Microsoft .Net software's hidden cost

Yahoo ^ | Sat Jun 22,11:11 AM ET | Joe Wilcox

[Dominic Harr]

Definitely, the rest of that thread was not too bad. But because, you should notice, not one single one of the MS-only folks so famous here on FR was posting.

B2k threw out one quick line, but hasn't jumped in.

That thread will be fine, until the MS-only crowd shows back up. Then they will burn it to the ground, completing what they started with the very first response.

[Dominic Harr]

So to sum up, yes, what that thread became after the MS-only flamers went away is *exactly* the kind of polite tech discussion I'm able to have with Mac-heads.

When the MS-only 'peasents with pitchforks' aren't around with the torches, that is.

[discostu]

"Windows to Mac" was a dig? Heck-a-fire man I hit that link expecting it to be Windows bash.

OK the second post was by an idiot, but I don't recognize the name, not on my list of usual suspects. And that was it from him, no mas. Then 21 comes in expecting all kinds of crap, then in the 50s todd throws out a couple of profanity laden anti-PC posts. But other than those 5 posts (mostly by Machead) it's mellow and civil. Actually read the thread, we can play well with other. There's always gonna be a couple of ding dongs but if you do like happened on this thread (nobody replied to any of the idiots) then it stays a reasonable discussion.

Of course you think "Windows to Mac" was a dig so I guess I can't expect you to actually utilize reading comprehension.

[Dominic Harr]

Of course you think "Windows to Mac" was a dig so I guess I can't expect you to actually utilize reading comprehension.

The title meant, "this person on another discussion group tried to go from Window to Mac and found Mac's suck". And it wasn't even an article or a news story -- just a post by a person on another board!!! Talk about a lame, poorly-disguised attempt to start a flame war.

Clearly posted only as a slam at Apple. And the mac-heads didn't bite. Did not flame back.

And then, the name-calling by MS-only folks started in the first response. Then there were a dozen or so other posts that were very agressively anti-mac.

And still the mac-heads didn't flame back.

You blow off the first post, blow off the first name-calling, blow off the fact that even after the all that the mac-heads never flamed back.

The mac-heads never flamed back!

Get it? The flames come from MS-only people. And flames are a sure sign of an intellectually vacant position.

You're beyond hope. MS-only folks can do no wrong, non-MS techies can do no right.

[discostu]

OK now it's time for me to accuse you of reading a whole bunch of extra stuff into something. When I saw the title I figured it was a person who switched from Windows to Mac but I figured that since they'd gone TO Mac they must have had a good reason and would come out in heavy praise of the Mac. I mean in this modern world I wouldn't expect someone to make a switch like that without having done enough research to garauntee they would be happier on the far side of the switch.

And, if you actually read the thread you'll see that to varying degress some of the Mac folks (but none of THAT crowd's usual suspects) agree with the guy, so clearly the accusations are not lame. That crowd's usual suspects tried but nodoby cared. But you obviously can't be troubled to read the other 94 posts because as long as you don't go past 2 all the evidence is for you.
It's always the same with you Dom, you only read the parts you like.

[discostu]

Here, let me help you out so you don't have to expose yourself to too many thing you might disagree with.

So Cal Pubbie in post 21: I hat to get into these Mac vs. PC wars but I guess I have no choice.The article is full of lies or distortions. Of course that wont stop the "I hate Mac because Steve Jobs is a lib, Macs are designed by gay men, Mac owners are snobs and mindless robots" crowd here on Free Republic.

Capt. Thom (quoting a friend of his) in post 54: This guy has his head up his ass... CONCLUSION: This guy REALLY has his head up his ass! Or he is really a paid shill for a very nervous PC industry,

Toddhisattva in 55: Uh, no. It's a poorly-written troll.

Toddhisattva in 56: Because it doesn't run on such shitty equipment.

Yeppers, no Mac people throwing flames here.

But the point is that nobody takes up the call, the thread remains calm and the signal to noise ratio is high.

[Dominic Harr]

The level of denial here is truly epic. I'm fascinated to see how far you'll go:

OK now it's time for me to accuse you of reading a whole bunch of extra stuff into something.

Did you read the post?

Windows to Mac
"After 9 months of working on a Mac I am not impressed."
"My advice to you, Ken, is "Don't Do It" unless you're really in need of a migraine experience."

Again, it was *very* clear what the title meant. It meant he had gone from windows to mac, and was unhappy.

And once again, you're claiming that clear words don't have their obvious meanings. That post was a mac slam. Not even one with any authority, not an expert or a news story, just a post pulled from another board.

Your denial of this is even more instructive than your last denial of simple, obvious written english.

But you obviously can't be troubled to read the other 94 posts because as long as you don't go past 2 all the evidence is for you.

The first 2 posts in the entire thread were mac bashing and a flame calling all mac-heads names!

And you disregard those? The absolute perfect definition of convenient memory -- you ignore what started it.

And I *did* read the other posts. Did you? No flames back. NONE.

In detail:

So Cal Pubbie in post 21:

He was responding to the fact that he had already been insulted in the 2nd post, and he repeated other insults that you and I have both seen the MS-only people use here on FR. He didn't "invent" those insults. I've seen them thrown at mac-heads in a dozen or more threads.

