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You mean there is no ECMA standard about .NET and you can't write a clone without a deal with Microsoft?

Umm.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=3A1C93FA-7462-47D0-8E56-8DD34C6292F0&displaylang=en
http://www.dotgnu.org/
http://www.mono-project.com/Main_Page

``C# isn't bad as a language, but it's Microsoft-only and too closely tied to Microsoft's run-time environment, which is too limiting.''

Is it really? I was under the impression that C# was an ECMA standard and had a number of non-Microsoft implementations.

Sounds like you have become a victim of proprietary technology lock-in.

``but they also need to find suitable replacements for everything.'' ...because the software, APIs, etc. are all proprietary and tied to Windows.

``Visual Studio?''

Proprietary and tied to Windows.

``Learn other editors (vi/emacs), IDEs, debuggers and compilers (gcc?).''

Cross-platform versions of these exist on Windows, too. You could have been using them, instead of the Windows-specific stuff.

``The windows APIs we're used to? Gone.'' ...and good riddance. Welcome to the APIs that virtually every operating system _except_ Windows supports.

``The widgets (winforms/winfx/whatever)? Gone. The frameworks? Gone.''

Same as above.

``C#? Learn another language.''

You don't have to: there's DotGNU Portable.NET and Mono, both of which support C#.

``Scripting languages you know? Learn perl instead.'' ...or any of the multitude of scripting languages that are available on *nix systems. Many of these languages are available for Windows, too.

``SQL Server? Learn another DB inside out.''

You can use standard SQL on any compliant database. Database-independent programming interfaces exist for various programming languages.

If the transition to GNU/Linux (although the same applies to other *nix systems, like OpenBSD, Solaris, or OS X) seems too large a step, you could take a number of smaller steps first, e.g. use cross-platform software on Windows: Firefox, OpenOffice.org, MySQL, Emacs, gcc, Eclipse, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, etc. etc. etc. You can also get a *nix environment on Windows by installing Cygwin.

That's sad really, I wonder on what standards those "wonderful Mono efforts" are based on ? Yeah. There'll never be a open standard for .NET, never bother about open source implementations.

In July 2005, Ecma submitted [the C# and .NET] TRs to ISO/IEC JTC 1 via the latter's Fast-Track process. This process usually takes 6-9 months.

• SharpDevelop is an open-source IDE very similar to Visual Studio, it can do C# and VB.NET
• DotGNU is a GNU-sponsored project to implement the .NET platform.
• The Mono Project, started by Miguel de Icaza of GNOME fame, is another implementation of .NET

Er, how was the parent marked insightful? Mark parent down!

C# runs on the .NET platform which was openly standardized. The standards have been adopted by the ISO, the same body that determines the metric units and also manages the C++ language. Furthermore, a number of open source groups have begun implementing .NET for other platforms than Windows.

And last but not least, all of the patents that Microsoft has covering the .NET platform have been released for public use.

With open-source leaders such as Miguel de Icaza (founder of GNOME, Mono) involved in producing .NET implementations for OSes other than Windows, it's hard for me to believe you just said what you did if you're anything but completely ignorant. .NET will exist on as many platforms and OSes as people choose to implement it on. And it currently exists on many.

Using a mouse to make an online purchase .... Oops too late Amazon already did it... http://www.oreilly.com/pub/a/oreilly/ask_tim/2000/ amazon_patent.html

Automatically updating security software over the internet ... Sorry McAfee already got that one ... http://www.dotgnu.org/patent-analysis.html

Use of graphics and text to sell products over the internet... Darn too late again (see Pangea Intellectual Properties) http://www.chillingeffects.org/ecom/

Tabbed browsing... You might be thinking Mozilla or Opera... Nope Microsoft http://www.internetnews.com/ent-news/article.php/3 406551

Maybe "techniques for cleaning one's anus using rolls of soft paper"... I have not checked but I am sure that one's covered too.

