[dba-Tech] More on Windows 8 promises...

Not only that, but Dreamspark is only available to college/university students and seems to require an acknowledged email address, such as .edu or .ac.uk. If that's the case, this may provide difficult for a foreign student or a student of an un-accredited school. Further more, this completely excludes younger students, open source developers and anyone wanting to learn to program or develop software independently.

This will force an incentive to distribute software at a cost and be a prohibitive barrier of entry. The big idea, as far as Microsoft is concerned, is to force (sorry, incentivise) these "second class developers" into making Metro apps, because Microsoft has a lot of catching up to do against iOS and Android. But in my opinion, it will only serve to push them to other platforms, like Linux, Android and Apple. There is already a trend of moving away from Windows development, so this may simply accelerate this change.

The carrot and a hammer approach tends not to work very well.

Best regards,
Hans-Christian Andersen


On 27 May 2012, at 14:09, "Jim Lawrence" <accessd at shaw.ca> wrote:

> Take a look at the dates... most of the packages shown are dated, 2006. :-(
> 
> Jim
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
> [mailto:dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Martin Reid
> Sent: Sunday, May 27, 2012 1:21 PM
> To: Discussion of Hardware and Software issues
> Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] More on Windows 8 promises...
> 
> http://www.microsoft.com/uk/education/students/software-and-developer-tools.
> aspx
> 
> All free. Will this change?
> 
> Martin
> 
> Sent from my Windows Phone
> ________________________________
> From: Jim Lawrence
> Sent: 27/05/2012 21:00
> To: 'Discussion of Hardware and Software issues'
> Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] More on Windows 8 promises...
> 
> Even Apple does not sell its development tools. (Some tools may cost but
> they are very cheap.)
> 
> That is the kiss of death as all computer science students, the future
> leaders of the computer world need to become familiar with the
> tools-of-the-trade...and they tend to be very poor.
> 
> Have you ever wondered why Open Standard systems have enjoyed the best
> growth and highest level on innovation? A good developer is born and not
> necessarily educated.
> 
> Most of the young guys I met, in the business, started their careers
> sometime around 9 or 10, maybe before. They have no money so they gravitate
> to what ever is cheap or free and simplest to use.
> 
> Apache over IIS, MySQL over MS SQL, Java/PHP over the new .Net, Linux
> Servers over MS Servers. Ninety percent of all innovation in the computer
> industry is created by these young hackers; NoSQL DBs, Event driven internet
> servers, Linux OS, Cloud development, JavaScript tools, and a huge number of
> development tools. (Major companies have been harvesting these innovation
> for years.)
> 
> Aside: Patent trolls have been making the development of any software an
> expensive legal nightmare so most new software is patented under the many
> Open Source dictates which makes its designers safe from legal action but
> also makes the software unsellable. This is why MS is blocking all this type
> of software...OSS has been challenging their supremacy and profitability
> since the early nineties.
> 
> I see MS as putting up another complex series of road blocks to developers,
> of the future, as nothing more than stupidity. Abandoning, their desktop
> roots is one thing but to hobble even their established desktop developers,
> by not supporting back compatibility or legacy software, blocking OSS,
> blocking all other browsers and charging a premium to future developers is
> not going to make their company another Apple.
> 
> The truth is that Apple does not make a majority of its income from
> software; it is a HARDWARE company that supports software through its web
> based distribution system.
> 
> Jim
> 
> Sent from my very old Windows XP PC desktop
> ___________________________________________
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
> [mailto:dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Martin Reid
> Sent: Sunday, May 27, 2012 11:56 AM
> To: Discussion of Hardware and Software issues
> Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] More on Windows 8 promises...
> 
> And this differs from apple in what way?
> 
> Martin
> 
> Sent from my Windows Phone
> ________________________________
> 
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