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Great post, here are some more reasons why Microsoft Project is simply not on the critical path any more...and it does not stop with Microsoft Project...

Today with rapid development, testing and release that is Agile, I am unaware of a single software development shop that is wasting time putting up a Project Management project. Once you have a sustainable velocity, not only are your developer's happier, but your customers are seeing you fix problems more rapidly as well. Its smart and a win - win - win - win.

Years ago, thanks to Joel on Software I took a hard look at project management in general. It really opened my eyes to how much time can be wasted if you are not careful. When I looked at the differences between Microsoft Project and Open WorkBench, I found Open WorkBench to be superior. The fact that Open WorkBench saves a company significant money as compared to Microsoft Project, simply makes it better. The Savings vs Buying Microsoft Project as of Sept 19, 2010 are listed as $350,855,864 and that is for only 585,736 downloads.

Since most organizations are resource-constrained rather than time-constrained, the resource-based scheduling in Open Workbench typically provides a more realistic plan in less time. ~ that just makes sense to me and is obvious.

Even though Joel does not want you to read about Painless Software Scheduling and he wants you to read instead about Evidence Based Scheduling, from a KISS perspective I discovered that I was able to do rapid estimating of projects using a spreadsheet. In fact before I ever started putting a project in Microsoft Project (when a company required that tool) I would first use Joel's method using an Excel spreadsheet. Naturally when I moved from Windows to Linux I found that OpenOffice Calc did everything that Excel would do. I will freely admit that there are things that some people do with Excel and Macros in Excel specifically that I would never do and/or use. In fact I have programmed some of those Macros for small businesses that insisted using Excel as their tool. However I have always felt that it was smarter to pick the correct tool for the correct job. If it is honestly Microsoft, so be it. In most cases, Macros and Excel are NOT better than open source software dedicated to that business function. From a pure Macro standpoint, there is nothing that one can do in Office Excel, that can not be done in OpenOffice Calc. And the price is right. From my perspective, OOo Calc is far superior!

My lesson did not start there, nope, I learned along the way with other smart purchases after doing a feature by feature comparison of products.

Many years before I needed a Graphics package to create, edit and reduce the size of images for the web. At that time, PaintShop Pro could do everything that Adobe PhotoShop could do at about 1/10th of the Price. It was a no brainer...I bought PaintShop Pro. (PaintShop Pro should not be mistaken for Microsoft Paint.). When the company that produces PaintShop Pro mistakenly attempted to force me to update my Windows operating System before using their new version of PaintShop Pro, I borrowed a Laptop running the new version of XP and installed PaintShop Pro on a USB device (yes they did try to prevent that in the install process, however if you know what you are doing

Great post, here are some more reasons why Microsoft Project is simply not on the critical path any more...and it does not stop with Microsoft Project...

Today with rapid development, testing and release that is Agile, I am unaware of a single software development shop that is wasting time putting up a Project Management project. Once you have a sustainable velocity, not only are your developer's happier, but your customers are seeing you fix problems more rapidly as well. Its smart and a win - win - win - win.

Years ago, thanks to Joel on Software I took a hard look at project management in general. It really opened my eyes to how much time can be wasted if you are not careful. When I looked at the differences between Microsoft Project and Open WorkBench, I found Open WorkBench to be superior. The fact that Open WorkBench saves a company significant money as compared to Microsoft Project, simply makes it better. The Savings vs Buying Microsoft Project as of Sept 19, 2010 are listed as $350,855,864 and that is for only 585,736 downloads.

Since most organizations are resource-constrained rather than time-constrained, the resource-based scheduling in Open Workbench typically provides a more realistic plan in less time. ~ that just makes sense to me and is obvious.