True, but not exactly. Microsoft has submitted C# for ECMA standardization (ECMA-334, IIRC).
The Common Language Infrastructure (CLI), has also been submitted for standardization.
From http://msdn.microsoft.com/netframework/ecma/: ECMA submitted the standards and TR to ISO/IEC JTC 1 via the latter's Fast-Track process. In April, 2003, ISO ratified the standards as ISO/IEC 23270 (C#), ISO/IEC 23271 (CLI) and ISO/IEC 23272 (CLI TR). Equivalent specifications have also been adopted as 2nd edition standards and TR by ECMA.

This allows free software developers to create free (as in freedom) .NET implementations, such as Mono and DotGNU. I consider this open-minded, and appreciate developping free software in C#.
On a related subject, they also opened their RSS extensions, protected by a Creative Commons License.

Even if it is true that using C# indirectly contributes to Microsoft's success, that's also a gift to FS developers.

It's clear I drink the kool-aid when I ask: are ReactOS and Mono/DotGNU viable alternatives which would allow you to continue using this hardware?

Alas, the release comes too late for the DotGNU project (their website has just been defaced).

mono is the only one? are you kidding? you should really try using google more.
theres a crapload of c# compilers out there.
Gnu's portable dot net had a working windows.forms library way before mono did.
http://www.dotgnu.org/

Yes and Yes

Just because Sun java isn't free doesn't mean there aren't alternatives out there.

Kaffe,
GCJ,
Jikes RVM,
Cacao,
and
others. .NET has Mono and DotGNU. That's two. So how is it "much more free"?

I get the impression that while RMS would tell us to beware the Microsoft Whore...

Wrong. Mono was endorsed by Stallman at first. After some ideological differences (think "GNU/Mono") the FSF started the DotGNU project, another free .Net implementation:

http://dotgnu.org

DotGNU Homepage:
http://www.dotgnu.org/

DotGNU FAQ:
http://www.southern-storm.com.au/pnet_faq.html

Hey, I really have no idea if you're the Miguel and I'm too lazy to look it up right now, but if you are, yay. I wanted to show you something.

DotGNU

Well, as for C#, would take a look at mono or Portable.Net for some enlightenment... pnet is a bit further for desktop/gui stuff, and mono is further with asp.net for web-application hosting... ymmv.

Also, on the editor, I can't say enough good things about crimson .. I use it for about everything.. I've also been using SharpDevelop which is a FOSS ide, not quite as responsive as MS's 2003 VS, but pretty nice..

In fact doing a presentation on NON-Microsoft.Net for my .Net usergroup in a couple weeks... There have been several books published on mono, pnet, #develop and more.. with a few on the way. For desktop applications, it can be pretty nice (check out wx.Net a .net wrapper for the cross platform wxWidgets toolkit... works on win/lin/osx.

I have to say that the MS tools are about the best of their breed, eclips is pretty nice, and I like more of a plain text editor (with syntax highlighting, and programming options) like crimson. Textpad is nice, imho, crimson is better.

So would all the JITs that everyone's built so far .. Remember that not all code blocks are loaded as readonly off the disk. I had to go through a couple of hoops to get portable.net to work on OpenBSD..

In short they would have to provide a way to mark a write-able buffer as executable - and I suppose you'd call it the next design mistake ?.

There's a wxWidgets wrapper for the CIL called wxNet, and there's work on a QT wrapper as well from the KDE people using that smoke stuff they've been working on IIRC, so they both are (or will soon be) accessable to C# and other CIL-based languages.

GTK's only a UNIX toolkit. On window's it's painfully slow, and on Mac OS X it requires a X Server (and thus, IMHO, is not really available for Mac OS X). Of course, that said, thanks to portable.NET you can use System.WindowForms on UNIX-like OS, Windows and Mac OS. Obligatory link to their screenshots from all those platforms, but I believe that the Mac OS X support requires a X server as well.. =\

No, I don't have anything useful to add to the conversation, why do you ask? ;)

Oh, one other thing that would need to be changed is that the code uses the win registry to store the last save path selected, username and encrypted password.

