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Anonymous wrote:
The open-source allows you to modify it to your liking and also sharing modifications to further strengthon the security it provides provides
Who has the time to fix and update somebody else's software. I barely have the time to do my own code. At least MS provides easy to use development tools for writing my own code.
Michael
Programming is great. First they pay you to introduce bugs into software. Then they pay you to remove them again.
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Anonymous wrote:
open-source
And then we could write different versions of all those tools to integrate with other tools each of a different version and then we could try and maintain all those versions, while keeping which platform the version matched and ...
I don't have time to rewrite the OS or teach my father-in-law how to use a command line to compile his OS...I'll stick with windows.
ed
Every time I walk into a singles bar I can hear Mom's wise words: "Don't pick that up, you don't know where it's been!"
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Hell, Apache can't even keep their own software working with each other.
PHP 4.2.2 with Apache 2.x?
Nope, doesn't work.
You have to pull the source out of the CSV and rebuilt.
Oh gee, thanks... Yeah, going to do that.
  
Tim Smith
"Programmers are always surrounded by complexity; we can not avoid it... If our basic tool, the language in which we design and code our programs, is also complicated, the language itself becomes part of the problem rather that part of the solution."
Hoare - 1980 ACM Turing Award Lecture
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Anonymous wrote:
Microsoft is making it more and more difficult to do any kind of combination like this - it is becoming an all-or-nothing choice.
I'm using Windows 2000 running VS 6 to talk to a Sun Solaris box running Oracle. Don't see much lock in to MS tools their. The only thing that makes me wish for more MS is the poor crap that Oracle supply for client tools.
Michael
Programming is great. First they pay you to introduce bugs into software. Then they pay you to remove them again.
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Michael P Butler wrote:
poor crap that Oracle supply for client tools
They went from good stuff to java...that should be a textbook example of why not to use java! 
ed
Every time I walk into a singles bar I can hear Mom's wise words: "Don't pick that up, you don't know where it's been!"
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Anonymous wrote:
any kind of combination like this
That is called a 'Marketing Plan'! And they do it very well...I agree that they try to inhibit the competition from integrating, but Ford doesn't make their engine compartments accomodate Chrysler engines either. They don't prohibit you from doing the customizations/integrations, but to make it part of their business plan???? I don't think so.
ed
Every time I walk into a singles bar I can hear Mom's wise words: "Don't pick that up, you don't know where it's been!"
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Navin wrote:
This doesn't matter much if you are confindent that MS will always be the best, until the end of time, but if something better, faster, or cheaper comes along, you won't be able to take advantage of it without a big initial expense.
(Of course, I realize MS is not the only company that tries to lock customers into their products...)
Even though you acknowledge knowing that MS are not the only ones practising it, I still boggle at the thought that you bring this up as a valid point against MS.
Should I stop using Adobe Photoshop because it outputs PSD files? What about Macromedia Flash? Man that is just evil stuff, I will go uninstall it right now!
Yes it would be nice if companies did not use proprietary file formats, but that is not going to happen for awhile.
This is what I keep asking: Are there valid reasons not to use MS which do not apply to other companies?
To me MS is just another company doing what every company strives to do, make profit. If you don't like what they do, use someone else, but don't make them out as the devil while everyone else is a saint, they aren't.
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Paul Watson wrote:
To me MS is just another company doing what every company strives to do, make profit. If you don't like what they do, use someone else, but don't make them out as the devil while everyone else is a saint, they aren't.
Interestingly, you yourself gave the best reason not to use MS right there - perhaps you simply don't like their tools. But that aside...
I never said "evil", "devil", or anything like that in my post. MY point was that MS often does use proprietary formats and protocols to lock in customers. And it is simply untrue that *all* vendors use proprietary formats. (Anything open-source, by definition, uses open formats. And even MS itself occasionally publishes its formats and protocols.)
Being too locked in to one vendor, whoever it may be, is almost always bad, for the reasons I stated before. For me, given a choice, I'll pick the vendor that is the most open unless there is a compelling reason not to.
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(again, that was really my post, but I forgot to log on...  )
There are three types of people in this world: those who can count, and those who can't.
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Anonymous wrote:
For me, given a choice, I'll pick the vendor that is the most open unless there is a compelling reason not to.