Convenient for you to pretend he invented them.

Capt. Thom (quoting a friend of his) in post 54:

Yes, he quoted an email by someone else that called the writer of the piece an idiot.

Didn't flame anyone in the thread at all. Wasn't even a quote by him.

Toddhisattva in 55:

"Troll" is not a flame, it's a term that means someone who is 'trolling' or 'fishing' for trouble, only looking to start a flame war. And it was a very accurate description. In fact, the exact same point I'm making here. That thread was flame-bait, trolling. By MS-only folks who started out by insulting all mac-heads.

And you present *that* as the model for a good thread. This is *too* juicy.

Toddhisattva in 56: Because it doesn't run on such shitty equipment.

This is the biggest stretch of all. He calls AMD and Intel machines 'shitty equipment', and that's a flame to others in the thread?

Dude, you ignore direct name-calling and trolling by MS-only folks, and get "insulted" by the slightest thing to hit your fancy.

The exact same thing that happened here, in fact.

This is very, very instructive, thank you.

[Scott McCollum]

-Yahoo.com, Foxnews.com, CNN.com, ABC News.com were the highest profile cases of high traffic websites all felled in a three year period 1999-2002 by Linux/Unix insecurities. None of the aforementioned sites have run on any flavor of operating system made by Microsoft during that three year period.

-Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks are most often perpetrated on "zombie" machines running some flavor of the decades old Unix operating system. Published reports from IDC Research studies and CMP Media magazines have repeated pointed out the majority of all DDoS attacks are attributed to bugs in *Nix security.

-The year old "Lion" worm virus still attacks unpatched Red Hat Linux webservers.

-A bug published this week in the open source Apache web server software on Solaris/Linux v2.4/BSD systems allowed hackers to remotely run malicious code. Last week, those 64% of safe and secure Apache users had to contend with a major bug that allowed unauthorized to access Apache servers.

-A critical flaw found in the OpenSSH code allows malicious code to be run on Solaris and other *Nix systems.

You're a liar if you say that these things aren't true. You're an apologist if you say these facts are insignificant.

Either way, you'd come across as delusional. Rarely are there Hollywood style "Beautiful Mind" endings for self-professed "Slan-like" super-geniuses that turn out to just be crazy people and the boneyards of history are strewn with their bulging, misshapen skulls.

[Dominic Harr]

Wow, consider this:

You consider this thread 'trolling', if I'm not mistaken.

You considered this thread 'damning', even tho it concluded good things ("Still, long term, Driver predicted that making the switch to .Net for building new programs would help lift productivity and create more efficiency within companies.")

I was never insulting, said many positive things about .NET and openly asked politely for feedback.

I was greated with outright insults, called a "moron" and the like, and flames erupted to high heaven even tho I never once responded in kind.

On the other hand, that mac thread you *don't* consider trolling. It's conclusion was damning, a direct slam at macs. And it's very first poster out-right insulted all mac-heads, calling them names.

The mac-heads responded in a restrained manner, never responding in kind.

In both threads, flames only came from *one* specific group of people. Everyone else was restrained, and tried to stay adult and carry on a conversation.

Do you have one single ounce of objectivity in your body?

[Southack]

"This also points out why that list of PR Press release 'case studies' from the MS website which are listed as 'success stories can't be trusted."

Well, in all fairness to Microsoft, Deutsche Bank just failed that demonstration yesterday.

I have no doubt that new development efforts using VB Dot Net are seeing some successes across the country (so there will be plenty of stellar implementations to choose from for the MS web site to legitimately post), however, my predictions of gloom and doom for the fools trying to "upgrade" from VB 6 to the new VB 7 .Net seem to be coming true. Dot Net simply isn't close-enough to VB 6 for a large-scale conversion to be risk-free.

Contrast that demonstratable risk for VB6/VB7 to the risk of using a new C++ compiler. The new C++ compiler will always compile the previous version's code. Not so with Dot Net.

Frankly, MS has embarassed themselves with their strategy here. They've gone from a solid compiler that had no trouble with previous versions of VB to one that can't manage 60% of the old version's code. Essentially they've kept the VB family name but dropped "true" VB in favor of a brand new version 1 language. Either that or else they don't know how to design in backwards compatibility anymore.

This is going to cost VB shops many fortunes (hopefully spent on my firm fixing what's been broken by MS).

Of course, MS is also a threat to pull backwards compatibility again when they release the next version of Dot Net. Is it by design or is it that incompetence has finally seized the day with MS designers?

[Dominic Harr]

Dot Net simply isn't close-enough to VB 6 for a large-scale conversion to be risk-free.

Yes, you're right, absolutely, this doesn't mean .NET doesn't work. This is just an indication that DB blew it this one time. Dot NET will make it, I am certain. It's just going to take some time, like any new tech.

That's why I'm trying to find and talk with some people working on these implementations. I'd like to know how it's going, how far along .NET really is, what stage it really is at.

The MS website's case studies don't give any details at all, and just claim everything is peachy on all these projects, not one single little problem!

