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Do you *NEED* .NET? Can you learn something else? Something cross platform, maybe? Surely there's something out there that will do the job?

Comparison between Vista and OSX are pretty subjective. Here are some counters: 1. 64-bit support in OS X is still an after thought. While it is Vista's primary target. 2. The new audio and video driver system in Vista ahead of any other OS. 3. .Net platform is now driven into the heart of the OS. If you have written code in a "managed" environment, you already know why this is better. Of course Java exists, but the depth of the integration with the OS varies. You will never write Photoshop in Java, while .Net aims to there eventually (Paint.Net?). 4. OS X sucks in developer support. The stuff they are doing with Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Communication Foundation and Workflow are amazing, although I have strong reservations about platform dependency. Unless... 5. Performance? After writing this, I guess we were both trolling. :)) The discussion was about next generation Operating Systems. That is not Vista, and it is not OSX, too. Singularity might be.

Accoring the software map, .Net and Mono is in a war. The truth is Microsoft is supporting the Mono project as can be read in the Mono Project FAQ.

Actually, I was sort of wondering why the military was using a rather unpolished .net runtime to run their Wing.

I mean, wouldn't it be better to write it in C? Or maybe even use Java?

What's a wing, anyway? Is that a new framework with which I'm unfamiliar, or is it some new DoD language? Is Wing Ada.net?

The short story is that whoever told you that was wrong.

IBM legal counsel is not handwaving

Yes, yes it is. The exact same "residual" issue exists with any source code that isn't in public domain. That includes GPLed code. I could write a module that's extremely similar to GPLed code, and the original author of the GPL code could sue me for failing to observe the licensing restrictions imposed by the GPL.

I hate to break it to people, but merely existing is a legal risk. The only way to mitigate that risk is to attempt to only do business with entities you trust. Now in the entire time that the SCSL code has existed (7 YEARS!), Sun has never lifted a finger against ANY entity over similar code. Nor have they lifted a finger against free Java or J2EE implementations for other licensing restrictions. In fact, they've tried to be helpful. (As helpful as you can expect a large, slow-moving corporation to be.)

Now that Sun has tried to address the concerns levied against them about the SCSL code, they've been demonized for trying to help. Well I'm sorry. I can't help people who are naturally distrustful of those that are trying to help, while simultaneously falling into a trap of the enemy.

For comparison, what's Microsoft's history? Oh yes: use any means necessary to CRUSH each and every threat posed against their dominance. This includes bad licensing, theft, bad-faith negotiations, "aqusitions", misleading advertisements, etc., etc., etc. And the OSS community has just gotten into bed with them.

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.

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.

Its near impossible to find skilled IT labor. The jobs that are being oursourced to other countries are the jobs that Colleges are cranking out gradutes to fill. If we expect to fill our own need in the technology world today there needs to be reform in the K through 12 grades. Students need to be tought the fundamentals of computer logic at an earlier age.

If you want to be a corporate IT drone, you should goto college. Learn what the professors can teach you. In high school I attempted to teach the programming class the basics of Java in 2 weeks, out of the 25 or so students only 1 caught on to the basics. A couple years ago I spent a semester teaching C++ at the local community college, its not the easiest thing to teach studentes that don't understand fundamental computer logic at that age. I'm not saying that I'm a great teacher, I know I'm not. I have absolutely no patience. My point, if you're going to College for IT, you should be working on advanced projects, defintely not fundamentals.

Colleges are starting to catch onto the fact that IT is not something that should be taught to people the age of college students. After the basic classes they are providing students with projects that allow them to hone their skills for the real world. If you're not ready by the time you're done with high school, this is a great opportunity.

Personally I wouldn't be where I am today if I took a job as an IT drone. The job I took when I dropped out of college was for a Project Manager. I'm definitely not condoning that students drop out of college to be a computer technician at Best Buy. If you have an opportunity that has room to grow, and will provide you with experience, I feel you should take it. 75% of the non-college graduates that I have placed in consulting positions have been hired for fulltime positions by the company that they were placed at. Some of the remaining 25% probably weren't cut out for the industry, they might actually benefit from some time in college. After a little more training they could probably fill some of the simple database programming and tech support roles (that my company outsourced to India and the Philippines).

