Are things going more opensource and away from MSoft? 1

[Bullschmidt]

Just wondering people's opinions about whether they think the current/future trend is more toward opensource (such as Linux instead of Windows, and PHP instead of ASP or ASP.NET) and away from the perceived monopoly of Microsoft?

I'm currently an ASP developer and wonder whether the next thing I should be learning is ASP.NET or PHP. Must admit that the idea of opensource has a nice, intuitive feel to it.

Best regards,
J. Paul Schmidt - Freelance ASP Web Developer

http://www.Bullschmidt.com

- Creating "dynamic" Web pages that read and write from databases...

 

[Tarwn]

Having played with both PHP and ASP.Net I would say that the move from ASP to PHP would probably be easier than the move from ASP to ASP.Net. Then again, I'm biased, I don't like ASP.Net and think they should have revamped ASP rather than recreate the language the way they did.

If you have C experience, PHP will prove to be rather easy to pick up. A lot of the fundamental web concepts are going to be the same, so you already have leg up over beginners just learning PHP from an HTML background. The language is similar in structure to ASP and syntactically somewhere between Perl and C.

I have seen a lot more webservers over the past year offering cheap PHP services, and a lot more websites beginning to use it. As far as ASP.Net, it seems overcomplicated for what is needed for websites, possibly because it is aimed at web services and the like.

Then again I hate any language that assumes I want pages of ugly javascript to hold the state of mjy program so that I can pretend to be a web developer rather than a VB "programmer". That was the "I" as in someone else, not me

Obviously I am severaly biased, so it would probably be nice to hear from someone else on this topic as well.

-Tarwn

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[Bullschmidt]

Thanks for the great answer Tarwn!

Best regards,
J. Paul Schmidt - Freelance ASP Web Developer

http://www.Bullschmidt.com

- Creating "dynamic" Web pages that read and write from databases...

 

[xutopia]

On a related note :

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/05/26/1855225&mode=nested&tid=109&tid=187

Yes people are moving away from M$ in more than just web design.

Gary

http://www.xutopia.com

Haran
==========================

 

[BDC2]

Is an ASP developer with no C experience, I'm finding PHP relatively easy to learn. As Tarwn says, the fundamentals are the same.

I haven't touched .NET yet but I don't think it's aimed at my level or that of my clients, Small to Medium sized Enterprises, who on the whole don't require web services containing all their business logic

Related thread: thread656-467425

BDC.

 

[Tarwn]

I've looked into a lot of web langauges over the past few years. PHP and ASP were easily the closest related as far as how they work and how the code is formed. A lot of the concepts in ASP transfer over to PHP quite easily. Perl is a little bit further away, JSP and .Net are several more steps away, Cold Fusion is probably the furthest, though this is also the one I haven't used before.

I really wish MS had come out with just an upgrade to ASP. I think some additional objects and efficiency would have gone a long way. I know many people think it is an ugly language, but I am the opposite. It is a simple langauge in that it is not overly complicated. Simplicity breeds beauty.

In my opinion the addition of:
An incrememnter/decrementor for variables (++/--)
More efficiency for the Response/Request objects
Inheritance for the Classes
A true collection object
and some efficiency work on database drivers

would allow ASP to keep up with PHP.

Oh well.

-Tarwn

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[Bullschmidt]

Yeah!!!

Best regards,
J. Paul Schmidt

http://www.Bullschmidt.com

- Freelance ASP Web Developer

http://www.Bullschmidt.com/DevTip.asp

- ASP Developer Tips

 

[xutopia]

Tarwn,

I use JScript when I need to do ASP (like the current contract I'm doing right now).

I much prefer the syntax too!

Define and set value to a variable on one line :

var xyz = 123

increments

xyz++
zyz--

And also ternary operators!

var toto = (xyz != 123) ? "Trippy" : "whoa!" ;

anyways..

