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Could .NET Render An MS Breakup Verdict Irrelevant?
AntiFreeze writes: "The Economist has a very interesting article about Microsoft's plans for .NET and how it would effectively remove most damage caused by a government orderred breakup. The article is written towards the layman, but is very clear and sort of scary." He cites this excerpt from the article, as well: "Even so, it is remarkable how effectively .NET could insulate the firm in the event of its being divided into an operating-system company (which would own Windows) and an applications company (owning Office)."
Bush needs to woo tech people (who can be gullible) by _talking_ big, but there is no chance he is going to blow vital political capital interceding for Microsoft. It's ridiculous to expect that- he stands to benefit more by interceding for AOL/Time Warner, or Texas oil billionaires etc. Interceding for Microsoft would be political suicide.
He can, and will, _talk_ all he likes- expect to see the word 'tragic'. "This tragic and senseless destruction of America's great technological resource." Here's the deal: Microsoft is worth more to Bush dead than alive. If they are seriously damaged by the court's actions started _before_ Bush was 'running the show' (note: riiiight. Dubya? Figurehead), then it is a very effective example. It's a way to marshal public opinion and soften them up for _other_ big-business friendly moves, and it's a way to put a big scare into the businesses and make them willing to bribe Bush's government hugely so they don't suffer the same fate. Win/win situation for the Bush camp. No-brainer.
In fact it could be tougher for MS with Bush than if Gore had won. Ever heard the saying, "Only Nixon could go to China"? Only Gore could intercede for MS without _seriously_ blowing political capital in the process. Bush just has way too much to gain from making sure Microsoft ends up being the bad example of what happens when those commie socialist antitrust weenies get their way. Watch for the backstab. Bush will say many things supportive of Microsoft, but watch for the backstab. He'll quietly make sure Microsoft go _down_. They're worth more dead.
Render a MS-Breakup irrelevant? Is there anybody out there who thinks that the prosecution of MS is going to continue under Bush?
Of course they're hedging their bets, but as of inauguration day, I doubt they have much to worry about.
-- Truth goes out the door when rumor comes innuendo. -- Groucho Marx
It's like Java - when you critize Java, what are you critizing? The bytecode? The language? The virtual machine?
.NET is basically the sequel to Win32).
.NET name.
.NET is a lot of things. It's a bytecode interpreter as well, and a a language, and a class library, and a bunch of other stuff. It's a replacement for Win32 (Microsoft makes that statement in one of their MSDN articles - that
It's not about renting software online - it makes renting software easier, but hey so does Java. I wish they'd given each piece a name and not chosen to wrap the whole bundle with the
DirectX is an example of where a bunch of technologies are living under one name fairly happily... but ActiveX is another Microsoft example of a name that, well, nobody really knows what it means (COM? OCX? OLE? JavaScript? They're all part of ActiveX).
- Steve
The article seems to focus and dwindle on summing up whats been happening in a more digestable format. I would have liked to see more about how Microsoft will convert shrink-wrap into on-tap delivery and how, since it controls the tap, buisness could be crippled if Microsoft decides that they should be (rasing the level of entry bar).
;)
What I don't like is the attitude of Microsoft of embracing and extending the _standard_ internet protocols into their own proprietary formats. This is already happening with IE, Kerbos, and Java and soon they will ensure that the "Internet" only works with Windows clients.
I think it is a good summation about what the current situation is but I would like a bit more of an editorial from this person. Especially with that hint at the end about it helping projects like Linux (how? why? etc).
Oh well.
Price, Quality, Time. Pick none. What, you thought you had a choice?
> But it's getting more and more difficult to come here expecting anything intelligent, when there are so many more mature, interesting webboards out there
IMO, Kuro5hin is lame. I keep the K5 Slashbox up, and still read the titles semi-regularly. Most of them are drivel. Now and then an interesting one comes up, but if I decide to drop by I almost always find that the discussion is drivel too.
Sure, there's lots of trolls and clubies on Slashdot. And lots of martyrs like you, who pretend to be a tiny minority with penetrating insight, whereas in fact you're a large plurality who pretty much conform to the caricature you accuse others of.
But if you browse at 1 most of the time, and mentally tune out the remaining drek, you can still actually learn a lot on Slashdot. A lot about technology, and a lot about what's going on in the social world too.
