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Free Desktop Software Development Dead In Windows 8
benfrog writes "Microsoft has decided to restrict Visual Studio 11 Express, the free-to-use version of its integrated development environment, to producing only Metro-style applications. Those who would like to produce conventional desktop applications or command line -based applications are stuck with Visual Studio 2010 or buying the full version. Microsoft announced the Visual Studio 11 lineup last week."
So if you are crying about this, what about coming up with those open source IDE's?? I understand that they have never matched Visual Studio, but seriously. I even buy good web development IDE's to my OS X, like Coda 2. Stop being a cheap-ass winer and pay for quality tools.
You know what this story actually tells? That even FOSS users don't like their IDE's. They want to use Visual Studio from Microsoft because frankly, it is much better than the open source alternatives.
Visual Studio 11 is an improvement in many ways over Visual Studio 2010. Its C++ compiler, for example, is a great deal more standards-compliant, especially with the new C++ 11 specification. It has powerful new optimization features, such as the ability to automatically use CPU features like SSE2 to accelerate mathematically intensive programs, and new language features to allow programs to be executed on the GPU. The new version of the C# language makes it easier to write programs that do their work on background threads and avoid making user interfaces unresponsive. The .NET Framework, updated to version 4.5, includes new capabilities for desktop applications, such as a ribbon control for Microsoft's WPF GUI framework.
Taken together, there are many new features in Visual Studio 11 that are relevant, interesting, and useful for desktop developers. Indeed, things like the new WPF capabilities are only useful for desktop developers.
If Microsoft is so bad then why the hell there isn't better open source versions of these things??
This is really stupid. I mean, I understand the (stupid) reasoning behind it, given the direction they want to go... but it's just shooting themselves in the foot.
At least VS2010 Express will still be available, but still... this is going to burn a LOT of good-will (such as it is) with Windows developers.
- Spryguy
There are three kinds of people in this world: those that can count and those that can't
It's worth noting that there's enough toolchains that are perfectly capable of producing desktop applications in that are Free (in both senses) that're capable of producing quality results.
Quite simply, if they're willing to cut their own throats in this space this way...let 'em.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
When I read Forbes naming Ballmer one of the 5 worst CEO, I had some doubt
After reading TFA, the doubt is gone
Indeed, Ballmer is utterly clueless on how to run Microsoft !
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
No matter how you read this, the headline is completely misleading. There are other compilers/IDEs for Windows that cost $0. And the term "free" can mean two things on Slashdot; this headline makes it sound like Microsoft is trying to kill FOSS.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
MS quipped. "you're free not to use it".
Just because I can't write c# console apps doesn't mean I can't write console apps...
So long, and thanks for all the Phish
There isnt a week where I dont come upon a story like this and laugh out loud. Its a shame too as Win 8 has nice features.
It was just Metro and now the lack of media player outside ultimate, no gui with aero in desktop mode, and now this?! What the hell are they going to fuck uo next?
There are work arounds like win7start and the intel compilers and eclipse (sucks to use phenom), but buying a machine with win 7 instead is a lot less hassle.
XP was bashed here on slashdot for years and then came Vista. Now these same users who bashed it think XP is the next coming of christ and perfection at its core and refuse to leave the 11 year old platform. Now we are being transformed into cutting enthusiasts to luddites we cant stand. Amazing what a bad OS can do.
I never would have have quit Linux due to its tavlet UI in March 2011 if I knew what was in store for Win 8.
http://saveie6.com/
There is no reason you have to release your code under the GPL if you use the Qt libraries. Qt is licensed under the LGPL.
My blog, if you're interested: http://www.purp
The LAMP stack has improved if it can build Windows desktop apps. They haven't talked about VWD, just the desktop targeted tools like the express versions of C# and VB. Funny thing is that they're targeting Metro and that's moving to HTML/JS.
It seems like with this move and generally the Metro and Windows 8 walled garden stuff, Microsoft is going more and more "the Apple way". Is it really in their best interest? Is it just me, or hasn't the open-ish (compared to Apple) Intel + Microsoft Windows ecosystem served a desktop market niche that is different from the Apple universe? Does Microsoft have an exit strategy in case they fail in closer competition with Apple at Apple's game?