Gary

http://www.xutopia.com

Haran
==========================

 

[Tarwn]

Ah, I knew I forgot something...ternary operators, something else that should have been added to VBScript

I know I was mixing and matching ASP and VBScript above, it was just easier to lump it all otgether

I'm not real crazy about javascript...I'm wondering how ugly ASP gets in PerlScript or Python...

-Tarwn

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[xutopia]

why bother with perlscript when you could use real perl?

LOL

Gary

http://www.xutopia.com

Haran
==========================

 

[palbano]

>> away from the perceived monopoly of Microsoft?

Microsoft’s monopoly is not perceived, it is a fact. But it has nothing to do with web site development. It's monopoly is in Desktop Software not Server Software. On the Server Side they have no superiority in customer numbers over competitors. In fact there numbers have been climbing the past few years but they are still behind.

So your question is difficult to answer. The future is unclear but in any case does not probably include any near term domination of server side software and therefore Web Server Platforms.

Also, individual developers likes and dislikes of languages probably are one of the least mitigating forces of this battle. As time goes on more and more developers will obtain experience across several platforms and languages. For many of us, languages, APIs and environments become mere tools and not of any real concern.

"But, that's just my opinion... I could be wrong."

-pete

 

[blueark]

I read somewhere recently that it's better to learn design principles than design technicalities. If you know where web pages come from, how they are generated, how they interact with databases, etc., then you have the principles. Applying that to a specific platform is just a technicality, sometimes a significant hurdle, but generally one that can be overcome.

The future is uncertain, of course, and predicting what platform will dominate is beyond my capabilities. Each has their strengths and weaknesses.

For example, one hosting company I use have started going the OpenSource route because of cost, not only cost of software, but the hardware requirements were also more modest.

But does that mean ASP.Net is dead in the water? I doubt it, and to be honest, I hope not. It's greatest mistake, I think, was to call it ASP. anything, because it made people think the transition would be straightforward. After several months of hating it, I've started to see it as a completely different platform, and I'm enjoying the many advantages it has to offer. Personally, I wouldn't go back to classic asp.

So what route will the future take? Who knows, but like I said at the start, once you know the principles, you should be able to adapt. My guess? OpenSource will play a big part, but so will Web Services when they become more widespread. Also, any data exchange technology such as XML, and the ability to create custom controls in .Net is something that every platform should adopt, IMHO.

Just my thoughts on the matter!

 

[cian]

When I can get Apache, linux, php, MySQL and a ton of free PHP applications why even consider MSoft?
There'll always be a place for both but as more people become aware of freebies their usage is bound to grow.

just my 2 shillings!

http://www.ssi-developer.net

 

[petey]

>> Are things going more opensource and away from MSoft?

"Things", as in companies, are trying to go open source, but MSoft squeezes the life out of them if they can.

Read this and you got to wonder...

http://www.linuxworld.com/2003/0527.petreley.html

http://www.drpeterjones.com/

 

[Tarwn]

Just a note of clarification on the word monopoly:

This word has actually been redefined by the Sherman Antitrust Act, in terms of businesses it no longer means that a business has exclusive sales in a specific market. Apparently it now means that a single company has a large majority of the sales from a single market. By the new and improved definition (which completely contradicts the actual definition of the word) MS Windows does have a monopoly over the other 30-or-so OS's. Makes me wonder what kind of court fines are involved in monopoly cases and how much these have increased since they redefined the word...

On the subject of making Windows Open Source: At least if they are forced to do this and someone else captures market share at some point, I won't have to listen to people say how their product "beat" windows. It's always easier to beat someone when you make them play by your rules.

Also on that subject: Has anyone considered how bad things would be if Windows did go Open Source? Every single OEM Manufacturer (Toshiba, Dell, Gateway, etc) would find a way to make minor changes to the system (they already do this, but would be freer to do it with an Open Source copy) and software developers would have an even more difficult time trying to write software for even more version (Heck, Toshiba already includes a service in their copies of 2000 that calls home regularly). Then again, perhaps making it difficult to write software and making it appear that Windows is even more error prone is the entire point, that only helps the competitors.

-Tarwn