The most important advice I can give to people is, don't underestimate yourselves and don't sell yourselves short. People who make money in this world are the people who own businesses, definitely not the people who take jobs at the bottom of a large coporation. I'm 24, own a profitable company and a not so profitable company, and spend most of my time sitting in a cushy chair in a nice office with Chief Information Officer on my door.

Another bit of advice: If you're in school, and want to be a developer, join the open source community. There are a lot of projects out there that need help and can provide you with valuable knowledge. Novell http://forge.novell.com/ is doing some great things with Mono http://mono-project.com/ and SuSE. Microsoft will enter this space soon, it will be a good place to be. Technology is due for another leap; with emerging technologies like AJAX and XMPP http://www.coversant.net/, renewed competition with Microsoft (Google), we (the IT industry) will need more skilled labor.

Let's be perfectly clear here - when Novell says "cross-platform" referring to Windows and Linux, they mean Mono. As much as it sucks, they usually mean Mono.

Thanks, Miguel... I'm sure that .NET stuff will offer great performance and stability!

Don't get me wrong, Mono sounds great in theory - cross-platform, ECMA-based code would be ideal. The problem is, the implementations I've seen to date (cough, cough, Beagle, cough) have serious resource-consumption issues.

"aspx" is asp.net, which is the web-wrapper for .NET. Note the "x" that differentiates it from "classic asp".

Both the .NET Framework and C# have been ported to Linux by the open source community, as an open source package called Mono.

Two key facts about Mono:
- Based on the ECMA/ISO standards
- Open Source, Free Software.

It's called Windows.Forms and the vast majority of that functionality is present in WINE. It will be nontrivial but possible to extend Mono with Wine in order to provide that functionality in the future.

I'm sorry, but wine sucks as a general solution. If you can get your favorite app/game to work with wine (good luck!), great, but I would never count on it. The bottom line is that such emulation/immitation is a bandaid used in lieu of native apps.

And FYI, the Mono project has abandoned Windows.Forms through WINE. See: http://www.mono-project.com/WinForms They're currently trying to reimplement it all in System.Drawing. The first thing that comes to mind is Java/Swing. Ugh! Talk about slow (and ugly). This is Mono's third attempt at implenting Windows.Forms. I'm not holding my breath. GTK-Sharp is the way to go for graphical .NET apps with Mono. Trying to emulate Windows(.Forms) is a dead end.

-matthew

When is the plan9 version slated for release ?

Why don't you tell us... Perhaps you can start the implementation for Plan9.... ;) Anyhow it looks like the boys at Mono are on the job so why don't you ask them ?

XAML and Vista are a while off, but it's definitely coming within the next year, when it's ready Microsoft will submit it as an open standard. I think you will see more movement on .NET as a crossplatform framework when Microsoft releases their version Office built on .NET (which is also currently in development). At this point there will be some tangible incentives for Microsoft to supply a version of .NET running on Mac and Linux. Till then I think you'll have to content with the efforts groups such as the Mono group to provide support for non-Microsoft platforms.

You mean, why don't Linux distributions litter userspace with Mono apps?

Like this: http://www.mono-project.com/Software ?

Oh, they do, that's right.

I would not be surprised to see OSS and Linux distro makers embrace Mono, C#, GTK#, and the like moreso than Microsoft pushes .NET

I'm not sure if mono and WINE are compatible, but mono does provide some .NET functionality on Linux. I have no experience with using it myself, however.

Where the heck is their support from, anyhow? It looks like 2 Indians and a Russian responded to your e-mails, at least giving a casual glance at the names. It's entirely possible that you're getting outsourced support and they may not be able to do anything directly for you.

O R L Y?

If there are no patents involved in winforms, then why does Mono's own page on licensing say there are patent issues involved with Winforms?