The Qt SDK has an option to be used with LGPL v 2.1 which will allow developers to release proprietary executables without being required to release their source code. Source release is only required if the developers make changes to the Qt SDK itself, which usually shouldn't be an issue. There's also a commercial license available if even this is too onerous.
What's the big deal? 2010 will still be available. Version 11 will cost $500 which is similar to what graphic artists pay Adobe for some of their software. Students are able to use free copies of the software through Dreamspark. I fail to see why this is an issue.
Qt for Windows builds with mingw, so YES it is possible to build Windows desktop apps for free.
You are forced to release your software as GPL if you use the QT sdk tough.
No you aren't. Get your facts straight.
They all exist to make Microsoft more money. In this case, they want to manipulate developers into developing for a platform they're trying to push because they think they can make more money off it it. Everything you do when you base your stuff on their platform exists to enrich them. And if it happens to enrich you in the process, well insomuch as the vague promise that it might happen keeps people developing for their platform, Microsoft cares. Otherwise, they don't care at all, and if you become really successful, they'll look for a way to make sure your success feeds their success at the expense of your success.
That's the nature of the Microsoft game, and they haven't ever changed how they play it. They can't. Their chosen business model depends on it.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Why not write in Qt for Windows? It's certainly pleasant to work with, and you get Linux and OSX ports basically for free.
Get Lost, Get Lost, Get Lost.
Enuff said. The desktop is the only saving grace for Microsoft, let alone Windows. Talk about killing the golden goose.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
...to laugh silently and sombrely at this comment from only three weeks ago, which is now tragically and frustratingly wrong.
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
Microsoft is so consumed with "Apple envy" that they seem to have forgotten what their bread and butter is: the business desktop. They are so obsessed with being a competitor in the tablet market that they are making a product that actively hurts their core demographic.
Why do people use Windows? Legacy support is a BIG reason – and yet Microsoft under Ballmer seems dedicated to trying to kill it as quickly as possible. Guess what? If legacy support goes away, so does a large part of the reason for people not switching to another OS! After all, if they have to rewrite everything anyway... Ballmer once understood that "developers, developers, developers" were what made Microsoft's platform dominate; now he seems to be going for tablet/smartphone-using hipsters and tweens, and giving developers the middle finger.
Billy Madison
Free, multi-plataform IDE for C/C++ projects: http://qt.nokia.com/products/developer-tools
You are forced to release your software as GPL if you use the QT sdk tough. But I think that's a limitation of QT, not qtcreator itself. It uses gcc/gdb as a backend.
Alright I was completely wrong about the GPL, as QT is now LGPL. Don't know where I took that piece of mis-information, I believe it was like that years ago, but no more. Well, that makes QT Creator even a better option.
A lot of people still use laptops and desktops. Microsoft is throwing away that market to be in also ran far behind iPhone and Android. Microsoft should focus on doing what they do best. Instead they are scaring Windows customers and Windows developers into leaving the PC platform. Poorly played, Microsoft.
Even if older versions of Visual Studio can be used, they are notorious for breaking under new OSs. VS2003 won't work on Vista or Windows 7. VS2005/2008 is slower, and VS2010 doesn't support global directories so you must enter your search paths manually into every single library, making porting time consuming and tedious. What Microsoft are doing here is saying if you don't want to develop METRO apps, then it's time to leave the Windows platform.
Just download the MS SDK. It's been free for years and includes the compiler et al. It's only the pretty IDEs that are a problem.
Not anymore:
"The Windows SDK no longer ships with a complete command-line build environment. The Windows SDK now requires a compiler and build environment to be installed separately."
guess that mindset is gone.
Even if Qt was GPL that doesn't mean that the code you wrote with the IDE needed to have its source released.