And sometimes you'll hear opinions that you don't agree with, and people will bring you around to their side if you participate in the discussion intelligently.
Forgive my rant; I just get tired of all the self-righteous bashers of Linux and Slashdot. If you don't like an article, don't read it. If you don't like Linux, don't use it. But don't pretend to be a clearsighted sage who rises above the ambient bullshit, when you're just bitching the same bitch that dozens of other morons post in response to every fuckin' article we get here.
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
One, MSFT has been tooting the standards horn for a LONG time. It's been at least two years since I heard them use the carefully-constructed, meaningless term "open, standards-based". Open means that you don't unnecessarily constrain data semantics, and standards-based could imply any number of closed standards.
Two, the term "open API's" does not imply that MSFT will not, as is "standard" operating procedure, attempt to gain control of the platform by using secret, undocumented API's in its own code and by "tumbling" wire protocols as frequently as they can get away with (see Samba and Windows NT service packs).
Chirped like a professional marketer who apparently can't look at a system and recognize a "core", unless they're talking about "core products". I'll save the design discussions for another day."High degree of interoperability" is another meaningless statement, at least without context. To a manager type, this might mean that people can use JavaStations to read their email. To a coder type, this might mean that I could write once and run anywhere. To a user type, this could mean that I can send email to virtually anyone. Without defining "high degree" and "interoperability", this says nothing.
Once again, what's more interesting is what's left unsaid. It's almost a certainty that the barriers against duplication or reimplementation of the .NET infrastructure are high (some or all of: patents, trade secrets, cryptography, binding EULA's, obfuscated code). One should not expect to run Office.NET on a free reimplementation of the .NET foundation, even if the intellectual property censors didn't find it first.
"Better experience" is crodocile tears, a standard trick of besieged organizations. Being a besieged organization, MSFT's motives are nowhere near so pristine. The basic idea really is to control ("standardize") distributed IPC and ensure that the largest possible part of that infrastructure is MSFT intellectual property, in order to create a better experience for MSFT shareholders.XML and its predecessors has been around for double-digit years
So, buried in this handwaving is much feeble misdirection that Microsoft is interested in providing anything at all to the computing community besides another epoxy-potted, magnesium-encased "solution" to a problem already solved.
-jhp
/. -- the Free Republic of technology.
The end result is probably something like:
- AOL Quality with Microsoft ethics
- MS Quality with MS Ethics
Waitaminute. We have the second one already.The only counter I can imagine to this right now comes out of those occasional rumors of AOL developing their own OS. I am sure everyone is just thrilled by that prospect.
We seem to be walking in a directions where the internet is being divided into large areas of fenced in territory owned by large corporations and other entities, with small time operators getting the left overs.
What makes this all the more believable are little details like this AP news story about mainland China's announcement that they are building their own information superhighway. To quote from the story:
We are walking in the direction of fragmented segmented internet. The glacial slow destruction of the internet as we know it for profit.The .net as proposed by Microsoft is selling this to us. But maybe it is still only one fence on the wild frontier. Or maybe Microsoft is the fence company, selling us the barbed wire.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
There is NO room for reason in how one looks at the Microsoft probelm. WIth that said, I would do what Larry Ellison reccomends. Don't split up Microsoft and instead not allow them to EVER purchase a SINGLE piece of technology, company, patent, software code, from anyone else and force them to develop it in house. Let them have their "right to innovate" and watch them fall on their face.
Burn Hollywood Burn
Some people here understand what .NET is, since it's largely a warmed over version of Java, with the primary feature being the removal of the language dependancy (which allows the VB legion to get in on the act with out being stymied by curly braces)
.NET is all about, that's largely Microsoft's fault. They are already spreading BS that Exchange is part of .NET (how?), Whistler is Windows.NET 1.0 (not in the betas it isn't) and so on. So, when everything is part of .NET, obviously the really important changes are going to be overlooked.
.NET will be Apple and IBM. However, I have a feeling that this will go to the same marketing doom as "Windows DNA", which was their way of pushing DCOM but eventually devolved down to a justification for crappy Access apps and so on and ultimately did not sell in the enterprise.
