLI. Managed DirectX.

What changed I guess is that they switched to embrace Linux full on. And now extending it as well. I trust that Linux is safe from extinguishing though - too much of the world runs on it, and free servers are just too compelling.

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How times have changed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5164635 > Why should I invest in the Microsoft stack? I'm done. Microsoft is no longer a platform I will work on and I will recommend open source products and frameworks from now on. > The Windows tech hegemony is a graveyard. XNA. Silverlight. WPF. DirectX. Managed C++. C++/CLI. Managed DirectX.

What changed I guess is that they switched to embrace Linux full on. And now extending it as well. I trust that Linux is safe from extinguishing though - too much of the world runs on it, and free servers are just too compelling.

Not extinguishing perhaps, but appropriating and building upon Linux for their own benefit without giving much back is certainly possible. Google's already done it with Android.

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#66
post #30

I think the pendulum has been swinging from Apple towards Microsoft for developer friendliness for some time now. This is definitely an active strategy on MS's part, and a huge misstep by Apple. Some key parts of the MS strategy: - Embracing Linux. Beyond what's mentioned in the article, there's the Windows Subsystem for Linux, and the new Terminal app. Being able to run Ubuntu (or whichever distribution) natively on…

What changes here would meaningfully change the competitive balance? A macOS subsystem for Linux doesn't sound interesting. Neither, really, does a new IDE for building macOS and iOS applications. What's the real misstep here? The crappy Apple keyboard?

I think the misstep by Apple was to focus so heavily on iPhones that they stopped paying attention to the developer experience on Mac. Look at the fucked Catalina release, the slow MacPro update cycle and the abandonment of the Mac Mini, the obscene SSD pricing (especially combined with the way Docker likes to eat gigs...), and yes, the shitty Macbook Pro keyboard and stupid touch bar. Lots of things that together add up to a poor developer experience.

Obviously, Mac doesn't need a subsystem for Linux because it's already a *nix and all the tools work there already. Microsoft was playing catch up, but they're starting to look pretty well caught up.

Now, this isn't to say Apple is doing poorly, obviously they make ungodly gobs of money and are usually the most valuable company in the world. My original comment was about developer mind share, though, which I think is swinging back towards MS after being thoroughly owned by Apple from, say, 2008-2016. By not making the developer experience a priority, I think Apple is losing ground that they didn't have to cede.

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#67
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What changes here would meaningfully change the competitive balance? A macOS subsystem for Linux doesn't sound interesting. Neither, really, does a new IDE for building macOS and iOS applications. What's the real misstep here? The crappy Apple keyboard?

The parent comment just reads like an ad for windows. Having recently had the displeasure of developing on Windows, WSL is terrible and buggy. I’ve tried it on two different occasions and both times I just ended up going back to PS. That comment will get upvoted because hating Apple is so popular here that even shilling Microsoft will get upvotes when framed like this (I guess the “year of the linux desktop” memes go…

Man, I wish Microsoft was paying me, but I'm just a guy who uses OSX and Windows 10 (and Linux) regularly and doesn't have much of a dog in the fight.

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How times have changed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5164635 > Why should I invest in the Microsoft stack? I'm done. Microsoft is no longer a platform I will work on and I will recommend open source products and frameworks from now on. > The Windows tech hegemony is a graveyard. XNA. Silverlight. WPF. DirectX. Managed C++. C++/CLI. Managed DirectX.

What changed I guess is that they switched to embrace Linux full on. And now extending it as well. I trust that Linux is safe from extinguishing though - too much of the world runs on it, and free servers are just too compelling.

What changed is Azure and you can be sure they will do what they can to keep you locked into that ecosystem.

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What changed I guess is that they switched to embrace Linux full on. And now extending it as well. I trust that Linux is safe from extinguishing though - too much of the world runs on it, and free servers are just too compelling.

Not extinguishing perhaps, but appropriating and building upon Linux for their own benefit without giving much back is certainly possible. Google's already done it with Android.

Quite a lot of Google-developed code goes back into the Linux kernel. Look at cgroups - the entire containerization revolution sprung from code Google gave back to Linux.

Re: This isn't your father's Microsoft

#70
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MS has always been super developer friendly as far as I can remember. The difference was in the past you had to buy into their ecosystem and way of thinking. Once that was done, VS was by far the most superior experience. Now MS embraces a greater variety of developers, not just those who bought in. Anyone remember DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS...? EDIT: found a clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vhh_GeBPOhs

How times have changed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5164635 > Why should I invest in the Microsoft stack? I'm done. Microsoft is no longer a platform I will work on and I will recommend open source products and frameworks from now on. > The Windows tech hegemony is a graveyard. XNA. Silverlight. WPF. DirectX. Managed C++. C++/CLI. Managed DirectX.

What would Microsoft like you to build? What is a modern Windows app in 2019? They seem to be retreating from even UWP.
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