>Essentially, the cost differences have become moot.
What? Have you seen these prices? http://www.microsoft.com/sqlserver/2008/en/us/pricing.aspx
That's just SQL Server for god's sake.
Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
21–30 of 193 posts
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#22That biz sparks program is like a drug dealer giving free samples... yeh u get a free copy of visual studio, but then you got to pay if you exceed any of these requirements...
http://www.microsoft.com/bizspark/
Privately held? Less than three years old? Making less than US $1M annually?
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#23-Not OSS (note I didn't include the F)
-Cross-browser pains
-Vendor lockin (getting better with mono, but not officially supported by MS)
-Non-(f)OSS tools or less (F)OSS tools
-Non-OSS risk (can't patch if needed)
-No support for WebGL/other html5 tech
-Useless pushing of Silverlight while industry shifts to HTML5
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#24At Busfeed.com all our systems and App are build on Microsoft platform and .Net framework. The MS BizSpark program is a winner for us and many startups we know. The icing on the cake: it’s waaaaay easier to hire Microsoft professionals on the east coast than for any other platform out there.
I think the ability to find and hire good developers is the most underrated factor in tools for startups.
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#25There is a strong perception (whether accurate or not--and I honestly don't know the answer) that it's the same old story with Microsoft: if you go the .NET route, you've gotta buy into the entire Microsoft ecosystem. It's not just .NET that you're choosing; you're also choosing Windows servers, IIS, Visual Studio, etc. If that perception is accurate, it's entirely reasonable to say, "Despite liking a lot of what .NE…
Not so sure that's the driver here. Many devs have bought into the iOS ecosystem. This certainly isn't cheap: macbooks, imacs, iphones, ipod touches, ipads. It's also a pretty deep dive to get into.
On the web side, I really think cost is the driving factor more than anything. As long as there's a free (open source) solution to MS's framework that is on par (we can argue either way which frameworks/platforms are better) there's little incentive for startups to go .NET. If a LAMP stack started costing as much as a .NET stack the landscape would be very different. .NET faces the problems going against the Java stack.
In the end, it's about the money. Which platform can I make more money on and does it more than pay for the costs to be on the platform? Right now on mobile it's iOS and on the web it's typically LAMP or lately a Ruby on Rails stack.
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#26Our startup is based on .Net and hosted on Azure. I don't think I realized just how uncommon this was until we were invited to Microsoft in Redmond and saw the excitement from the developers when they learned that we were a startup. We love the framework. But its definitely not the only stack we use. I also agree that there are bad .Net developers that spoil it for the rest of us. In my opinion, most of the issues se…
I agree. Our company builds products for many startups on top of ASP.NET MVC and it can be EXTREMELY difficult wading through the terrible webforms developers to find the developers with a strong core understanding of how the web works. For us we actually focus much of our attention on developers from outside the .NET world, as we've found they are able to wrap their heads around low level javascript much faster, and relatively speaking picking up C# syntax is relatively trivial.
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#27There is a strong perception (whether accurate or not--and I honestly don't know the answer) that it's the same old story with Microsoft: if you go the .NET route, you've gotta buy into the entire Microsoft ecosystem. It's not just .NET that you're choosing; you're also choosing Windows servers, IIS, Visual Studio, etc. If that perception is accurate, it's entirely reasonable to say, "Despite liking a lot of what .NE…
It's not accurate, for what it's worth. I'm working on a startup with .NET, and while I do use some parts of the MS Ecosystem (Visual Studio, C#, ASP.NET MVC, SQL Server, IIS) I use plenty of tools that aren't from Microsoft (NUnit, JQuery, Github, ReSharper, TeamCity, DotTrace, DotCover, Selenium). Any good technologist mixes and matches the things that work best for their solution, right?
Yes, there's definitely a split. Core infrastructure like the CLR, OS, and IDE greatly benefit coming from MS (although none are requirements, as Mono demonstrates). But anyone who does serious .NET dev work knows that tons of third-party tools are used.
One big difference I notice in .NET shops is that they seem a lot more willing to pay for the best solution. Whereas for FOSS shops they seem more likely to get an adequate solution for free.
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#28With rails or php, developers can use the editor and the OS they want. With .net, you're "forced" to use Visual Studio and Windows.
Also, I feel like .net teams are a bit closed to the rest of the programming community. Lots of C#/C++ programmers think that everything that is not C#/C++ is a joke or a little scripting language. "Omg, I would never build my 2D game on Python and save 100 hours" - says the C++ developer.
Also, startups and big companies think and act really differently. The mentality of a startup is: "Go faster!!" while the big company is: "Don't screw up or you're out". I know it's not that black and white, that's just a simple way to say it. But basically, the python philosophy is "Programmers are smart and they'll do their best to use the library correctly" while the C++/C# mentality is: "Imagine that an idiot will use your library so play it as safe and defensive as possible".
Finally, I feel like C# is like a big package deal. Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like it'd be hard to use CoffeeScript or Compass (for instance) with a C# project. And, it's not that much about the technology, but the mentality of the big company. From my experience, I know that had I told my boss: "I'll use CoffeeScript", he wouldn't have understood why.
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#29Closed source. If it breaks (really breaks) I (or anyone without a Microsoft badge) can't fix it. And if they do fix it, it will take a while for the patch to get to me. Pretty simple if you ask me.
Re: Why Startups Could Use .NET, But Don’t
#30Our startup is based on .Net and hosted on Azure. I don't think I realized just how uncommon this was until we were invited to Microsoft in Redmond and saw the excitement from the developers when they learned that we were a startup. We love the framework. But its definitely not the only stack we use. I also agree that there are bad .Net developers that spoil it for the rest of us. In my opinion, most of the issues se…
Does bizspark include a discount for Azure?