There were a lot of folks who were skeptical about AJAX development, particularly
in the business realm, where concerns arose about server-side manageability,
JavaScript-borne security threats and difficulties in testing and proving code.
To paraphrase William Shakespeare, some corporate dev pros felt AJAX was "a
tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."
A February report from Forrester Research showed that businesses -- and, in
particular, enterprises -- have been slow in adopting AJAX. But there's growing
evidence that these wait-and-see shops are piling onto the bandwagon.
Witness the activity at the AJAXWorld show last week, where Microsoft announced
that it was joining
the OpenAJAX Alliance. As RDN Executive Editor Jeffrey Schwartz put it,
the announcement "shows that this is clearly going to be the middle ground
of all rich Internet application development. Regardless of whether companies
are going to work with the Flex and WPF/E architectures, AJAX is a common denominator
in today's rich Internet applications architecture."
What's more, Forrester's Jeffrey Hammond contends that companies are underreporting
AJAX deployment, in part because development is happening at the departmental
level or in guerilla fashion.
Do you agree? Is your company starting to work with AJAX, and if so, is it
being implemented from a grassroots perspective? Let us know at [email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/28/20070 comments
As far as technical circles go, Don Ferguson was a made man. An IBM fellow
and chief architect in IBM's Software Group, Ferguson was the driving force
behind Lotus WebSphere in the 1990s and has been active in the areas of SOA,
Web services and, more recently, Web 2.0.
Ferguson had reached a spot at IBM that few relinquish -- the
technical equivalent of a Supreme Court appointment. So when Ferguson abruptly
jumped ship to join Microsoft to become a technical fellow in Platforms
and Strategy, it grabbed our attention. Big time.
What's behind this surprising defection and what might it mean for Microsoft?
It's an open question and one that Microsoft is not answering at the moment.
But given Ray Ozzie's predilection for openness and loosely coupled systems,
and Ferguson's background in the same, it's not wild speculation to think this
could impact Microsoft's SOA and Web services strategies -- possibly in a large
way.
The unusual steal also brings to mind some great technology defections of years
past, whether it's Brad Silverberg bolting from Novell to join Microsoft, or
Eric Schmidt quitting Novell to head up Google. What are some of the greatest
personnel coups in the technology industry? E-mail me at [email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/21/20070 comments
Last week, I noted an article that
took
a dim view of trends in the programming arena. And readers had a thing or
two to say about it all.
Reader Joel runs a skewer through the argument with this incisive response:
Of course not. It's a great hallmark of progress that most people can
work and live their lives at much higher levels of abstraction than before.
I for one don't want to make my own clothes or catch my dinner.
There will always need to be a handful of people writing microprocessor
code for the assembly programmers, a few hundred assembly programmers writing
compilers for the C/C++ programmers, several thousand C/C++ programmers building
frameworks like Java and .NET for the application programmers, and finally,
millions of application programmers building the apps that 99 percent of the
world actually uses. If Mr. McBride can point to a single time in computer
history when there were more software developers, more (or better) development
tools, or more programs in existence, I could take his concern seriously.
Did automotive science die when mass production put 99 percent of the
tinkering machinists out of work? Or did it encourage even more investment
because the ones who remained multiplied their innovations by 10 million cars
instead of one? Yes, someone somewhere needs to know how to write the assembly
language code that makes all the levels above it possible, and I hope those
people are getting paid handsomely. But the other 99.9 percent of us should
take a quiet moment to be thankful it isn't us, then get back to writing our
applications instead of worrying about the death of the field.
Mr. McBride correctly states that computer science curricula need to be
more relevant and vocational, but I hope he understands that if that isn't
done, it will be computer science departments that die, not computer science.
-Joel, New York
Laura is not as upbeat, but she makes a similar argument.
It's the computer scientists who make the "era of visual programming
languages where 8-year-old kids can program robots with a drag-and-drop interface"
and other wonderful things possible.
Computer science is certainly not dead. But let's be realistic: Job opportunities
in this country are simply not what they were. At least, that is the present
perception. The world isn't flat, as one author has famously preached; it
is cone-shaped, everything sliding down a slippery slope.
-Laura, Connecticut
Do you agree with these counterarguments? Was pundit/humorist P.J. O'Rourke
right when he wrote that those who pine for a perfect era in the past are forgetting
about the pain that past produced (including *shudder* painful dentistry)? Let
me know at [email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/21/20070 comments
Our buddies over at
Redmond magazine are at it again, poking around
Microsoft about issues related to open source and
discovering
some very interesting things in the process. Whether it's Ray Ozzie's touted
Live initiatives or the SourceForge-esque CodePlex site for sharing open source
code, it's clear that Microsoft has been changing its tune.