This doesn't have any effect on .NET web development, since VS 11 Express Web is still available same as before. It's the support for classic desktop apps - C++/Win32, or .NET/WinForms, or .NET/WPF - that's no longer there; it's Metro only now.
In addition, the desktop is likely to be the high profit margin market in the future. CAD/CAE, publishing, software development graphic design, etc, and most office work will still need large screens. The mobile market could easily turn into a race to the bottom. I'm surprised that MS wants to be there.
AFAIK the complex but useful behaviors I am used to with s86 aps will not exist in metro as by definition touch just will not support that level of detail in any convenient way. And I find portable computing hazardous rather than useful, the devices disappear, for starters, and so far using something as a remote terminal (as the server does not get lost or stolen) just hasn't appealed to me. But obviously MS is better off if they can merchandize to both x86 type machine owners and the larger number of portable devices, with essentially the same product. So I would assume they want that new interface on your new ap. BUT here's my ignorance: can it become reasonable to build a new x86 ap behind a metro interface, working as desired in metro and more fully with a keyboard interface? Or to attach a metro interface in a meaningful way to an x86 ap? I doubt it; and if not, full feature ap development will be in trouble ...at least until some sort of brain-level interface starts to overthrow touch...imho
Well, don't forget as a starting point that "open source" doesn't necessarily mean that the software is free, or that there's a lack of full-time/paid developers on board. Firefox and OpenOffice are both open-source with paid developers, just to name two examples of FOSS projects that have or had paid developers on the team, even though they're dwarfed by the number of volunteers.
Anyway, even if we just touch on the well-known applications that can hold their own at the very least on a consumer level, if not for professionals, I can think of at least a few off the top of my head: GIMP, VLC, Firefox, Thunderbird, and OpenOffice. I don't have much experience in terms of specialty software, but when I was searching for something my mother could use to view files from a recent MRI she had, it seemed like a lot of the software considered high-quality was cross-platform Windows/Linux and sometimes also OS X.
Now mostly at Usenet:comp.misc & SoylentNews.org (it's made of people!)
Or you can use other IDE, such as SharpDevelop. That is what I actually use for C# development.
That was my first thought too. I've been developing software for Windows since the early 90's, and while I'm a gamer and I enjoy owning a relatively powerful PC I have zero interest in smartphones, tablets and other gadgetry. I won't be developing for any of them, just the desktop.
As for the desktop market disappearing, tell that to small businesses running accounts software, or authors writing novel, or just about anyone else who - when they think about computers - thinks 'keyboard' not 'gestures'.
Hal Spacejock: Science Fiction with Nuts
Never mind VS2003 - officially, you can't even install VS97 under Windows 7 64-bit. (Someone posted a workaround, eventually, but it took 12 months or more.) There's a lot of legacy VB6 code out there and you can't just open those projects in VS2008 and recompile, not by a very, very long shot.
Hal Spacejock: Science Fiction with Nuts
Qt was like that before Nokia bought Trolltech. None of the dire predictions came to pass, but a bunch of people called the switch to the LGPL.
God, that was back in 08/09. I feel old.
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
Think.
This isn't going to hurt enterprise desktop development *at all*. Know why? Because people who write enterprise applications don't use the free version that's intended for hobbyists / students.
Legacy support is also not going away. Why do you think there is still a desktop / win32 environment?
For C++ development, ease of use, portability and tools, Qt Creator is both a lightweight and feature packed IDE. It has about the same feature set as Visual Studio and similar usage, plus it's much easier to use and configure for custom build systems. It can be used with both MSVC compiler and Mingw. It's well mantained and has some killer features such as the locator. As a plus, it works identically everywhere, so I can get my favorite development environment no matter if i'm at work (Windows), at home (Linux) or on my laptop (OSX).
In my view, the biggest problem it has is it's name, "Qt-Creator", which i wish developers would change. Even if Qt is hands down the best library and toolit i've ever used for mobile and desktop development, it works perfectly fine for non Qt related development too, so plenty of developers writing non-Qt are missing the best opensource C++ IDE.
or build your apps on HTML5 and to hell with it all.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I have a feeling there will be enough backlash to reverse this decision. Besides, has anyone seen Visual Studio 2011? They've decided to make it look like a Metro app despite being a desktop application. Looks horrid. I'll stick to 2010 as long as I can if they don't reverse this decision.