Even though Joel does not want you to read about Painless Software Scheduling and he wants you to read instead about Evidence Based Scheduling, from a KISS perspective I discovered that I was able to do rapid estimating of projects using a spreadsheet. In fact before I ever started putting a project in Microsoft Project (when a company required that tool) I would first use Joel's method using an Excel spreadsheet. Naturally when I moved from Windows to Linux I found that OpenOffice Calc did everything that Excel would do. I will freely admit that there are things that some people do with Excel and Macros in Excel specifically that I would never do and/or use. In fact I have programmed some of those Macros for small businesses that insisted using Excel as their tool. However I have always felt that it was smarter to pick the correct tool for the correct job. If it is honestly Microsoft, so be it. In most cases, Macros and Excel are NOT better than open source software dedicated to that business function. From a pure Macro standpoint, there is nothing that one can do in Office Excel, that can not be done in OpenOffice Calc. And the price is right. From my perspective, OOo Calc is far superior!

My lesson did not start there, nope, I learned along the way with other smart purchases after doing a feature by feature comparison of products.

Many years before I needed a Graphics package to create, edit and reduce the size of images for the web. At that time, PaintShop Pro could do everything that Adobe PhotoShop could do at about 1/10th of the Price. It was a no brainer...I bought PaintShop Pro. (PaintShop Pro should not be mistaken for Microsoft Paint.). When the company that produces PaintShop Pro mistakenly attempted to force me to update my Windows operating System before using their new version of PaintShop Pro, I borrowed a Laptop running the new version of XP and installed PaintShop Pro on a USB device (yes they did try to prevent that in the install process, however if you know what you are doing

Great post, here are some more reasons why Microsoft Project is simply not on the critical path any more...and it does not stop with Microsoft Project...

Today with rapid development, testing and release that is Agile, I am unaware of a single software development shop that is wasting time putting up a Project Management project. Once you have a sustainable velocity, not only are your developer's happier, but your customers are seeing you fix problems more rapidly as well. Its smart and a win - win - win - win.

Years ago, thanks to Joel on Software I took a hard look at project management in general. It really opened my eyes to how much time can be wasted if you are not careful. When I looked at the differences between Microsoft Project and Open WorkBench, I found Open WorkBench to be superior. The fact that Open WorkBench saves a company significant money as compared to Microsoft Project, simply makes it better. The Savings vs Buying Microsoft Project as of Sept 19, 2010 are listed as $350,855,864 and that is for only 585,736 downloads.

Since most organizations are resource-constrained rather than time-constrained, the resource-based scheduling in Open Workbench typically provides a more realistic plan in less time. ~ that just makes sense to me and is obvious.

Even though Joel does not want you to read about Painless Software Scheduling and he wants you to read instead about Evidence Based Scheduling, from a KISS perspective I discovered that I was able to do rapid estimating of projects using a spreadsheet. In fact before I ever started putting a project in Microsoft Project (when a company required that tool) I would first use Joel's method using an Excel spreadsheet. Naturally when I moved from Windows to Linux I found that OpenOffice Calc did everything that Excel would do. I will freely admit that there are things that some people do with Excel and Macros in Excel specifically that I would never do and/or use. In fact I have programmed some of those Macros for small businesses that insisted using Excel as their tool. However I have always felt that it was smarter to pick the correct tool for the correct job. If it is honestly Microsoft, so be it. In most cases, Macros and Excel are NOT better than open source software dedicated to that business function. From a pure Macro standpoint, there is nothing that one can do in Office Excel, that can not be done in OpenOffice Calc. And the price is right. From my perspective, OOo Calc is far superior!

My lesson did not start there, nope, I learned along the way with other smart purchases after doing a feature by feature comparison of products.

Many years before I needed a Graphics package to create, edit and reduce the size of images for the web. At that time, PaintShop Pro could do everything that Adobe PhotoShop could do at about 1/10th of the Price. It was a no brainer...I bought PaintShop Pro. (PaintShop Pro should not be mistaken for Microsoft Paint.). When the company that produces PaintShop Pro mistakenly attempted to force me to update my Windows operating System before using their new version of PaintShop Pro, I borrowed a Laptop running the new version of XP and installed PaintShop Pro on a USB device (yes they did try to prevent that in the install process, however if you know what you are doing

>How about project management software
One out of an endless list of FLOSS project management: http://www.openworkbench.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=32&Itemid=37

>3d rendering tools
Puh-lease: Blender...