The question is: What tune will it eventually follow? While Microsoft's open
source maven Bill Hilf is saying (and to some extent, even doing) all the right
things, suspicions about playing ball with the original 800-pound gorilla abound.
The most telling quote comes from Michael Tieman, president of the Open Source
Initiative (OSI), who chides Microsoft for the lack of transparency with its
various licensing structures: "We don't want anyone claiming they are open
source if they aren't. Microsoft has always extended a friendly gesture to anyone
willing to build on the Microsoft platform, and then kept the other hand clenched
to strike if that application company becomes successful."
Is Tieman being too hard on the Redmondians? Maybe. As Hilf points out, the
company has sued over IP infringement only twice in its history. And with so
much open source software being developed for Windows, there's definitely a
platform imperative for Microsoft to get in on the open source applications
game.
What do you think? Could Microsoft's engagement help advance and diversify
the arena of open source development? Might we be looking at a classic Trojan
horse gambit to inject Microsoft IP deep into open projects? Or is it simply
Microsoft doing what it does best: protect, extend and leverage its Windows
platform into growing markets?
You tell me, and let me know how these concerns impact your development efforts.
E-mail me at [email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/21/20070 comments
Bad news for FoxPro fans: Microsoft confirmed to third-party developers on
Tuesday that Visual FoxPro 9 will be the last incarnation of Microsoft's desktop
database developer tool. Read Stuart Johnston's coverage of the story
here.
Surprised? Saddened? Tell us your tales of FoxPro development. We'll make a
place for 'em in the magazine. E-mail me at [email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/14/20072 comments
As development industry big-hitters go, few hit as large as Anders Hejlsberg.
The distinguished engineer at Microsoft has been knocking pitches out of the
park since the mid-1980s, when at Borland he authored the Turbo Pascal IDE and
later architected the Delphi IDE. You can check out his bio
here.
Since joining Microsoft in 1996, Hejlsberg has led a parade of key projects,
including J++, C#, .NET Framework and now Language Integrated Query.
Haven't heard of LINQ yet? You will soon. Baked into the upcoming version of
Visual Studio (code-named Orcas), LINQ enables C# and VB programmers to access
data sources -- including SQL Server databases, XML data and object properties
-- directly within program code. String queries in the strongly typed environment
get the same support -- Intellisense, compile time checking and code refactoring
-- as native program code. This is stuff to warm the heart of the most ardent
FoxPro developer.
"You're already dealing with data sets and you are already dealing with
object-oriented programming," Hejlsberg says. "The leap is just in
understanding where it makes sense and where it helps you. You can do data binding
within LINQ easily, literally data binding to query results."
Even more exciting are some of the long-term implications of LINQ. Hejlsberg
has hit some long balls over the past 20-plus years, but this one could fly
further than a lot of people think.
"It's my hope that in five to 10 years, programming languages simply will
have queries as a concept built-in, because that is just a must," Hejlsberg
says. "I really do think it is going that way. It's kind of gradually been
trending that way with some languages like Python and Ruby. So I think in that
sense we're making a fundamental contribution to programming languages science,
if you will."
There's a lot more ahead in LINQ, and Redmond Developer News wants to
hear your takes and publish them in the April 1 issue. If you have been tracking
LINQ, tell us your findings. What is working, what is failing, and what do you
expect to do with the technology once it emerges later this year or early next?
E-mail me at [email protected].
And if you could ask Anders Hejlsberg just one question about LINQ and dealing
with the new technology, what would it be? We're fixing to talk to Anders in
the next few weeks and would love to be able to pass on your thoughts. Again,
you can send you questions by e-mail to [email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/14/20070 comments
That's the question a British lecturer is asking at the British Computing Society
Web site. You can find Neil McBride's opinion piece
here.
McBride calls out issues we've chewed over before -- including the decline
in computer science enrollment at U.S. universities and efforts
to bolster interest. But the piece comes back to a visceral theme: In an
era of visual programming languages where 8-year-old kids can program robots
with a drag-and-drop interface, is there really any room left for steely-eyed
assembly coders?
McNeil has a point. But his descriptions of the halcyon day of programming
also bring to mind a favorite quote, from political humorist P.J. O'Rourke in
his book All the Trouble in the World:
"In general, life is better than it ever has been, and if you think that,
in the past, there was some golden age of pleasure and plenty to which you would,
if you were able, transport yourself, let me say one single word: 'dentistry.'"
What do you think? Should we be pining for the good old days of bare metal
programming, where men were men and coders wrote in assembly language? Or can
we expect .NET and managed code and a parade of other well-intentioned abstractions
to carry us forward to a brighter day?
Let me hear your thoughts at [email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/14/20070 comments
Yesterday, Microsoft released the
Visual
Studio 2005 SP1 Update for Windows Vista. The refresh promises an improved
user experience for those developing under the Vista OS, building on the Visual
Studio 2005 SP1 release targeted for Windows XP back in December.