Like I said: WinForms may have a bit of platform-specific code that may be depended on but there are no patents. which is the whole point. MS hinting and not giving "blanket immunity" is not unusual. Look at Sun and the JCP. If you're interested, go here for info about what Mono is: http://www.mono-project.com/FAQ:_General

(As a .NET programmer, I would love to see .NET platform become available on my macs, though.)

The core of the .NET Framework, and what has been patented by Microsoft falls under the ECMA/ISO submission. Jim Miller at Microsoft has made a statement on the patents covering ISO/ECMA, (he is one of the inventors listed in the patent): http://web.archive.org/web/20030609164123/ and http://mailserver.di.unipi.it/pipermail/dotnet-ssc li/msg00218.html.

Basically a grant is given to anyone who want to implement[sic] those components for free and for any purpose. [emphasis mine]

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

How many system has the complete .NET framework, including compilers and libraries, been ported to?

It may not yet be as widespread as the UCSD p-System was at its peak, but it's getting there. See Mono supported platforms.

at which point they shut them down with patent infringement lawsuits.

Have you read Mono's page about this issue? Microsoft has already permissively licensed any patents that are used in the portions of the .NET framework that have been submitted to ECMA. The worst thing that could happen is that ASP.NET, ADO.NET, and Windows.Forms might get yanked, but from what I've seen so far, most of Windows.Forms is similar enough to prior art. Or if you are publishing your own programs for the .NET framework, you can use Gtk# on Windows too.

[Using .NET framework is] still locking you into a proprietary platform

The Mono framework is not proprietary. Mono can run on a BSD or GNU/Linux operating system, which is also not proprietary.

There is this list on the Mono site.

If you must use MS compilers, there are the usual suspects: C#, VB.Net, and the like, as well as Python.

-java runs on just about any OS, .net only windows

.NET isn't just for Windows - nor is the Microsoft implementation the only one available. Check out the Mono, an open source cross platform implementation of the .NET Framework.

Code in C#, using wrappers for GTK, producing an app that runs flawlessly on Windows, Linux and MacOSX? Sure can, with Mono.

the OSS community would probably bother to make/improve a .NET clone.

You mean, something like this?
 
.Netters will be hired back to adapt the differences to Linux

If this "difference" is writing code that calls directly out to the Windows API or Windows-only libraries, then yes, .Netters will be hired to "adapt the differences", but not to Linux. Simply to better coding standards, in which if you're going to call something not in the .NET API, you write proper bindings for it, and you use something portable, like OpenGL, instead of something Windows-only, like DirectX.

(because perfect cloning is probably not practical.)

Perfect cloning of the whole OS? Probably not. While there are several attempts, and while the Mono project did attempt to use components from Wine, not everything works, and even if it does, running under Wine sucks compared to a truly native port.

But, they are getting pretty damned close to perfectly cloning this aspect. As I understand it, quite a few applications written for .NET on Windows run unmodified on Mono on Linux, probably even on my AMD64 Linux.

Let me put it this way: It's perfectly possible, and sadly, far too common for a Java applet to be written that only works under Internet Explorer, in Windows. However, in Java, you hardly have to be trying to make something portable -- you almost have to be trying to write bad code to make it IE-only. All my courses so far that have used Java have worked just fine on 32-bit Windows, 64-bit Linux, and my 32-bit PPC Mac (a Powerbook). Even the IDE (Eclipse) was portable, to the point where I'd be able to rsync my workspace across.

the OSS community would probably bother to make/improve a .NET clone.

You mean, something like this?
 
.Netters will be hired back to adapt the differences to Linux

If this "difference" is writing code that calls directly out to the Windows API or Windows-only libraries, then yes, .Netters will be hired to "adapt the differences", but not to Linux. Simply to better coding standards, in which if you're going to call something not in the .NET API, you write proper bindings for it, and you use something portable, like OpenGL, instead of something Windows-only, like DirectX.

(because perfect cloning is probably not practical.)

Perfect cloning of the whole OS? Probably not. While there are several attempts, and while the Mono project did attempt to use components from Wine, not everything works, and even if it does, running under Wine sucks compared to a truly native port.