Of course, if people don't understand what
If MS is lucky the only people that will overlook the core of
Is the court's action meant to be a 'corrective action' to even the playing field, or a 'punishment'?
.NET initiative corrects the things the court is pursuing to the point where it nullifies the court's action, haven't they taken the 'corrective action' themselves?
If Microsoft's
Or are we hellbent on 'punishing' Microsoft?
Hay thar.
*disclaimer: I apologise for what was without doubt the crappest attempt of humour ever ventured on /. *
GiraffeSville, a place anyone can call home
Really, all that ".NET" is a marketing campaign for DCOM, with protocol changed from whatever bullshit it used before to SOAP. What basically is yet another RPC. So far all technologies incorporated into .NET except COM and XML, are complete failures - RPC in all of its incarnations is most hated protocol ever, DCOM is a bitch to write for, and ActiveX never took off (except as calling anything that uses COM "ActiveX"). COM wasn't a complete failure because Microsoft was pushing it for more than a decade, and XML is a "technology" in the same way as comma-separated list is a "technology".
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Microsoft likes to bundle mostly unrelated technologies under a single banner in order to "simplify the message."
.NET bytecodes are not tied to any particular hardware so in a few years shrinkwrapped software may not be specific to Intel or Alpha.
.NET framework and the JVM is that .NET is supposed to be multi-language whereas Sun unashamedly promotes Java as the "One True Programming Language." Multi-language applications written for .NET can be a lot more integrated than COM or CORBA. There is a single exception architecture, a well-defined debugging architecture etc.
.NET that points to "a future where people rent rather than buy applications." Obviously applications have been moving to the desktop to the Web for years and .NET has additional features that will allow developers to take that a few steps farther. But the new .NET features are useful in traditional applications also.
The ".NET Framework" is a virtual machine and standard library similar to the JVM.
The primary difference between the
ASP.NET is Microsoft's Web development platform. It has a concept of "web services" which is basically distributed computing re-invented based on Web-ish technologies.
The win32 GUI APIs have been replaced with "Windows Forms".
There isn't really a lot in
"Rent" versus "buy" is basically a marketing and distribution decision. You could do the same thing with Java bytecodes or even Active-X controls.
.NET is hard to define...it's quite a large umbrella. MS is even having a hard time defining it. /. MS is actually moving towards using standards and open APIs. .NET is that direction. The core of .NET is truly Visual Studio.NET, the .NET framework, the .NET enterprise servers (such as Exchange 2000, SQL Server 2000 and BizTalk Server), and Whistler (probably Windows.NET 1.0). These core applications and services will have a high degree of interoperability (with themselves AND with 3rd party applications).
.NET enterprise servers are out (or RTM'd) and VS.NET is now in public beta.
.NET Framework SDK here.
It's truly a platform move...despite comments from the zealots here at
The basic idea is to have a standardized way of communicating between these applications and services, in order to create a better experience for the developer, business, end user, et al.
Yes, it sounds fuzzy, because it still is. The core is there, however. Almost all of the
You can download the
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The Web is the Ultimate Copy Protection
Even with a proprietary closed-source program, you at least still have the distribution media so you can still reinstall your application if the original publisher stops selling the program.But with a web-based application, the publisher keeps the executable binary, and even with copylefted code, the GPL's source code distribution requirement does not come into play because the binary is never distributed.
This will ultimately lead to disaster for ordinary users as web applications make the move from news, shopping and entertainment to functions that people depend on in their daily lives or businesses.
Michael D. Crawford
GoingWare Inc
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
It is ported to other platforms (Unix, GNU/Linux).
Software AG did it, IIRC.
It's just a multi-megabyte download
I don't know if many people acutally use it... cheers, Rainer
Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
There certainly are plusses to .NET -- indeed, I honestly wish it were developed and controlled by an open project or standards body (or a vendor with more of an interest in cross-platform support). It standardizes calling conventions and data types (removing issues such as the binary compatibility problems between G++ 2.95 and 3.0), permits debugging tools to work with support only for the platform in general rather than the specific language (a great thing for those who happen to like coding in Eiffel or something else off the wall but are interested in using our other debugging tools). And no, it doesn't require its own language.