In the back of my mind, I still feel like some lines were crossed though and this isn't exactly the plan.
I am also enjoying QT Creator. Easy to use, fast, lots of good examples, nice documentation, includes a visual GUI designer too. I'm a C guy who's just cutting his teeth in C++ and graphical applications, so it's also a learning tool for me. I had VS2010 (from DreamSpark) for a while but it felt a bit overly complex and, I'm not sure if the Windows GUI with all it's legacy cruft is a good way to go anyway (CMIIW).
But a lot of them do target XP, which is no longer supported in either version.
but that's 99% lazy, lazy programmers using the built in MS-SQL (which will bite them hard in the ass in a few years when in high cost of maintaining SQL DBs running over TCP/IP vs el-cheapo access DBs on network shares becomes apparent).
...I can think of all sorts of arguments for not using MS SQL that you could adopt for valid reasons, but I would have never dreamed I would hear someone advocating shitty access dbs on network shares as a replacement for a proper db.
You sir, are a goon.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
I don't think it was an accident that XBox was good and cheap. Design decisions: commodity PC like hardware: oddles of people that already know how to code games for something like that, the hardware's commodity use in other areas give you volume effects you are unlikely to get with some odd "emotion engine" architecture etc. For XBox 360: HDDVD: bad guess, at the time no one knew which would win I don't think this is the reason why XBox 360 was cheaper, it was cheaper because it used relatively more mainstream hardware rather than some oddball CPU that was being produced in small volume.Kinect: something pretty awesome from what I've seen of it online (I live in a bubble with my 55" screen and PS3 so no XBox for me but consider it comparable) and the next logical step from the Wii mote. Might add for example a whole lot of touch like gestures to tablets and desktops without the need for a touch screen and the mess of having someone touching your screen all the time.
Vista->Win 7 agreed. Email: I'm thinking more servers with Exchange. Not sure what the MS tech from the 90's was but most people I knew were using sendmail or something similar back then part of the reason why people were going nuts for Sun hardware and geeks in robes praying to the UNIX gods was still cool because it let you do something useful on your win 95 box windows didn't really have anything comparable for internet and email.
strong arming metro is going to piss business off. Have they honestly tested this with people that have been using windows for the last 20 years ? I doubt it.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
dido database solutions
Dido's into database solutions now? Guess the music career was tanking.
Some people write code because they need to do something. With no intention of publishing it at all, free or pay.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
By the time W8 is released iOS+Android should be approaching a billion users. That's a pretty big installed base.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Really? What are they replacing ASP.NET with? Why haven't they announced this ASP.NET replacement yet? Last time I checked IIS didn't execute HTML 5 and Javascript on the server so that will need to be reworked quite a lot, and they'll also need to completely rewrite Sharepoint, Dynamics CRM, Visual Studio and probably other apps as well. Seems like a lot of work for no benefit. Of course you could just be talking out of your arse.
Vista was a beta (alpha?) of Win7 that they got people to pay for, so that's kinda of win really.
Meh... I bought Vista when it was first released, 15 seconds boot time from boot manager to desktop (slower than that now with about 1/2 a gazillion apps installed), currently over 1 month uptime, directx11. YMMV, but it's good enough for me.
That being said it was buggy as hell when I bought it - it would not install with my motherboard chipset and 4gb or more RAM (known bug). Needless to say, I was unimpressed with BSOD reboots on installation, and took quite a while troubleshooting the problem.
I just received a chair in the mail.
Chairpoint. You had to point out that monstrosity, didn't you?
Let me know when Microsoft's implementation of HTML5 includes the Media Capture API. Otherwise, barcode scanner applications are impossible.
And, as a bonus the resulting app is more portable.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Tablets aren't going to replace PCs for everyone, but for a majority of people who don't use computers in their jobs and don't have much of an interest in a PC, a tablet will be good enough for them.