But, they are getting pretty damned close to perfectly cloning this aspect. As I understand it, quite a few applications written for .NET on Windows run unmodified on Mono on Linux, probably even on my AMD64 Linux.

Let me put it this way: It's perfectly possible, and sadly, far too common for a Java applet to be written that only works under Internet Explorer, in Windows. However, in Java, you hardly have to be trying to make something portable -- you almost have to be trying to write bad code to make it IE-only. All my courses so far that have used Java have worked just fine on 32-bit Windows, 64-bit Linux, and my 32-bit PPC Mac (a Powerbook). Even the IDE (Eclipse) was portable, to the point where I'd be able to rsync my workspace across.

#And don't tell me about GNOME mono. That project will be killed in some way by Microsoft
#as soon as Microsoft thinks it's in their advantage to do so. It's just a much a dead-end
#as .NET.

The fact that you are calling it 'GNOME mono' means you don't know very much about mono at all. I guess you're somehow infering that because mono includes the GTK# GUI Toolkit (which is only 1 of 4 supported GUI Toolkits: http://www.mono-project.com/Gui_Toolkits) which is a only a small component of the entire mono platform - it deserves to be called GNOME mono.

If anything you should call it 'Novell mono' since Novell has acquired Ximian who are the core developers of Mono.

#That project will be killed in some way by Microsoft as soon as Microsoft thinks it's in
#their advantage to do so.

It doesn't sound like that you are aware that mono is an 'open-source' implementation of EMCA standards (http://www.mono-project.com/ECMA). I'm not aware of any 'open source' implementations of a standard in history that has been 'killed'.

#And don't tell me about GNOME mono. That project will be killed in some way by Microsoft
#as soon as Microsoft thinks it's in their advantage to do so. It's just a much a dead-end
#as .NET.

The fact that you are calling it 'GNOME mono' means you don't know very much about mono at all. I guess you're somehow infering that because mono includes the GTK# GUI Toolkit (which is only 1 of 4 supported GUI Toolkits: http://www.mono-project.com/Gui_Toolkits) which is a only a small component of the entire mono platform - it deserves to be called GNOME mono.

If anything you should call it 'Novell mono' since Novell has acquired Ximian who are the core developers of Mono.

#That project will be killed in some way by Microsoft as soon as Microsoft thinks it's in
#their advantage to do so.

It doesn't sound like that you are aware that mono is an 'open-source' implementation of EMCA standards (http://www.mono-project.com/ECMA). I'm not aware of any 'open source' implementations of a standard in history that has been 'killed'.

And have Microsoft realize their empire on software development is no more. Right now we have enough development tools available or in progress:
MONO (alternative for .NET),
Gambas (alternative for Visual Basic - linux only tho),
KDevelop (for C++ under Linux),
Code::Blocks (for C++ under Windows),
wxPython, DABO (Foxpro alternative, uses wxPython)...

Soon Bill Gates won't have to worry about people stealing his development tools... because NOBODY WILL USE THEM! X-D

I believe it uses GTK# for its GUI. C# (and a few other languages) for coding. Mono exists because Microsoft submitted the C# language specs and the CLR (interpreter more or less like the Java JVM - not exactly, but I'm trying to be brief...) to the ECMA standards body. Basically anyone can implement a version of PARTS of .Net. Microsoft reserved certain libraries so they would still have the most attractive version of .Net.

I'm trying to be factual without inserting opinions about the motives of any of the parties involved or their relative worths, and I am not currently using Mono, nor am I specifically recommending it, .Net or C#. I'm just trying to point out one of very many options to the orignal poster.

If anyone wants to debate the value of .Net, Mono, Microsoft, ECMA, emacs, vi, Linux, Mac, Apples, Oranges, or whatever, feel free. I, however, am not interested in a debate.

Just use Mono.

It does not take a second look to figure out the stats made up.

1. Most of Wine's wins are in the 0-2% mark. Means nothing except _inconclusive_; otherwise where is the variance, num tests to justify this?
2. Wine's perf is bad in the tests it lost
3. Old test suites were used
4. As some one said, If Wine is 90% faster it means it is 90% faster. If it is 90% slower it means it is 10 times slower!!!