Hmm, looking at the Portable.NET Namespaces, it seems to be missing a lot of namespaces I use (2,094 methods to according to them). System.Collections, System.Threading, System.Net.HttpWebRequest (this is the main part of the app to download MP3's), according to the Portable.NET Namespaces, System.Net.HttpWebRequest is MISSING. The program also needs System.Net.HttpWebResponse to download the MP3 and according to DotGnu's site, System.Net.HttpWebResponse is MISSING. I don't even see System.IO.Stream which I use to download the stream from the System.Net.HttpWebResponse. I use System.Security.Cryptography to securly store the users password and this namespace is totally missing from the Portable.NET Namespaces.

Even if I switched to GTK# or QT#, this little app would need to be totally rewritten to work with DotGnu. I have a lot of hope for Mono and DotGnu, but as it is now, DotGnu doesn't cut it for production deployment. Mono is great on the web app side, but is missing the GUI side unless you use something like GTK#, wx.Net or QT#.

On paper it is, but not in practice.

But, not for any of the reasons you say. .Net is not the SDK that Microsoft lets you download for free. .Net is a ECMA standards that establish the format for .Net assembilies and the library profiles for .Net. [This includes, but is rather more than the C# language standard.]

If developers program against that, it will run on mono, ms.net, possibly even Portable .Net.

If you write code that uses Windows.Forms or Microsoft.Blah, it's basically like using the sun.* classes in java with one important difference: Microsoft, relishing the idea of further developer and user lock-in, does not warn you away from these classes but, rather, encorages developer to take advantages of Microsoft's .Net platform, in stark contrast to Sun's warnings to not use sun.* classes or you are not writing "100% Java".

On a related, but different topic: Applications written using Gtk#, Qt#, or wxWindows# on top of the .Net standards are cross platform, they simply have a library dependency. All those windowing (etc.) toolkits are available for, at least, the 3 major desktop OSes: WinXP, OS X, and X.Org on Linux.

The same could be said of Swing applications on Java 1.1 or J2EE applications now.

First let me state that I like and use both Java and .Net daily.

Same here; I wish gentoo supported them a bit better. For example, Tao and Axiom (.Net) and jalopy (Java) are not in portage and checkstyle (Java) has an emerge that doesn't create a cli script to run it.

http://www.dotgnu.org/, that has portions of System.Windows.Forms implemented, as well as parts of the 2.0 api implemented. Best of all it runs on Linux, Windows, OSX, BeOS and several handheld computers from what i understand. While its not a full implentation of the api, it will be eventually.

Why should I install more badly designed MS software then I have too?

You don't.

First of all, the .NET framework is not badly designed. It's one of the best-designed products Microsoft ever came up with. The reason Microsoft released so much crap over the years, is probably because all their best programmers were working on .NET.

Secondly, their exist free (as in free software) alternatives. Mono is the best-known one, an other is DotGNU Portable.NET. But they're not 100 % complete yet, so I don't know if this Paint.NET will work.

Why should I install more badly designed MS software then I have too?

You don't.

First of all, the .NET framework is not badly designed. It's one of the best-designed products Microsoft ever came up with. The reason Microsoft released so much crap over the years, is probably because all their best programmers were working on .NET.

Secondly, their exist free (as in free software) alternatives. Mono is the best-known one, an other is DotGNU Portable.NET. But they're not 100 % complete yet, so I don't know if this Paint.NET will work.

Microsoft dont need to port it.

Mono
Portable.NET
DotGnu

So some of the biggest groups in OSS development seem to think that it might be a good idea to have an implementation of the CLI for other operating systems (Linux, OSX, Windows, Solaris, NetBSD, FreeBSD) and architectures (x86, PowerPC, ARM, Sparc, PARISC, s390, Alpha, and IA-64 to name a few).

What you have to keep in mind is that the CLI (the virtual machine in a sense) is an ISO standard (Java still isnt). The API's such as the System.* namespaces are still in a murky area and they may still be controlled vigorously through MS legal. But that doesnt stop any developer from using API's developed independantly - ie gtk#/Wx.NET for cross platform gui across the above mentioned platforms (still in development.. but it will get there soon).

There is not one supplier. http://www.mono-project.com/ and http://www.dotgnu.org/.

