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Microsoft Phasing Out ESP Simulation Platform?

Posted by timothy on from the you-must-be-looking-for-the-old-tenants dept.

Ian Lamont writes "Overlooked in last month's news about Microsoft laying off the entire Flight Simulator dev team is the news that Microsoft's ESP development team has been gutted as well, and the future of the platform is in doubt. ESP is oriented toward industrial use, and lets companies build 3D simulations for flight and other applications. Late last year Microsoft announced big plans to expand ESP to other verticals, such as real estate, city planning, and law enforcement. That looks increasingly unlikely. Even though Microsoft declined to comment on ESP's future, companies which invested in the product are angry, judging by some of the comments on an MSDN thread. As noted by one user, 'my company used it for a solution and invested time and money into getting it approved and purchased. Microsoft sure handed us a raw deal for taking a gamble on their platform.'"

22 of 101 comments (clear)

  1. ESP by Anenome · · Score: 3, Funny

    Not to worry, with their mind-reading abilities I'm sure they'll find new jobs in no time ;P

    --
    "I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist"
    1. Re:ESP by Elektroschock · · Score: 2, Informative

      ESP means End Software Patents and is run by the FSF. Microsoft decided not to participate in it.

  2. VB6 by spectrokid · · Score: 4, Funny

    Microsoft sure handed us a raw deal for taking a gamble on their platform.

    It is as if I hear a million VB6 developers screaming all at once...

    --

    10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then

    1. Re:VB6 by should_be_linear · · Score: 3, Insightful

      MFC, OCX/ActiveX/COM/DCOM, ATL, VisualJ, FoxPro, ...

      --
      839*929
    2. Re:VB6 by Joce640k · · Score: 2, Funny

      .Net, Silverlight, .... all will pass.

      --
      No sig today...
    3. Re:VB6 by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 3, Funny

      This reminds me of this classic by Ron Burk:

      First, there was the Windows API and DLL Hell. Revolution # 1 was DDE remember how hot links let us create status bars showing the current price of Microsoft stock? About that time, Microsoft created the VERSIONINFO resource, which eliminated DLL Hell.

      But another group within Microsoft discovered a fatal flaw in DDE: they didnt write it! To solve that problem, they created OLE (which was like DDE, only different), and I fondly remember a Microsoft conference speaker proclaiming that the Windows API would soon be rewritten as an OLE API, and every control on the screen would be an OCX. OLE introduced interfaces, which eliminated DLL Hell. Remember in situ fever, and how we dreamed of the day that our applications would all be embedded in a (apparently very large) Word document? Somewhere in there, Microsoft got the C++ religion and MFC emerged and solved all our problems again, but with inheritance. Well, OLE wasnt going to take that sitting down, so it re-emerged as COM, and suddenly we realized what OLE (or was it DDE?) was really meant to be all along and it even included an elaborate component version system that eliminated DLL Hell.

      Meanwhile, a renegade group within Microsoft discovered a fatal flaw in MFC: they didnt write it! They forthwith corrected that problem by creating ATL, which is like MFC, only different, and tried to hide all those fascinating details that the COM group was trying so hard to teach us. This stimulated the COM group (or was it OLE?) to rename themselves ActiveX and issue hundreds of pounds of new interfaces (even new versioning interfaces, which eliminated DLL Hell), along with the ability to make all our code downloadable via web browsers, complete with user-selectable viruses (ha try to keep up with that, you ATL weenies!). Like a neglected middle child, the operating systems group cried out for attention by telling us all to get ready for Cairo, some weird crud that they could never really explain, let alone ship. To their credit, however, the operating system group did introduce the concept of System File Protection, which eliminated DLL Hell.

      Meanwhile, another group inside Microsoft discovered a fatal flaw in Java: they didnt write it! That was remedied by creating J, or Jole, or ActiveJ (honestly, I cant remember the name), which was like Java, only different. That was very exciting, but Sun sued Microsoft under some archaic law that limits the amount of crapulence any one company can ship in a year. This was clearly an attempt to stifle Microsofts freedom to create products that are like other products, only different, and resulted in the creation of The Microsoft Freedom to Stuff Money in the Trousers of Congressmen Network (newsletter and $14.75 T-shirts available). Remember the J/Jole/ActiveJ program manager pounding his shoe on the table and insisting that Microsoft would never abandon his product? Silly wabbit! All this could mean only one thing too little attention for the ActiveX (or was it COM?) group. This incredibly resilient herd of API gushers came back strong with COM+ (shouldnt that have been ActiveX+?), and MTS. (I have no idea why theres no COM or Active or X or + in MTS they totally shocked me with that one!) They also threatened to add yet another + onto all their buzzwords in the very near future.