BUT, what is really impressive is that Wine actually managed to run all the tests. The compatibility is indeed impressive. This benchmark would have been very credible had it not played with the numbers and colors.

Maybe a troll, but here is my argument against Wine:
Windows is moving to WinFX. Then it makes more sense to emulate WinFX's API than Win32 API. (WinFX does use Win32 extensively underneath, but why emulate 2 API's??). In the longer term, the answer to Windows compatibility is not Wine, it is MONO.

• iFolder - http://www.ifolder.com/
• openSUSE - http://www.opensuse.org/
• Mono - http://www.mono-project.com/
• Hula - http://www.hula-project.org/
• Diva - http://www.diva-project.org/
• Tango - http://www.tango-project.org/
• Beagle - http://www.beaglewiki.org/
• Better Desktop - http://www.betterdesktop.org/

Wikis are being used increasingly as CMS-replacements, as they should, as working with a CMS is hugely unappealing. See the http://www.mono-project.com/ website for a reasonable beginning example. Another exciting use is as a simultaneous mostly free-form encyclopedia and structured knowledge base, database, or whatever. See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Semantic_MediaWiki.

Mono is a more complete environment than any open source version of Java has ever managed - Miguel et al have done great things - now even commercial products like imeem are using it for their data center and Unix ports.

"Spoken like a true astroturfer"

Thanks for flying your colors up front. I'm glad to know that I won't be involved in an intelligent discussion this morning.

"Several times more, at least in Web server arena, according to Netcraft. 69.97% for Apache vs. 20.92% for IIS."

Exactly my point numb nuts. ASP.Net runs on Apache. So if by the parent's "little else then IIS" comment, he actually ment to say "will run on the vast majority of web servers", then yes he would be correct. But I'm pretty sure he was just reciting FUD from the anti-MS bin.
(see http://www.codeproject.com/cpnet/introtomono2.asp, http://www.mono-project.com/ASP.NET, and even http://apache.slashdot.org/apache/02/07/22/2334239 .shtml?tid=109)

"And Microsofts operating systems do suck, especially when used as servers;"

That is debatable. Any server will "suck" when used incorrectly.

"making a server application with a language that would tie you to Windows is a very bad idea"

It depends, maybe your employer is pleased with Windows and doesn't see the need to invest in changing software and staff. In that case using a language that can get the most benefit from a Windows environment would be GOOD. In this case it's a mute point however as ASP.Net is NOT locked down to Windows.

-Rick

You should read that information before making any comments about patent issues.

Seems like they have a work-around.

Take a look at the FAQ.

Does the ECMA spec (and attached licence) say anything at all about patents?

Why, yes! It appears that any Microsoft patents covering ECMA parts of .NET are permissively licensed. This permissive license does not necessarily extend to System.Windows.Forms ("winforms"), but if the Mono developers discover essential patents that encumber winforms, they'll simply suggest that developers of free software switch to Gtk#.

MainForm.cs(35,26): error CS0234: The type or namespace name `Windows' does not exist in the namespace `System'. Are you missing an assembly reference?

Also, C# 2.0 isn't complete, are you sure you shouldn't be using mcs over gmcs?

http://www.mono-project.com/CSharp_Compiler

http://www.mono-project.com/WinForms

Most .NET apps will most likely need to be ported from native windows to linux and unix based mono apps.
The 100% completion of the above package from Novell should go a long way towards easing that code portage by developers wishing to port their .NET application to mono.

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.

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.

It seems like the only people who have any interest in C# are

The Mono project is actually gaining some momentum and it's been progressing quite nicely.

Novell would hardly have supported it this much if there was no interest in cross-platform .NET languages.

It seems like the only people who have any interest in C# are

The Mono project is actually gaining some momentum and it's been progressing quite nicely.

Novell would hardly have supported it this much if there was no interest in cross-platform .NET languages.

And of course there's mono, too.