Say someone who owns an iPad and no PC decides to take "introduction to programming" at the local college. Given Apple's stance against tools that allow development on a device, on which computer should this student test his own programs? Or should he have bought a Transformer instead because it runs AIDE?
Free is not about the price, but about the freedom. And there are other compilers than the microsoft one.
Say someone who owns an iPad and no PC decides to take "introduction to programming" at the local college.
But why would we say that? Most people won't, and that's the point. For better or worse, most people outside of work are primarily content consumers not content creators, and tablets are better content consumption devices for many people's needs than a desktop PC.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
They are killing off the usefulness of free version of studio, in effect, but to be honest the last thing i wrote for windows didn't even use studio ( or a .net language ). It used actual open tools.. VS may be the defacto standard for windows development, but its not the only one. Not by a long shot.
Now if they start *requiring* signed binaries and refuse to give them to 3rd party free tools, then we might have a issue.
But even so, not all is lost as this may have the effect of increasing the use of alternative development tools. ( which is one of the things that caused Microsoft to come up with the express versions in the first place )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Qt has been available under both LGPL and GPL since version 2.2. But there were always some extensions that were only available in the commercial libary.
What you are probably remembering is that Trolltech only produced this version for free platforms like Linux and the BSD's. If you wanted to run this version on Windows you had to jump through hoops and wouldn't get any support from TrollTech people. For Windows, Trolltech only packaged and supported commercially licensed and later GPL licensed versions. After Nokia bought TrollTech the next version was released as LGPL on all platforms. Nokia could produce the product as a loss leader and didn't have to make a profit on the commercial version, although it is still sold by a 3rd party mostly for the support that comes with it.
TrollTech also used to have this clause in the commercial license that wouldn't allow you to switch from LGPL to the commercial license. I don't know if they actually refused to sell the commercial license to anyone in practice though as that would seem counterproductive for a for-profit company supported by licensing and support.
I personally hate Visual Studio, it's a horrible enviroment for any programming that is not Object Oriented. I program a lot of C and ASM and Visual Studio is the last thing I would ever grab. It's overhead, it overbloat and it's just not a very good overall IDE. Gedit + GCC is all you need for C development.
See, as they make very clear when you download Microsoft Visual Studio 11 for Windows 8, Microsoft controls the publishing rights of all Metro applications. Which, pretty much makes building them pointless. Why, as a developer, should I put my time, hard work, and money on the line, only to give Microsoft the option of never allowing my app to see the light of day? It just doesn't make sense. I would say the same thing of Apple, also, before you point out that they also have a walled garden. In the case of Microsoft, I don't think it can work because it's the opposite strategy of the one that made them successful in the first place. And if they want the opposite of success, they can have it. As a developer, I find the mobile platforms more compelling anyway.
This signature intentionally left blank.
Tablets aren't going to replace PCs for everyone, but for a majority of people who don't use computers in their jobs and don't have much of an interest in a PC, a tablet will be good enough for them.
Say someone who owns an iPad and no PC decides to take "introduction to programming" at the local college. Given Apple's stance against tools that allow development on a device, on which computer should this student test his own programs? Or should he have bought a Transformer instead because it runs AIDE?
So, a "majority of people" are going to take an introduction to programming course? Uh, no. That doesn't actually happen.
And for those that do, why would they buy a Transformer, when instead they can just buy a PC (notebook or desktop, Mac or Windows) and an iPad? What value would the Transformer provide? It's a shitty PC, and a shitty tablet, but it's all-in-one. That's preferable to going for a good PC and a good tablet, but are two devices? While we're only talking about a very small percent of people here (those that take programming courses), I doubt that a Transformer alone would be preferable to a proper PC and a proper tablet, even amongst them.
And when you broaden it to the general non-professional population, as the OP actually did and which you ignored (presumably to make a irrelevant point), I'm absolutely certain the Transformer is a poor choice.
