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My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

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Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#81

Post by mpu »

philwelch wrote: post #59
mpu wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it what you do when you use a free software stack?

The difference is that in free software, anyone can step up and maintain. Relying on the kindness of Microsoft is a much scarier proposition.

In theory, maybe. But, let's say you want to go maintain X11/GCC/Qt (or even xterm), I doubt "anyone" can. Some people are full time developers on these projects, paid by some company we somehow rely on. You cannot just replace an expert working on such a big piece of software.

Of course, using free software might widen your "trusted base" compared to the situation where you go full MS.

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#82

Post by gtani »

I have no beef with MS (disclaimer: I don't have any close friends who work there but I do live in Seattle area and talk to lot sof people in the C#/C++/F# spheres). The one problem here is the C++11 implementation and how it's been rolled out, or not in the VS 2012/2013 releases. If anybody's interested, /r/cpp has herb Sutter and a couple other MS people dialoging:

http://www.reddit.com/r/cpp/comments/1harvz/microsoft_switch...

http://www.reddit.com/r/cpp/comments/1h47qi/herb_sutter_the_...

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#83

Post by moskie »

RyanZAG wrote: post #44
jasonkester wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fortunately, they reinvent the program every few years. So in reality you can be in EmpowerISV for 3 years, then BizSpark for 3 years, then [thing that replaces bizspark in 2/2014] for 3 years, etc. I've personally been in Microsoft's "let's give developers everything for basically free" programs since 2006, and am not worried that I'll suddenly face a crippling bill down the line. Shafting little startups for a lous…

What? You're basing your business continuity on a corporation creating a special 'free pass' for you every 3 years explicitly? Because they've done it once before? This seems like a terrible idea. Godspeed man, godspeed.

One could just as easily scoff at someone for basing their business off of "open source community supported" tools.

But, instead, the realistic position is to understand Microsoft's tools and programs will be a decent choice for years to come, just as using FOSS would be.

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#84

Post by pmelendez »

dkhenry wrote: post #10

While Microsoft might be a good solution for many people (Use what get the job done), this specific article has absolutely no real reasons why you _should_ use Microsoft. The truth is if One 8-gig windows server is what he needed for his start up he could get by with one 8-gig Linux server and save a couple of bucks a month. While that might not be a big deal now, if he ever wants to get big, those little costs start…

>"this specific article has absolutely no real reasons why you _should_ use Microsoft"

He does give some reasons, which might not apply to everyone is another thing: (from the article)

    Because I love C#.
    Because "MS is expensive" is a myth. 
    Because of Visual Studio
Of all the three I am very agreed with the third one. I wish it would be different but I haven't used a better alternative to VS so far (XCode, Eclipse, Netbeans, etc. just didn't work for me for several reasons )

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#85

Post by hapless »

sljd wrote: post #78
hkarthik wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, he could easily be using a JVM-based stack to get the same or better efficiency out of his 1-server configuration. Also there's some clearly naivety when bragging about his "low cost" $200/month setup. His SQL Server licenses alone will probably triple or quadruple his costs when his Bizspark status runs out.

Well, AFAIK he can easily switch to MySQL for instance, under the same ORM.

MySQL is possibly the single hardest database to port to/from, because it supports nothing.

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#86

Post by workhere-io »

I totally understand the "I like C#" argument - that's a personal taste, and we all have personal tastes when it comes to languages.

What I don't understand is the "we can run it on one server, so Microsoft is better". The same sites could very easily be run on open source software on the same hardware or even less. I've never heard anyone, not even Microsoft, claim that Microsoft server software requires less RAM and processing power than open source software.

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#87

Post by venomsnake »

jzwinck wrote: post #57
tbrock wrote: post #14

Wouldn't you be doing something horribly wrong if you couldn't serve 70k requests a day? It's actually less than 1 a second: 70000 / (60 * 60 * 24) = .81 I think this article is more about distributed systems being costly (yes) and perhaps overly complicated for the types of applications most people build. I agree. However, you could easily do the same with Linux.

Requests to a typical smallish site will not be uniformly distributed--not by a long shot. Given that the peak is what matters, if we might get a day's worth of traffic in a single hour, that's 19 requests per second instead of 0.8. Those 19 transactions per second will still sound tiny to many people, but a couple months ago we heard that Mt. Gox could only do 37 TPS. So 70k requests per day is not nothing, especial…

On my home dev machine which is nothing to brag about (i5-750 overclocked to 4.2 ) golang was able to process that per second on a single core if you keep the static stuff prezipped in the ram.

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#88

Post by soundgecko »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #75
jasonkester wrote: post #19

I'll pluralize this anecdote. Every bit of my little software empire runs on a single Windows box. That includes my 3 main money-making products, a couple dozen smaller sites being hosted for consulting clients and my partner's businesses, and the Expat blog. Lots of steady-state traffic to lots of sites, several Techcrunch, Reddit and HN poundings, nothing to write home about as far as downtime or drama in the 6 yea…

I've worked in IT for 12 years. Microsoft server stuff never just works . I'm in the process of replacing a $1 MM video asset management system that sits on top of Windows Server with OpenStack/Debian precisely because of this. Microsoft server just works . Hah!

Meanwhile millions of businesses are able to get it to work quite well. Ever use StackOverflow? NewEgg? Their server and tools revenue continues to increase by double digits. You think that's all media manipulation? Go search Dice for for the number of openings.

Just because someone was not able use the right tool for the right job in your instance doesn't prove anything. One of my friends used Windows Server to stream popular sports and got so much traffic that he got shutdown by Dish.

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#89

Post by pmelendez »

hkarthik wrote: post #52
dkhenry wrote: post #10

While Microsoft might be a good solution for many people (Use what get the job done), this specific article has absolutely no real reasons why you _should_ use Microsoft. The truth is if One 8-gig windows server is what he needed for his start up he could get by with one 8-gig Linux server and save a couple of bucks a month. While that might not be a big deal now, if he ever wants to get big, those little costs start…

I agree, he could easily be using a JVM-based stack to get the same or better efficiency out of his 1-server configuration. Also there's some clearly naivety when bragging about his "low cost" $200/month setup. His SQL Server licenses alone will probably triple or quadruple his costs when his Bizspark status runs out.

>"I agree, he could easily be using a JVM-based stack"

Maybe but believe it or not, there are people who HATE Java (that would includes me)

Re: My startup is Microsoft-based, here's why

#90

Post by obviouslygreen »

pmelendez wrote: post #89
hkarthik wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, he could easily be using a JVM-based stack to get the same or better efficiency out of his 1-server configuration. Also there's some clearly naivety when bragging about his "low cost" $200/month setup. His SQL Server licenses alone will probably triple or quadruple his costs when his Bizspark status runs out.

>"I agree, he could easily be using a JVM-based stack" Maybe but believe it or not, there are people who HATE Java (that would includes me)

I'm not a huge fan of Java either, but sometimes it's important to get past that and either try and work with a language that's extremely effective for some deployments, or consider that the JVM supports quite a bit more platforms than just Java.
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