Wonderful! Then do so and stop bashing MS around. Get on with your life.
Anonymous wrote:
Interestingly, you yourself gave the best reason not to use MS right there - perhaps you simply don't like their tools. But that aside...
Even more wonderful! I am pro-choice all the way. Our world is full of choices, more reason why all this MS bashing is just totally daft.
My question which still has not been answered is still the same: Are there valid reasons not to use MS which do not apply to other companies?
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Paul Watson wrote:
My question which still has not been answered is still the same: Are there valid reasons not to use MS which do not apply to other companies?
I thought that not locking yourself into a proprietary format was a valid reason? Not sure why you think this is not a valid reason and that I am just bashing MS - you have not made your point clear. If your point is that other companies also lock into proprietary formats, yes it's true, but there are companies that don't. So I consider this a valid reason.
There are three types of people in this world: those who can count, and those who can't.
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Navin wrote:
If your point is that other companies also lock into proprietary formats, yes it's true, but there are companies that don't. So I consider this a valid reason.
LOL no. That is my whole point with the question. What MS does is what a lot of companies do, so either bash all the companies that do and not just MS, or don't bash anybody and get on with life.
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Paul Watson wrote:
LOL no. That is my whole point with the question. What MS does is what a lot of companies do, so either bash all the companies that do and not just MS, or don't bash anybody and get on with life.
Okay, then. If your point is that most of the "evil" things that MS does, many other companies do as well so why single out MS, then I agree with that. But then that makes the question rhetorical... you would be hard pressed to come up with *anything* that MS (or any other company does) that at least some other company somewhere also isn't guilt of.
There are three types of people in this world: those who can count, and those who can't.
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Your analogy of thieves -vs- coding practices is even dumber.
And considering proprietary formats as a bad practice is almost as dumb.
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Netscape released their browser for free so why is it bad for Microsoft to do the same???
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Yawar Maajed wrote:
they are eating all the small fish out there
Could you please elaborate on how MS slaughters other companies? I would like to know all the tactics they are using that slaughters the competition.
Please exclude buying the competition, offering a better product, or bundling their own lesser offering in the OS as they are not illegal in the free enterprise.
Honestly, I'd like to know what they are doing that makes them a 'slaughterer'...you have your chance persuade.
Thanks,
ed
Every time I walk into a singles bar I can hear Mom's wise words: "Don't pick that up, you don't know where it's been!"
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This is a good one to work over. I agree with the virus problem to the extent that there are areas where security and collaboration had to fight it out and the collaboration guys won. Well, later on we discover that the security guys should have won. MS made a big mistake!! (In reality users were partly to blame for not paying attention, as were IT for not keeping updates and security wonks who make public holes before telling the company.) But I think MS has learned quite a bit from that...I hope!!
I would not say they wiped off the competition. Outlook Express is included with the OS but is nowhere as good as Outlook that comes with Office. You pay big bucks for that. Outlook Express is ok, but I would use another program which I would pay for over Outlook Express. I used to use Eudora.
Now the full Outlook is head and shoulders over the competition. Eudora did not keep up, they didn't offer the bells, whistles, or anything like Outlook. Same think with Notes. I would bet that most people only use Notes because they are locked into it. Some bigwig doesn't want to use anything else and they are stuck. (Me for example!) I hate Notes! I'd risk the security problems for something that works nearly all the time, is highly configurable and usable. Notes crashes or locks up too much, is barely confugurable and is not usable. I don't call that killing off competition, I just call it a better product.
Thanks for a good response! I'd rather have a difference in opinion with good discussion. Thanks!
ed
Every time I walk into a singles bar I can hear Mom's wise words: "Don't pick that up, you don't know where it's been!"
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ok.
You will use multiple vendors, primarily because they are all "open", but, using MS tools, I'm gonna finish my project before you do. 
"Dammit Jim! I'm a developer, Not a doctor!" =)
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I've used MS products for a long time, I've been on beta products as well, etc.
Overall, I think MS has been improving majorly in the past few years.
Yes, there are many things I am not happy about, but at the same time I don't think Linux can offer as many tools, etc. I may be a great system, it doesn't have all the tools needed right now.