In a perfect world, it wouldn't matter what system they had. Either way, they would just remote desktop into a VM hosted on the college's system, and use an external mouse or keyboard to do their assignments.
At some point in time, (I hope) people will realize that they don't need a processing powerhouse at every station. They do want lots of stations that are inexpensive. So, hopefully, a home server will pop up that can serve up VMs that are size matched to the client device. All of your data from any of your devices. All of your apps on any of your devices. All of it stored in a box in your laundry room. Heck, just about every modern TV could become a high end workstation without hardware changes.
Unfortunately, the MS Home Server seems to be abandoned by MS. And no one else seems to be picking that perticular torch back up.
I am tired of supporting old versions of IE, Win 7 supports trim for SSDs so they do not die within 90 days, it can handle multi cores, when something fails like a driver win 7 can handle it better, it is MUCH more secure.
Windows 7 is a decent improvement. Its not perfect but it certainly is an upgrade from XP.
http://saveie6.com/
I have used the Express products to biuld a number of windows desktop applicatins, XNA games and Windows Phone apps. It hurts that they are taking away some of that power I have gotten used to. My apps aren't quite profitable enough yet for me to afford a full license of VS.
Visual Studio is hardly the only development IDE on Windows. Yes, it is good, but you cannot really say that "free desktop software development dead in Windows 8" just because gasp, MS wants you to buy the new version. Hell, they even still offer Visual Studio 2010 for free!
For now.
So if you are crying about this, what about coming up with those open source IDE's?? I understand that they have never matched Visual Studio, but seriously. I even buy good web development IDE's to my OS X, like Coda 2. Stop being a cheap-ass winer and pay for quality tools.
No thanks.
You know what this story actually tells? That even FOSS users don't like their IDE's. They want to use Visual Studio from Microsoft because frankly, it is much better than the open source alternatives.
In other news, Free software advocates like Free software. Shocking!
If Microsoft is so bad then why the hell there isn't better open source versions of these things??
......Because the free Visual Studio was good enough for everyone, up until now?
Are you purposely, or just accidently this stupid?
Wait, who says we'd need to be bound by Miocrosoft's implementation
Microsoft does. Windows RT doesn't run anything but IE.
So, hopefully, a home server will pop up that can serve up VMs that are size matched to the client device.
Except a lot of people are going to end up wanting to run Windows-only software. Microsoft has tended to charge through the nose for client access licenses for terminal servers.
So, a "majority of people" are going to take an introduction to programming course? Uh, no. That doesn't actually happen.
In the (U.S.) Democratic Party's vision as I understand it, everybody will have a chance to go to college. The college I attended had "Introduction to Programming and Problem Solving" as one of the general education prerequisites that all freshmen take. I'll admit this college was an edge case because all freshmen had to buy the same model laptop, but I imagine that in a few years, programming will soon sit alongside physics, chemistry, English composition, and the like as part of the standard freshman schedule at more and more institutions.
And for those that do, why would they buy a Transformer, when instead they can just buy a PC (notebook or desktop, Mac or Windows) and an iPad?
Because I understand that some people just don't want to own a PC.
And when you broaden it to the general non-professional population
Then you get to my general case: someone wants to try doing something, discovers that it would require buying a PC, and then decides that he doesn't want to do it enough to warrant buying a PC. If the economies of scale shift far enough that locked-down tablets are far cheaper than PCs, this situation will arise more and more often.
most people outside of work are primarily content consumers not content creators
The distinction between a "consumer" and a "creator", as opposed to a participant in culture, is the whole problem that locked-down tablets perpetuate.
Why do we keep getting these ridiculously over-sensationalised headings in story submissions? Can't we really rely on slashdot submitters to have two bits of brainpower needed to write a balanced heading when the original story is way overblown and uses an unnecessarily sensational headline?
It's interesting that you chose to write "...that locked-down tables perpetuate" there.
I'm all for openness and I'll be the first to agree that mobile operating systems, particularly Apple's, are sadly lacking in this respect and a huge retrograde step in flexibility.