But if you don't want to use .NET,Mono, or dotGNU then fine. But don't think you can influence anybody else to not use them.

Except for the fact that .Net code already runs on other platforms see http://www.go-mono.com/ and http://www.dotgnu.org/.

Now the virtual machine and its tools etc still come from one provider...

Now the Virtual Machine and its tools etc still come from one provider?

And also, don't forget about this one...

It would not surprise me if the DotGNU implementation was lumbered with a full GPL

It would not surprise me if the DotGNU implementation was lumbered with a full GPL

Microsoft hasnt written a windows.forms implementation under Linux - they are not playing 'catch up', they are implementing something that doesnt yet exist.

Actually, it does. DotGNU Portable.NET has had a native implementation of SWF for over a year now. We discarded Wine as a viable option from day one.

DotGNU Web Site.

While I love to see Mono working, I'd like to know why did you (Mono people) refused (at least to some extent) to cooperate with DotGNU? Texts on both DotGNU and Mono sites aren't optimistic.

Getting rid of Mono could never work.

First of all I doubt Miguel would stay with Sun/Novell if they quashed Mono. He'd probably leave and continue the work elsewhere. I doubt they could stop him since Mono is based on ECMA standards and the current Mono C# compiler, runtime and class libraries are all covered by open source licenses (GPL, LGPL and X11, respectively).

Second, if Mono was quashed most of its developers would probably migrate over to dotGNU, the other free C#/CLR implementation.

Long story short, free software can't be bought (and eliminated or made proprietary) as easily as the companies that develop it.

There's a GNU project at DotGNU that has already created a runtime that supports a large portion of Windows Forms, yet nobody seems to know about it. Why?

Java to IL examples ...

Java to IL examples ...

DotGNU's java compiler can compile stuff like this (which was my Demo program for a LONG time).

It uses parts of classpath + C# glue and never got fully developed because nobody was interested. (and the javalib therefore never hit the CVS)

here, here, here and here.

here, here, here and here.

here, here, here and here.

here, here, here and here.

As to the DotGNU approach vs the Mono approach, basically I think you'd have to be insane to want to reimplement what Wine has done. Nobody is going to use System.Windows.Forms on Linux because it blows goats, everybody will use GTK# or (maybe when it is mature) Qt# - therefore a SWF implementation is useful only for application compatibility.


*SIGH* You don't need to reimplment Win32 to get System.Windows.Forms going. Implementing SWF ontop of wine is LAME. We have SWF working nicely and written in pure C#. It has been designed to be abstract and uses different drawing toolkits for the backend (X for Unix/OSX systems and Win32 for windows systems).

Check out the screenshots

MDI Windows.Forms in DotGNU , an IDE in Windows.FOrms on DotGNU , Gtk# on DotGNU ...

MDI Windows.Forms in DotGNU , an IDE in Windows.FOrms on DotGNU , Gtk# on DotGNU ...

MDI Windows.Forms in DotGNU , an IDE in Windows.FOrms on DotGNU , Gtk# on DotGNU ...

Java is slow and getting dated. C# is a more mature language and runs faster. Yes, Microsoft did do something right this time... Projects like DotGNU and Mono are being developed for linux machines and other unix variants. Plus, the JVM Gui really really sucks. Tell me now... how many java apps have u seen that have shitty GUIs? Too many to count. So, i think people should start using C# and perhaps DotGNU and Mono should start writing GTK/QT/X versions of the System.WIndows.Forms class, so it doesnt have to use wine. That said, I really dislike microsoft (as most others on slashdot do). Peace.

Mono is free and open source. So is DotGNU. Rotor is made by MS themselves, free and "shared source". And the Microsoft Official .Net SDK is free as in beer as well, and free to distribute with any programs you make with it.

With all these free implementations, and Lots of free Open Source IDEs out there for it, implying that C# development costs money is pretty much the dumbest argument you can make against it.

It would be nice if the open source community could take Mono and optimize for various chips and cards.

Mono's current codebase isn't very suitable for that. However, if you're interested in this kind of thing, have a look at the DotGNU project, specifically libjit.

Or does .gnu have it right?