John W. Colby
jcolby at colbyconsulting.com
Mon Feb 24 09:54:00 CST 2003
What you would discover if you were a diplomat, is that countries do things for a variety of reasons, all of which equate to "it's in our best interest". The whole "open source" thing never had a chance until MS raised their rates and changed their licensing methodology. All of a sudden... But it has very little to do with "phone home" except of course that phoning home prevented users from stealing the software and thus ended up costing everyone more since all of a sudden they had to pay for every copy. "In out best interest"!. Which of course it is, because MS software was costing a bundle just to get the secretary typing in a word doc. Do you need windows (at $100) plus Office (at $500) just to type a letter? Of course not. Linux and Star office works just fine (if a bit slowly). But to jump from there to ".Net (or any other MS technology) is not going to be accepted" is about like the difference between here and the moon, and here and the nearest star. Opensource has it's place. It is growing, and I am very happy that it is. But to drop everything MS related on the hope that something like Java is going to be king is not "in my best interest". Now, to discuss reasonably what .net is (and is not) would be a worthwhile thread. BTW, MS has been working on this stuff for about 5 years apparently. Pieces of the .net programming environment are written in these languages, using the framework to provide services. <disclaimer> I am not currently anything other than an Access developer looking at expanding my horizons. I don't work for MS, I don't know HOW to use .net. I have however done some reading so I can BEGIN to discuss the ideas behind .net. Take anything I say with a grain of salt because I am just beginning my explorations" </disclaimer> .Net begins with the .net framework. http://msdn.microsoft.com/netframework/ The .net framework is the foundation of the .net programming environment. It has thousands of classes which build up the functionality exposed by the framework. <MS Marketing> What Is the .NET Framework? The .NET Framework is the programming model of the .NET environment for building, deploying, and running Web-based applications, smart client applications, and XML Web services. It manages much of the plumbing, enabling developers to focus on writing the business logic code for their applications. The .NET Framework includes the common language runtime and class libraries. Common Language Runtime The common language runtime is responsible for run time services such as language integration, security enforcement, memory, process, and thread management. In addition, it has a role at development time when features such as life-cycle management, strong type naming, cross-language exception handling, dynamic binding, and so on, reduce the amount of code that a developer must write to turn business logic into a reusable component. Class Libraries Base classes provide standard functionality such as input/output, string manipulation, security management, network communications, thread management, text management, user interface design features, and other functions. The Microsoft ADO.NET data classes support persistent data management and include SQL classes for manipulating persistent data stores through a standard SQL interface. XML classes enable XML data manipulation and XML searching and translations. The Microsoft ASP.NET classes support the development of Web-based applications and XML Web services. The Windows Forms classes support the development of Windows-based smart client applications. Together, the class libraries provide a common, consistent development interface across all languages supported by the .NET Framework. </MS Marketing> ALL of that stuff is the difference between just using java and writing to the .net environment. Development is ALWAYS about cost. In the end, managers don't care if they have to pay $50k for MS licenses if the app they need developed costs $50k, when the alternative is to not pay the $50K to MS but pay $500K to develop their app. And that is the Achilles heel of the "opensource software" (free software to the unknowing). The stronger the foundation you build your app from, the less you have to do. Write Access, or buy it? Write SQL Server or buy it? Write the .net foundation or buy it? Try doing any of this in Java and come back next century when you are ready to start building your actual app. <DISCLAIMER> I am NOT justifying anything, I am NOT selling Microsoft, I am simply making an observation that will stand or not. <DISCLAIMER> The windows environment provides a very powerful foundation for building things. It has a published API, it has dozens of languages to use in building apps, and it has millions of people programming to it. Any time you call the API to have Windows do something for you, that is "java code you don't have to write". That API provides you with literally millions of lines of code already written and exposed for your convenience (and slavery to the environment, but that is the subject of another thread). To get back to .net, the idea is simply to build up the .net framework to provide exactly this same concept, thousands of classes that do all kinds of stuff, and then expose that stuff for your programming convenience. I have downloaded a .net demo that uses maybe a hundred lines of code to read and write