(As a side note, I think Unix users are a very good reason not to move to Unix systems; Have you ever asked a question to one ? besides pointing you to the manual and telling you that you suck if you don't know that you need rev 294.49 of package A if you want package B to work, unless you have rev 489.2 of package C, etc. The 'we're using Linux, we're better' attitude is a complete disservice to their cause.)
In the meantime, MS is improving their products...
Spyware is an interesting topic; Yes, I like my freedom and I don't like to be spied. However, what is really spying ? Are they prying in your private files ? no. Are they tracking what you're doing on the web ? anybody around you with a packet sniffer can do it. Net accesses have never been private. As long as it's not disruptive, I think it's useful for companies to monitor how people are using their products.
It's like an automated feedback on thousands of people. It's cheap and efficient.
The tool that reports errors is a great idea for example. As a software developper I think it is wonderful to have a way to get infos from crashes on as many different machines as possible.
The windows activation is not new either. I remember all expensive software on Unix system had similar schemes. It's just a way to curb piracy.
What I would worry more is the tendency to go toward renting computers and software rather than buying them. Some Intel people told me about that in 1998 or 1999, the industry is slowly moving there. I think this is the real issue, not really if it's Microsoft or Red Hat that will dominate.
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Paul Watson wrote:
Are there valid reasons not to use MS which do not apply to other companies?
Nope.
What other industries out there, have competing companies agree on using a standard anything? How often have to tried to fix something only to find company ABC used the XYZ wingdingy on that model. Sorry, no they don't really have standards for that stuff.
So why does it come as such a big surprise this thinking has carried over to software??
BW
{insert witty/thought-provoking saying here}
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MS tools are good, especially when you have the time to tweak them, read a lot of articles, go to hundreds of sites, and cycle again.
What makes me furious about MS is their .NET strategy. In short,
- they are relying on developers for .NET evangelization. What do you think developers are going to do when they start distributing .NET-base sharewares or freewares. They're will be a strong issue, because users are forced to download and install a shitload of run-times just to launch a simple .exe. Your program'd better be great, otherwise I am pretty sure you'll be flamed. That's about it, I believe users and customers are going to resent a lot individual developers about .NET if the user experience is worse than before.
That said, everyone must remember that launching a .NET-based application requires a few seconds just to let the CLR compile the IL code.
- they are faking the entire dev community with their multi-language CLR strategy. The only reason why the CLR, in marketing words, accepts more than one language, is that MS want Java implementations be translated as seamlessly as possible to C# or the like. Hence the goal is only to gain the lost business and comfort their monopol.
- the latest MS standards are locking customers and developers. Whenever (for instance) Xml namespaces changes in the future, individual developers are forced to upgrade their products so it keeps working. In other words, you can not develop a program and figure that it will work during 2 years without any change.
This means that, although MS runtimes are at the basis of everything, they not only take your time for you to figure out all the workarounds needed so your program works neatly, the MS runtimes infact lock you into a full-time job just to follow what MS is doing in their service packs and so on. You are glued!!! While you should be freeed!!!!!!!!!!!!
- and finally, last but not least, MS is applying scheduled obsolescence. I fear the day MS tells the world that W2K is legacy, no support for it, and everyone should buy XP licences. That day, that will be a major final f*** for the entire community, (developers, users, customers).
MS quote (http://www.microsoft.com/ddk) : As of September 30, 2002, the Microsoft® Windows® 2000 DDK, the Microsoft Windows 98 DDK, and the Microsoft Windows NT® 4.0 DDK will no longer be available for purchase or download on this site. Support for development will ship at the same time as the Windows XP Service Pack 1 (SP1) release.
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StephaneRodriguez wrote:
What do you think developers are going to do when they start distributing .NET-base sharewares or freewares.
The .NET framework has been on Windows update for months. I'm guessing that by the end of the year Windows XP will ship with it. Most magazine coverdisks seem to have a copy. I'm sure IE7 will have it too. This is a temporary thing.
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
they are faking the entire dev community with their multi-language CLR strategy.
I think the CLR is the future for Windows development. I think MS know what they are doing with this and have a long term strategy (not just one of giving Java a good kicking)
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
- the latest MS standards are locking customers and developers. Whenever (for instance) Xml namespaces changes in the future, individual developers are forced to upgrade their products so it keeps working. In other words, you can not develop a program and figure that it will work during 2 years without any change.