However, I think that is a separate issue. The basic nature of these mobile touchscreen devices is that they are lousy for creating new content. You can't type at 100+ WPM on a touchscreen. You can't display both a large area for your content and as much area again for menus, toolbars, command pallettes, script windows and whatever else you need, if you're starting with a screen that has about a 10" diagonal.
I think we're seeing the next logical step in the evolution of personal computing technology: devices that are more specialised than an old general purpose computer, but where interoperability and communication and sharing data and the behind-the-scenes standards compliance necessary to achieve those things are really important. Some people offering these products/services will hold out and try to lock people into their platform, whether that's by trying to lock down the hardware or the network or the data itself, but in the long run they are fighting a losing battle. Computing is ultimately all about your data and what you can do with it, and tools and software and networks that let people do more useful/interesting things more easily will have a natural advantage that I think will win in the long run.
From this point of view, I am quite happy that we now have mobile devices that allow simple UIs and easy consumption of content without being tied to a desk. People want these facilities, and my new iPad is better at supporting them than any laptop I use. But it's still a laptop -- a large one, with a big, high-res screen -- that I want when I go to a meeting with my clients. The difference is that today, I can use the right tool for each job, because now someone actually makes both tools.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
You can't type at 100+ WPM on a touchscreen.
I can't type at 100+ WPM period. Last time I was tested, I was around 85 WPM, but I think I could maintain that speed on a Bluetooth keyboard paired to an iPad or on the keyboard dock that connects to the Transformer.
You can't display both a large area for your content and as much area again for menus, toolbars, command pallettes, script windows and whatever else you need, if you're starting with a screen that has about a 10" diagonal.
A tablet shares these drawbacks with the netbook into which I'm typing this comment. Some of those limitations can be worked around on both tablets and netbooks with clever user interface design, unlike the artificial cryptographic limitation of code signing verification with no owner override. A Transformer or virtually any other Android-powered device has owner override; an iPad does not without paying $650 for a Mac plus $99 per year for the certificate allowing owner override.
Some people offering these products/services will hold out and try to lock people into their platform, whether that's by trying to lock down the hardware or the network or the data itself, but in the long run they are fighting a losing battle.
Then explain how locked-down game consoles still beat PCs in several genres despite the obvious disadvantage of not having mods or locally developed games.
But it's still a laptop -- a large one, with a big, high-res screen -- that I want when I go to a meeting with my clients. The difference is that today, I can use the right tool for each job, because now someone actually makes both tools.
The scenario I want to avoid involves a tablet owner not being able to afford a PC once he realizes that a task that he wants to perform needs one. If locked-down tablets become so ubiquitous that people decide they don't need PCs, this scenario will become more and more likely, and people will become discouraged from performing such tasks in the first place outside of a paying job. Such discouragement would serve only to cement a "creator"/"consumer" divide as opposed to a "participant" culture.
I Gnu it.
"Love is a familiar; Love is a devil: there is no evil angel but Love." --William Shakespeare ('Love's Labors Lost')
Embrace use of their compilers for free SW devel, Extend it to support proprietary models, and those who grew used to the tool set will now find that the ability to develop unencumbered, useful programs has been Extinguished -- thus grabbing a large mental-share of people who would have been using Gnu tools and contributing to their development and now forcing them into a dead-end or becoming paying MS customers...
Beware of Geeks baring gifts...
Microsoft is end of life-ing .Net
I won't be surprised when you aren't able to provide any kind of citation for that one.
Bimbo Newton Crosby, for most the iDevices are just glorified PMPs whereas with X86 not only can you consume but you can produce as well. Hell with my little E350 i will edit multitracks straight off the recorder in Audacity just to see if we got a good take, on my desktops i do a lot of transcoding because some of my family is on widescreen, some 4x3 and ALL bitch if they have to watch the wrong one on their sets. I have customers that are artists, engineers, contractors, hell even the little happy home maker types are editing the photos from their cameras or making DVDs of their kid's soccer game in Windows DVD maker so there is a LOT of uses for even ordinary folks to actually create instead of just consume.