.net has a future of some sort. Whether it becomes the new win32 API that everyone else is incompatible with (except for via some rather dodgy ports/reimplimentations), a competitor for Java bytecode or even universally ubiquitous I don't know, though.
I really think
Howdy. As a software developer (professionally) and sysadmin (on the side) with both win32 and *nix experience, I've got to dispute what you're saying. (Note that my win32 experience is getting increasingly dated; I'd be happy to know if any of my statements are outdated -- for instance, if Windows actually has logical volume management or online filesystem resizing support now).
Command line OSes are harder to learn than GUI-based administrative systems -- I'll agree with you there. The thing is that us Unix folks distinguish between "hard to learn" and "hard to use". If after scaling that steep learning curve we can then get our work done faster -- and we can -- then by our definition Unix is easier to use. Furthermore, because we've mastered all that (hard to learn) control, we can do our jobs better.
The current effort is on getting the best of both worlds by putting together GUI-based administrative tools, so that folks can use whatever they choose. For those of us who've already finished the learning curve thing, though, there's no more need; we're there.
Let me rephrase one of your earlier sentences. MS software is centered around making learning my job easier and saving training time. I'll agree that it does both of those. However, once I'm done with the learning, I can do a better job on a Unix-based system than on Windows. Why? The same reason it's hard to learn -- I've got more control. Can *you* add another hard drive with your machine still running and resize your filesystem online, with all your software still running? As long as my box has hardware and BIOS support (thanks 3ware!), I can. Furthermore, because more of the 'guts' of a Unix system are available for inspection, debugging and postmortem analysis is much easier. Trust me, when you're trying to figure out why your VPN isn't working, it sure helps if you can add a few lines of code to dump the keys on each side out to the syslog for comparison. We also have better filesystems -- ever seen reiserfs and NTFS side-by-side trying to access lots of small files? It's lots of fun.
While a Windows-based system was initially designed to be controlled by an individual at the console clicking with a mouse, *nix-based systems are controlled in manners more condusive to automation. A skilled sysadmin can automate nearly every task he needs to do with greater ease than on Windows (yes, I know automation support is available there, but it sucks -- I've ported perl scripts for Apache user administration to work on IIS; they got a whoole lot more complicated and slower in the meantime).
Finally, the documentation depends on what you're trying to do. Frequently the man pages aren't the best source -- that's why there are info pages, HOWTOs, mailing lists and (of course) the actual code. Having to go to the source sucks, of course (it's happened to me very rarely), but it's better than not having any source to go to at all, no?
"Where is the standardization in their IDE"? Since when were Windows IDEs standardized? As for the windowing API, X is about as much a standard as one can get. The widget sets on top of it are admittedly quite varied, but many of them are much (much!) more fun to code for than either MFC or the win32 API.
Anyhow, if you want to continue ranting, just email me. The address given is real.
The article talks about the possibility of cross-platform support for .NET. Didn't Microsoft also say that DCOM was a cross-platform standard? It was supposed to be ported to other operating systems. I've never seen it running on anything other than Windows.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
---
gmp
Now, I am treating the software like something physical (a typewriter), but it's essentially physical anyway (or at least tangible - you've got it or you don't). Tell me, do you want to have to rent a typewriter everytime you want to make a letter? I'm pretty sure your don't. I think that you can figure out the rest from here...
Now here's where the REAL fun begins: Microsoft has to not only convince consumers to use .NET software, but it's got to convince programmers to write .NET software - which has its own programming language.
The article that this story is in reference to also states that Microsoft is planning to use the .NET server software to boost Win 2K sales. The infers that .NET server software will only be made for the Win 2K platform. That leaves some people on the other side of the wall.
Frankly, I can't find any real pluses to this strategy, either for Microsoft or consumers. And despite what the article says about this move helping to preserve Microsoft in the face of a breakup, I doubt it. If the person heading up the application side of the newly broken empire is business-minded, they won't restrict the .NET system to the Windows OS, thus shooting the whole plan to sell the Win 2K OS for .NET server software in the heart. And of course, .NET won't work out for the reason's mentioned above. I guess the question now is what will be the next dominant Desktop OS? Will it be Linux, a BSD, or perhaps Mac OS X? We'll see...
CAP THAT KARMA!
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