Yeah, I've heard *that* one from project managers before . . .

The folks here in this thread repeated those claims, in fact. The MS sales pitch is that it *is* ready for prime-time, today.

I'm hoping to find out how close to reality that sales pitch is.

[gitmo]

They claim it's ready for mission-critical work today!

I reviewed 3 mission-critical apps for Fortune 500 companies this week. Seems to be working far better than their J2EE apps. Took half the time to develop. Faster execution times. One of them has over a million transactions in an hour.

[Dominic Harr]

Interesting.

Without going into any details that would get you in trouble, can you tell me more?

[Scott McCollum]

How about this: You admit that open source is can be easily hacked by cyber-miscreants because anyone can see the source code and I'll admit I know nothing about software development...

In the past two weeks we've seen Apache, OpenSSH, Red Hat Linux and all manner of cripplingly serious open source bugs come to light. Remember, you say they're insignificant and you're an apologist. You say it's not true and you're a liar. Defend Red Hat Linux and you're obviously on their payroll...

Yes, that's exactly how people of the open source/free-as-in-beer-and-in-liberty cult have treated the "evil Micro$oft zombie drones." It is very unbecoming.

[dheretic]

How about this: You admit that open source is can be easily hacked by cyber-miscreants because anyone can see the source code and I'll admit I know nothing about software development...

I won't admit that because that's not how hacking code works. The quality of the code is what determines how readily it can be hacked. If the open source code is of low quality then it can be easily hacked. If closed source is of low quality, it can be easily hacked. Once again, it is the quality of the code that determines the hackability.

[Dominic Harr]

You know exactly how a combination lock works. Spin it right to one number, left to another, right back to another and *presto*.

The design for combination locks is completely "open-source".

Yet it's still secure.

[Scott McCollum]

You're forgetting the most important part - "Open source" combination locks have the numbers in the combination freely available for peer review.

If those combination numbers where hidden from peer review, they'd be "proprietary" and a big no-no for open source fanatics.

Giving a thief detailed blueprints of your combination lock and the numbers for the lock is not the most secure option for keeping the contents of your locker safe.

[discostu]

no, I consider some of the posts to be trolling. I consider most of the thread to be fine proof that the two sides can play nice. I think the trolling posts, which come from folks that anybody familiar with Mac threads knows very well because they're always hip deep in the scrap, are the sign that some folks, the outright Macheads as opposed to the Mac users, are just whack jobs. The fact that in this particular thread the 'heads are pissed about stuff the users to varying degrees agree with tells you everything you need to know about the heads.

And for the 400th time, when you post that everyone using an MS app was duped made a mistake and is a liability to their company you ARE being insulting. And let's not forget that when you WERE given polite feedback you wrote it all off as fake. Why should anybody give you polite feedback if you're just going to say it's fake.

How in blazes can you call a post that begins and ends with words "the author is an ass" restrained? Not only is it not restrained, simply quoting it, much less posting it in the first place, is a violation of the rules JimRob has asked us to follow (sorry guys).

Read the whole freaking thread. Macheads trying to start a flame war 3 (with one double cluching he wants a flame war so bad), PCdweebs trying to start a war 1.

[Dominic Harr]

Macheads trying to start a flame war 3 (with one double cluching he wants a flame war so bad), PCdweebs trying to start a war 1.

Well it's clear what happened here in this thread, then. Same thing that happened there. The MS-only folks tried real hard to start a flame war, and when they failed they bailed.

You ignore outright insults by MS-only folks, and call any slight thing that takes your fancy an "insult" to MS-only folks.

"I see you're doing it X way. Did you know if you use this solution you could have saved your boss X hours and X dollars?"

You see *that* common tech conversation as an insult. But calling people whiners and morons and maroons? Nah, that's to be ignored -- as long as it was posted by an MS-only person.

Because it's all in who says it, with you. If an MS-only person says the sky is green, you go to the wall defending them, refusing to admit that the sky isn't green even after the original poster admitted the sky is green. If an MS-only person calls names, you don't even *see* it. If a non-MS techie so much as asks uncomfortable questions, you hit the ceiling.

A real piece of work, you are.

I wonder, is it completely impossible to have a tech discussion with MS-only types without it becoming a flame war?

As I said, that thread ended up "playing nice" because the Mac-heads didn't flame back and the MS-only folks left, obviously because they don't want to take part in an actual tech conversation.

They tried to start a flame war, failed, and bailed.

You must be *so* proud. Apparently you consider that the model of a perfect thread. Because the MS-only folks *failed* in their attempts to start a flame war!

And you call that playing nice. Ya'll slap the mac-heads, and the mac-heads don't slap back. Beauty.

I haven't seen that deep a level of denial since talking to Ds about Clinton.

[Dominic Harr]

"Open source" combination locks have the numbers in the combination freely available for peer review.

No.

The 'key' is not public.

Only the security mechanism. Just like with combo locks.

You know how to crack a combo lock -- just need 3 numbers. Yet you need to know the 'key'.

With software, they use 'keys' that are 128 bit and bigger these days. Which still can be cracked, but it's awfully difficult.

But having the source code to the internal mechanism in no way helps you crack that key.