But then again every person i know that bought an iPad has a desktop AND a laptop AND the Ipad, so it isn't like they are actually doing without. All these fanbois that think the iPad is gonna magically replace X86 I have NO doubt they themselves have X86 at home and its probably used several times a week, because there are plenty of jobs where a PMP like the iPad just don't cut it. I know trying to type anything more than a simple tweet on one of those visual keyboards drives me up a damned wall, give me my little E350 netbook any day of the week as i've have a full paragraph written on it before i get to the second sentence on an iPad.
Oh and on the long life of X86? I'm typing this on the 1.8GHz Sempron at the shop while i wait on some board tests to check out. this PC is nearly 9 years old now but for the tasks that it has, being a driver and patch server and nettop? it is whisper quiet, it never hangs, it never sucks power, it "just works" and works so well i gave the customer $75 in trade in just to get it, with its built in card reader and super quiet operation its really a great unit. I can pick up a mobile Athlon for it dirt cheap but....why bother? Even with this 8+ year old box I have cycles to spare.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
The reason MS Home Server no longer exists is frankly nobody bought it and it didn't do Citrix style remote desktops anyway. Also you seem to think that the network can replace the PC when in most places, hell even a lot of colleges, the amount of bandwidth that would require would cost more than the machines to roll out.
But if you don't need the cycles the nice thing about X86 is that you can save money while still having a full desktop. I paid about $350 for my EEE PC AMD with 8Gb of RAM, it only uses 18w under load and gets 6+ hours on a charge. if you want similar on the desktop it is even easier as several make both kit and fully built E350 that are cheap and again low powered. I have actually done what you are suggesting, in that I replaced the majority of full size P4 hogging power towers at the local print shop with E350s that are about the size of a VCR and just pop under the monitor. For the workers there editing HD graphics naturally they required bigger units but there is no reason for the basic office workers or a school for that matter to need all that power.
So there really isn't a need to switch to a client server model when you can buy a unit that'll run a full blown OS and applications with low power and heat. sun tried what you are suggesting with the Sun Ray and last i looked those can be bought for $10 a pop simply because so few used them. By going with client server you'd need a pretty damned big server that would be blowing through power 24/7/365 whereas when not in use the desktops can go to sleep and only draw a couple of watts.
Finally you are forgetting a big chunk of the cost in client server which is licenses. Like it or not most places simply can't use linux as they have too much Windows software that is required to run and MSFT really sticks it to you if you are using terminal services. I have looked into your idea with some SMBs and frankly for less than several hundred seats it ends up costing more for the licenses than it does just to give everyone a bog standard desktop. Again there is always ways to save power and electricity on a desktop but any savings you'd have by going client server would be quickly eaten by the licenses so you'd end up losing money on the deal. Better to just stick with the way we do things now and simply use less powerful machines friend.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
So, um, which is it?
After having read your comment, I realized that I can't know for sure what my general case is. It involves speculating at the future of an economy, which can never be 100.0 percent reliable because we never know for sure that there isn't going to be some sort of disaster that ends the developed world as we know it. But what I do know is that locked-down devices rule out certain computer-mediated hobbies. They make it hard for people to transition from the role of a "consumer" to the role of a participant in culture, someone who both "consumes" and creates. And if tablets become so prevalent that it's hard for an individual who wants a laptop to get one, this mobility will become even more difficult.
and VS2010 doesn't support global directories so you must enter your search paths manually into every single library, making porting time consuming and tedious.
Or you add shared props files that have the correct settings to your project through the property manager, and then you only have to edit them in one place whenever they change. There are some new ways (better ways) of doing things in VS2010 compared to older versions. It's not perfect, but it works. And in the end, a project file is pretty human-readable XML that you can easily modify with Python for example. I do it relatively often to fix certain niggles (like how the dependency manager fails to handle files referenced in the project that are not on disk, but not required for a successful build).
You can use the Monodevelop IDE to develop on windows using the .NET framework. While it might not be VS, it is free.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
Microsoft wonders why there software and OS's are pirated.