      Around that time, someone was yelling about Windows DNA and the Windows Washboard for a while, but that died out before I ever figured out what it was. At this point, Microsoft had been watching the Internet for several years with growing unease. Recently, they came to the realization that there was a fatal flaw in the Internet: well, you probably know what it was. And that brings us up to date with .NET (pronounced like doughnut, only different), which is like the Internet, only with more press releases. Lets be very, very clear about one thing: .NET will eliminate DLL Hell.

  3. We can't be missing much... by wjh31 · · Score: 2, Funny

    The microsoft ESP wiki is a red link

    1. Re:We can't be missing much... by Rich0 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You'd be amazed by how much industry-specific software is out there. This kind of software has 25 customers, with 100 users each, and each of them pay $1-2M for the licenses. It is the polar opposite of Microsoft Office. And therein lies the problem...

      Like any industry we use a ton of this stuff at work. I've always found that you're better off finding a successful vendor that specializes in this kind of work than buying something like this from a big software house. When you go with the specialized vendor the product probably makes up 30-100% of their revenue. With the major software house the product makes up 0.001% of their revenue and their main focus is on stuff that comes in boxes on the shelf of Best Buy or wherever. Usually this kind of stuff starts out in small companies and gets bought out by a big company. They invest minimally (nothing truly innovative - mainly support for database/OS upgrades), and milk the maintenance contracts. Eventually everybody abandons them and they drop the product entirely.

      Sure, you also take a gamble with a small company. However, with small companies I can sit down and talk to their development team and they actually have a vision for where their product will be in five years. They actually come up with new ideas. If you get in early you can actually build goodwill and form a partnership and get discounted rates. Or, you can pay full retail by waiting until they're already popular, but then most of the risk of being abandoned goes away. Just make sure the core development team isn't about to sell out - it helps to get to know them and their motivations a little.

      Sure, if you're talking commodity software (software used in ANY industry - webservers, email, development platforms, etc) just go open source. However, you'll find this isn't much of an option when you get to industry-specific stuff (with some exceptions).

    2. Re:We can't be missing much... by chebucto · · Score: 2, Interesting
      you'll find this isn't much of an option when you get to industry-specific stuff (with some exceptions).

      Hopefully this will be less true in the future. At $1m-2m/license, there's no reason why buyers couldn't set up a consortium and have to have their boutique software written for them and release as free software. The problem of free riders this would create would probably be outweighed by the benefit of knowing the software will stick around.

      --
      The English word fart is one of the oldest words in the English vocabulary.
    3. Re:We can't be missing much... by neumayr · · Score: 2, Insightful

      How would that work?
      You set up a consortium, come up with all the features you'd need in your software. Then you hire someone who's willing to acquire all the specialized knowledge needed to make specialized software, and begin making it. Lots of the features your consortium came up with won't be possible, leading to lots of meetings and debates in order to find a working compromise.

      That will take a while, and in the meantime members of this consortium will change their minds on some of the features, some will want to leave and others will want to join.

      In the end, after a few years, you'll have a piece of software designed by a comitee, few members of which are actually qualified to design software.

      Then you release it as free software - to what end? Successful free software sticks around because it has a large userbase, something not given in this case. Nobody is going to pick up that code and start working with it, unless they happen to have an industry to run. In which case, they're most likely not going to start tinkering with the code very much.

      --
      Truth arises more readily from error than from confusion. -Francis Bacon
    4. Re:We can't be missing much... by Rich0 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      The big issue is leadership. You need it to make good software.

      When 10 guys decide to live on hot dogs for three years to make a software product, that is leadership. If what they make does well they all end up owning islands, otherwise they end up having to get regular jobs.

      When Google decides to take over the mobile phone OS market with an open source offering, writes 95% of it themselves, and then uses it as a platform to make money on value-adds, that is leadership.

      When some guy in his spare time invents an application, and gets a few friends to join in, that is also leadership.

      This kind of stuff doesn't tend to come out of consortiums of equals. I can think of a few initiatives like that in my industry and none of them have gone anywhere. The problem is that software isn't core to these industries. Their CEOs don't talk about software in their shareholder meetings. Software leaders don't become company leaders - they go to other companies if they have those kinds of ambitions.

      Most companies want somebody else to solve the problem for them and then pay big money for the product. They line up for outsourcing opportunities for this reason - even if with proper focus they could do the same job cheaper in-house. The key word is "proper focus" - if IT is considered just a distraction then it won't get the leadership needed to be successful - you just need to buy stuff.