encrypted files. It uses built in windows encryption, which has about 6 different encryption standards (including public key) wrapped by the framework, and those framework classes are used to set it up and do it. So, could you do that in Open Source? Probably. But "how" is the problem. You go looking for this and searching for that. Downloading stuff, trying this one, and a week later, you have your solution. Cool. 1 week at $80 / hour = a TON of money. And all you got for your ton of money is an encrypted file, a TINY fraction of what you need to get done. Again, I downloaded a .net demo that builds a chat client. Not sure exactly how much code (I am looking at it), but probably under 200 lines. Again, can you write that using Open Source. Probably (see previous paragraph). We use ANY tool because it makes our job faster or easier. MS has spent hundreds of millions of dollars writing a programming "system" whose purpose is to create slaves to the environment (but that is the subject of another thread), but in the process they MAY have (I haven't really used it yet) made our job a whole lot easier / faster. In the end, if my clients already use the environment, then it saves my clients money, or makes me more money, or both. We can demonize MS till the cows come home (that is the subject of another thread), but I for one am willing to at least give them credit for whatever they do accomplish. You don't have to like the motives (another thread), but this discussion really should be a discussion about what it does and doesn't give us. I don't know enough to speak with authority about that yet. But I don't find it in MY best interest to simply dismiss it out of hand. I don't live in Germany. If I did I would evaluate what was in MY best interest, living there. I hadn't heard that they had outlawed using MS software, but it certainly wouldn't surprise me. I know for a fact that the US government as NOT outlawed using MS software. I get the feeling however that I would have plenty of clients if I were to use .net. John W. Colby Colby Consulting www.ColbyConsulting.com -----Original Message----- From: accessd-admin at databaseadvisors.com [mailto:accessd-admin at databaseadvisors.com]On Behalf Of Henry Simpson Sent: Monday, February 24, 2003 2:36 AM To: accessd at databaseadvisors.com Subject: RE: [AccessD] .NET Over 2 gigs and multiple development languages? What with countries like Germany mandating the use of open source software because they can't really allow ET to phone Microsoft home and disclose potentially sensitive information through the updating and registration processes (curiously enough, a number of US federal departments have taken this stance as well), plus with Microsoft being ordered, awaiting appeal, to include Java support and of course, the comparative maturity and robust capability of Java, I would have to wonder why anyone would want to start learning .NET. As I had mentioned several weeks ago, Java already has ADO capability. It also has and has had true object oriented capability, is becoming a college and university standard for teaching OOD, has seen several generations of RAD IDEs and is free with tons of free available code. It runs on virtually any existing OS including Microsoft, Mac, Linux and Unix. If Access is coming out with a .NET version real soon, it may be a reason to learn some .NET. Microsoft had better let the cat out of the bag real quick and they had better be telling me that Access will have inheritance while they're at it before I spend any time learning any .NET. I had looked at the .NET stuff over a year ago and had spoken with several people who were asked for input by Microsoft over earlier pre beta releases as well as downloaded several hundreds of megabytes of Microsoft AV files promoting the technology and have seen little that is compelling. Local developers have provided a very mixed opinion on .NET and much has been said about bugs. On the other hand, Java seems to be making inroads not only with governments and universities, but also in business. I expect to continue developing in Access 97 and 2000 but have not yet seen any demand for XP. I believe it will practically be a miracle if Microsoft endows an Access.NET with the speed and convenience of its desktop guise and will require drastic changes like those in VB. Will it still be an affordable handy single or few user database? As long as Microsoft keeps the wraps on where it's going and when a reasonably bug free version is realistically anticipated to be released, I'll be learning Java, which already does everything .NET is supposed to, very well at that, for free, independent of operating system, and governed by very consistent and stable standards. Hen _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 with e-mail virus protection service: 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus _______________________________________________ AccessD mailing list AccessD at databaseadvisors.com http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com ---------------------------------------------------- Is email taking over your day? Manage your time with eMailBoss. Try it free! http://www.eMailBoss.com -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: winmail.dat Type: application/ms-tnef Size: 7204 bytes Desc: not available URL: <http://databaseadvisors.com/pipermail/accessd/attachments/20030224/4cd7e712/attachment-0001.bin>