I'm puzzled, where did you learn this? I can't believe this is true. (If it is, then it is certainly a step backwards from MS - backwards compatability is part of the reason they are so dominant on the desktop)
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
- and finally, last but not least, MS is applying scheduled obsolescence. I fear the day MS tells the world that W2K is legacy, no support for it, and everyone should buy XP licences. That day, that will be a major final f*** for the entire community, (developers, users, customers).
Yeah, but at least we'll always get to play with new toys 
Michael
Programming is great. First they pay you to introduce bugs into software. Then they pay you to remove them again.
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Michael P Butler wrote:
The .NET framework has been on Windows update for months. I'm guessing that by the end of the year Windows XP will ship with it. Most magazine coverdisks seem to have a copy. I'm sure IE7 will have it too. This is a temporary thing.
You're thinking short term. The .NET run-time you have on your system is never up-to-date. There are so many people working on it, and so many customer feedback, that everyone must be ready to download and upgrade the .NET run-time at least two times a year. This is an acceleration on what happened in the past.
And it wouldn't be a shame if run-times were small in size. But that's gigantic!!! Several hundreds of megabytes from a just-formatted system to get up-to-date.
This means those who connect with dialup will never get in touch with it. That's exactly what I am talking about. I develop freewares/sharewares for everyone, not for those with 1GB/s who in addition love blindly upgrading their system.
Michael P Butler wrote:
I think the CLR is the future for Windows development
Multi-language is a fake. No one needs it, no one uses it. The only language optimized for the CLR is C#. People in software houses will start C# development by the 2 next years, and will trash their current VB or C++ stuff. Again, who gives a f*** about the multi-language.
Besides that, most people use Interop (native WIN32 calls) to fill the huge gap in the .NET framework features. So anyone talking about platform interoperability (what CLR is supposed to do in the long term) is just f***ing lying.
When you are a C++ developer, why should you need the CLR. If you need low-level, performance and control, you won't use CLR.
The only new stuff about CLR against MFCs is that typical CLR objects can get to know whether an object in hands is actually valid or if that's void. This prevents most stupid errors we know as C/C++ developers when we have a pointer and we assume it points to a valid object.
But that's all for everyday developers.
About Xml namespaces : you certainly know that a lot of MS products already use xml schemas or other namespaces in Xml streams. Namespaces is a kind of virtual contract (no code here), that's not a DTD or any scheme that would give the ability to validate and bind Xml data types.
MS is using a lot of namespaces already whenever they export or import Xml. Again, whenever MS change the namespaces in a service pack, or a major release, you developer are forced to update YOUR code to make sure the data types bind properly both the newest data types, and the former data types.
In other words, MS controls the change. For instance, IE5 used a 1998 XSLT stylesheet for whatever default Xml transform. And from IE5.5, they are using the 2000 XSLT stylesheet, which is not compatible in any way.
As Xml, XSLT, Xpath, ... are being upgraded by the W3C, new changes are to happen by next year or so.
If you are a developer, you'd better follow every W3C move, and every MS move, or YOUR software won't work.
MS quote (http://www.microsoft.com/ddk) : As of September 30, 2002, the Microsoft® Windows® 2000 DDK, the Microsoft Windows 98 DDK, and the Microsoft Windows NT® 4.0 DDK will no longer be available for purchase or download on this site. Support for development will ship at the same time as the Windows XP Service Pack 1 (SP1) release.
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StephaneRodriguez wrote:
Multi-language is a fake. No one needs it, no one uses it. The only language optimized for the CLR is C#. People in software houses will start C# development by the 2 next years, and will trash their current VB or C++ stuff. Again, who gives a f*** about the multi-language.
I remember, may years ago, developing a C (not ++) application that needed a grid control. There were billions of VB (COM) ones floating about, that I wasn't able to use. I would have given my eye teeth for multi-language facilities that would have let me use someone else control in my app. I ended up writing my own grid control. Good experience, but a lot more work.
One tremendous use for multi-language is for porting legacy software. Got an old COBOL app you want ported to C++. It's a big job rewriting it completely all at once. Much easier to port it to COBOL.NET, get it working, and then rewrite a bit at a time. If you do it right, you might even be able to leave it in production.