      So, while I agree that what you suggest could work in theory, it won't work in practice. Companies would rather spend $100M buying products than $10M trying to do it themselves.

  4. X-Plane developers picking up MS customers by Yuioup · · Score: 4, Informative
    Reading the thread in MSDN I can see that customers are being urged to use X-Plane:

    I am also interested in knowing how long ESP will be available because my company used it for a solution and invested time and money into getting it approved and purchased. Microsoft sure handed us a raw deal for taking a gamble on their platform. It sounds like X-Plane is the way to go from now on. This is the last time I gamble a product's success on Microsoft. Every gaming studio Microsoft touches seems to sink like the Bismarck. http://www.x-plane.com/ms_to_xp/ms_to_xp.html

    The X-Plane site itself is offering deals for the abandoned ESP customers:

    http://www.x-plane.com/ms_to_xp/ms_to_xp.html
    http://www.x-plane.com/ms_to_xp/esp_to_xp.html
    http://www.x-plane.com/order.html

    I like the comment "X-Plane 9 (temporarily $39.00 to let in all the new MS users)."

    1. Re:X-Plane developers picking up MS customers by He+Who+Has+No+Name · · Score: 2, Interesting

      When X-plane ships 24,000 real-world accurate airports, hi-res DEM and regional terrain textures for the entire globe, 7,000 unique landmark structures and features, full ATC for human and AI traffic, and an SDK that doesn't require the equivalent of native fluency in several extinct languages to use in order to develop commercial-grade dev or art content... ...let me know. ; )

    2. Re:X-Plane developers picking up MS customers by Ice+Tiger · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It has a development team, that good enough for you?

      --
      "Because we are not employing at entry level, offshoring will kill our industry stone dead."
    3. Re:X-Plane developers picking up MS customers by cfc-12 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      That's going to make a difference in the long term, but right now FSX is still the sim of choice for those who value the things that He Who Has No Name mentioned (X-Plane may be superior in some other areas). Moreover X-Plane's dev team is tiny compared to ACES, so it will probably take them years to catch up. Unless of course they snap up some of the ex-ACES folk now on the job market...

  5. I was part of the ACES team by He+Who+Has+No+Name · · Score: 5, Informative

    Flight Sim WAS ESP. When the team behind Flight Sim - and therefore Flight Sim itself - were canned, ESP was part and parcel of those cuts.

    The fact that anybody thought ESP still existed as anything more that a couple of my former coworkers sitting at desk and tying up loose contract and licensing ends... well, that's only because Microsoft carefully obfuscated how much overlap ESP and FS had.

    ESP is dead and has been since ACES closed on January 23rd, 2009.

  6. Take the source by Teun · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Stop whining, take the source code and hire your own devs.

    Oh, you said MS?

    --
    "The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
  7. I've heard rumours... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...that MS is planning on open sourcing the entire code base as abandonware, so customers don't have to worry.

    It'll be released right after hell freezes over.

  8. TLA's (Three Letter Abbreviations) by captainpanic · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Well... if you don't know what ESP stands for, then why do you reply?

    I reply because I'm getting tired of people expecting that the whole world knows what their 3-letter-abbreviation stands for.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esp

    ESP, in my field, is an Electrostatic precipitator. I'm pretty sure that Microsoft isn't working on cleaning up exhaust gases though. I guess it is the "Microsoft ESP - A visual simulation package produced by Microsoft", as found at the bottom of the 3rd (!) list of ESP-abbreviations on wikipedia.

    Thanks.
    It takes only a few characters to actually spell it out, and explain it, but it takes a minute to google it.

  9. Flightgear by LingNoi · · Score: 3, Informative

    If you're looking for an alternative to Flight Simulator there is always FlightGear.

  10. Another Argument Dispelled by ehaggis · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Too often I have heard the following argument against OSS - "You don't know when support will end or if the project will exist tomorrow." This is true. But you can make relative safegaurds against choosing a dead software package. How long has it been around? How much activity? How popular? How many participants? I can also download a sample several packages without pulling out my wallet. If support suddenly stops, I still have access to the code should I need to develop the product further.

    With a proprietary package, it is take it or leave it with a limited amount of options.

    Certainly both approaches (OSS and closed) have there pros and cons, but with OSS I am better able to hedge my bet against obsolescence.

    --
    One ring to bind them - should probably have more fiber and less rings in their diet.
  11. Re:Hey, Here's an idea... by poetmatt · · Score: 4, Funny

    She's the only one with the balls for the job.