>Production Ready video editing tools
What do you mean by 'Production Ready' ? Hollywood stuff? How many people actually use that outside of Hollywood!? For Sony Vegas users there is Kdenlive: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kdenlive

>and automated translation middlewear?
Babelfish?

C'mon man...

Have a look at:
Open Workbench
http://www.openworkbench.org/

Dotproject.net
http://www.dotproject.net/

try http://www.openworkbench.org/index.php/ to help you out. I think that is a comparable open-source application to MS Project!

Paying someone to write a Gantt chart program would undoubtedly be much more expensive than just buying Microsoft Project. No efficiency gained there.

There are a couple of alternatives available now - Computer Associates opensourced their product, which is now called OpenWorkbench

The Hauppauge card was more a case of the IVTV developers lying to me. Don't tell me your driver supports that model of card if it doesn't.

It is not unknown - indeed it's quite common - to find that a manufacturer releases two totally different products which achieve the same end under the same model number.

It's quite possible that the developers weren't even aware that Hauppage had done this.

Persoanlly I've not used it for any project planning, but if MS Project is out of your reach why not try OpenWorkBench

http://www.openworkbench.org/

"Have you looked at http://www.openworkbench.org/? It's a formerly commercial PM package that went opensource a while back."

So in other words the bazaar model can't deliver the goods, so it's the cathedral model (the "buggy-whip") to the rescue. How much for that irony in the Windows(TM)?

Actually, the only app I've had real problems replacing is MS Project, ironically I need it for my Software engineering degree; You'd think developers had no need for project management tools. Maybe I should submit an ask slashdot? ;)

Have you looked at http://www.openworkbench.org/? It's a formerly commercial PM package that went opensource a while back.

For windows, Open Workbench is a quite nice open source project planner. It doesn't do minute-accurate planning like MSP, but in my experience then you're overplanning anyway. For the average project, it seems to work well.

http://www.openworkbench.org/

Disclaimer: Open Workbench integrates with Clarity (payware portfolio/governance), and I work for a partner of CA doing Clarity implementations. OWB stands very well on its own as a project planner though.

It's getting very boring seeing IBM publish un-ending reams of information that totally ignore the realities of the Windows software market. If you want to see the sort of things porters are up against go look at the recently open sourced Open Workbench, a free alternative to MS Project. Look at the source. See how dependent it is on Win32, MFC and COM, even though parts are even written in Java!

IBM constantly spread this sort of FUD about Wine, and it's sad to see a company that supports Linux on the server side so heavily be so counter-productive on the client side. IMHO either they should clarify exactly what they mean so an open and educated debate can occur, or they should shut up. If they don't they're no better than SCO.

As to code stealing - there is a CVS repository dating back many years (nearly 80,000 changesets), and one man has maintained it pretty much since the beginning. There's no evidence of Microsoft submitting their own code anonymously, so claiming it might have happened is like claiming Elvis might be living on the moon: not grounded in the real world. Would entrapment like that even be legal itself?

To be honest I think a far more likely story is that some guy high up in the IBM Linux heirarchy tried Wine in 1998, couldn't make it work, decided it was TEH SUCK and has been carrying his prejudices ever since. It would not be the first time I've seen that happen. Of course, the hundreds of thousands of people that use it every day would disagree but hey ... that sort of thing never stopped stupid irrational biases before.

There's also MrProject for Linux, I don't know if there's a binary for Windows. I compiled this on Linux once and it was nice but it broke pgAdmin, I think it was some version incompatibility with GTK or something.

There are some other similar tools here. Open Workbench Is supposed to be really good, although I haven't tried it. iTeamWork is another free tool.

And finally, this is a list of some more tools.

http://www.openworkbench.org/ is a formerly proprietary project management tool that's been open sourced. I'm no expert on this, but its feature list seems pretty impressive to me.

Take a look at Open Workbench