Cheers
The universe is driven by the complex interaction between three ingredients: matter, energy, and enlightened self-interest.
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A few points.
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
- they are relying on developers for .NET evangelization.
Who doesn't. The best marketing technique in the world is word of mouth from a satisfied customer.
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
They're will be a strong issue, because users are forced to download and install a shitload of run-times just to launch a simple .exe.
You mention Java later, so I'll bring you up on it. 
Do you remember when Java was released. I do. It was exactly the same. Users had to download and install the JVM and the JDK (if they were developing).
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
That's about it, I believe users and customers are going to resent a lot individual developers about .NET if the user experience is worse than before.
And so they should. But that is not a .NET issue. That is a developer issue. If you produce crap, you should be pulled up on it. But whose fault is that?
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
- they are faking the entire dev community with their multi-language CLR strategy. The only reason why the CLR, in marketing words, accepts more than one language, is that MS want Java implementations be translated as seamlessly as possible to C# or the like. Hence the goal is only to gain the lost business and comfort their monopol.
Welcome to the world of business and marketing. What is the goal of business? It is to make a return on investment. No-one runs a business to give their competitors an advantage. No-one runs a marketing campaign to give their competitors an advantage. Can you imagine Coke advertising that Pepsi tastes better?
It is still a case of Caveat Emptor. If you don't believe MS claims about .NET... don't use it. No-one is forcing you to use it. Time will tell if the claims of the MS Marketing department are true.
I also believe that the reason CLR works with multiple languages is to shaft Java. But there is another good business reason. It's called reuse. It means that less work has to go into upgrading their products. When all the languages are updated for .NET v2, there will be a hell of a lot less work to make all their features work. They don't need to update MFC, and the VB libs, and the C# libs, and the Eiffel libs. Only one set of libraries need to be updated.
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
- the latest MS standards are locking customers and developers. Whenever (for instance) Xml namespaces changes in the future, individual developers are forced to upgrade their products so it keeps working. In other words, you can not develop a program and figure that it will work during 2 years without any change.
I'm not a hundred percent sure what you mean by this, but XML doesn't lock us in as much as the old proprietry formats used to. It would be much faster to upgrade with XML than it would be with any of the old binary formats they used to use. Apparently, much of MS Office will store it's data in XML. Makes it a lot easier to write a converter for say, a Word document.
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
This means that, although MS runtimes are at the basis of everything, they not only take your time for you to figure out all the workarounds needed so your program works neatly, the MS runtimes infact lock you into a full-time job just to follow what MS is doing in their service packs and so on. You are glued!!! While you should be freeed!!!!!!!!!!!!
I honestly don't see this. MS runtimes are at the centre of everything whether you use .NET or not. If you use Linux, their runtimes are at the centre of everything. If you use Java, ectcetera, etcetera.
I think you are making an assumption that MS will deliberately go out of their way to make things harder for developers. I don't agree with this viewpoint. First it will be quite foolish at a time when Linux is gaining market share. One thing about MS is that they aren't foolish. Second, and related to the first point, you catch more flies with honey. MS are more likely to make things easier to use as time goes by. It will get them more developers. Look at Direct3D. Early on it was real hard to use. OpenGL was a lot easier. MS iteratively refined it until D3D was easy to use and provided more features than OGL. Now it is the dominant 3D platform on the PC.
StephaneRodriguez wrote:
- and finally, last but not least, MS is applying scheduled obsolescence. I fear the day MS tells the world that W2K is legacy, no support for it, and everyone should buy XP licences. That day, that will be a major final f*** for the entire community, (developers, users, customers).
Who doesn't?
One day W2K will be obsolete and unsupported. Just as Windows 3.0 is. It's called progress.
Is this a MS thing? Well not really. Sun have released a number of new Java versions. All of the shrinkwrap software companies I have worked for have released new versions of their software. Not because the customers need the extra features, but because the company needs the cash flow.
MS also need to keep up with the competition by adding new features. Software is a feature driven industry. In a purely business sense, do you think any software company can survive for long on one release if their competition makes a release with new and improved features?
When all is said and done, my sig says it all.
Cheers
The universe is driven by the complex interaction between three ingredients: matter, energy, and enlightened self-interest.
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