In a Q&A
on Microsoft's site, Microsoft Developer Division Chief Soma Somasegar offers
additional detail about the new release and Vista. Among the nuggets is information
on what was fixed with the SP1 Update for Windows Vista, including "significant
issues around debugging and profiling, and around creating ASP.NET applications
for IIS on the developer machine," Somasegar says. "We also wanted
to improve the feedback that Visual Studio gives to developers when an error
occurs on Windows Vista."
You can download Visual Studio 2005 SP1 Update for Windows Vista here.
Will you download the new update? If so, we want to hear your opinions! E-mail
me at [email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/07/20072 comments
Like the $6 Million Man,
Redmond Developer News is getting bigger, stronger
and faster. Starting with the April 1 issue, RDN transitions to a twice-monthly
schedule that allows us to deliver more issues, more coverage and quicker turnaround
on news and events in the industry.
No surprise, we've had to staff up to achieve the doubled frequency. I'm proud
to announce the arrival of executive editor Jeffrey Schwartz, who was previously
senior editor at VAR Business. He will be heading up features coverage in RDN,
as well as contributing to our regular news coverage. Also joining the staff
is veteran news journalist Thomas Caywood. As a senior writer on staff, he'll
be instrumental in our news coverage, as well as producing features and other
articles for the magazine and Web
site.
In other happenings for Redmond Developer News, while the Oscars may
be over, the magazine awards season is just heating up. This week, the finalists
for the 56th Annual Maggie Awards were announced, and Redmond Developer
News earned recognition as a finalist in two categories, including best
new publication. The Maggie Awards winners will be announced on April 27.
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/07/20070 comments
Like Clark Griswold's legendary membership in the Jello of the Month Club in
the film
Christmas Vacation, it seems that
DST07
is the gift that keeps on giving.
One erstwhile IT manager working overtime to remediate issues at a Midwest
law firm says the problem continues to get worse. His team is currently working
to ensure that the firm's fleet of BlackBerrys won't stagger under the time
switch, but he says "it's taking us seven days to get responses from BlackBerry
and we are paying huge dollars for support. They are swamped."
One emerging problem: bounced e-mails, as customer e-mail servers are rebooted
or taken offline to apply patches and change configurations. In short, the fix
is compounding the disruption posed by the original problem.
"And just think, if they choose not to renew the law, this fire drill
starts again in three years," he says. "We should all use UTC and
be done with it, just like the metric system."
Posted by Michael Desmond on 03/07/20070 comments
Looks like Microsoft decided to shut down the
GotDotNet
Web site. According to Microsoft, the move is intended to eliminate redundancies
with other Web resources and reflects declining traffic on the site.
The Partners, Resource Center and Microsoft Tools have already been shuttered,
and Private workspaces, Team pages and Message Boards will be next on March
20. By April, the GDN CodeGallery will be dark. The whole schmear will fall
offline on June 19, according to the projected schedule.
The decision is hardly a surprise. Microsoft has put its weight behind CodePlex
and wants to make sure that subset sites like GotDotNet aren't robbing it of
momentum.
Check out a nice synopsis of the history of GotDotNet and its eventual demise
at the .NET
Sweatshop (v2) blog.
Posted by Michael Desmond on 02/28/20070 comments
A couple of weeks ago, RedDevNews delved into the emerging issue around
this
year's early switch to Daylight Saving Time. For years, DST has kicked off
predictably at 2 a.m. on the first Sunday of April. But this year, the switch
is coming early, on March 11.
The early change is causing a scramble among software vendors, IT managers
and dev shops, which must ensure that time-sensitive code is ready to recognize
the sudden spring forward. One IT director with a Midwest law firm who oversees
some 40 servers and 300 Windows XP clients says the early time change has crushed
his staff. He has four admins running overtime, applying patches, checking code
and badgering external customers to make sure their interfacing software doesn't
introduce errors when the switchover occurs.
Most distressing, he says, are the unfinished patches coming from vendors.
"We've been testing patches but it's a moving target. People keep rereleasing
patches because they can't get it right the first time," he says. "Plus,
the Exchange tool to correct calendars is single-threaded. So if you've got
tons of users, you better start running that pup now."
DST07 is no Y2K, but it appears the unexpected changeover is bringing to mind
some familiar headaches. Your IT folks will need to manage the hail of patches
coming from Microsoft and other vendors, but corporate dev shops need to get
on top of this issue, and fast. With so many systems in upheaval, relying on
a late-inning effort to deploy cleaned code is just asking for trouble.
Are you experiencing a DST07 nightmare? Tell us your tale, and we may feature
it in our coverage of this challenge in Redmond Developer News. E-mail me at
[email protected].
Posted by Michael Desmond on 02/28/20072 comments