Microsoft .NET Core update asks developers: How you doin'? Microsoft has released RC2 (Release Candidate 2) of .NET Core and ASP.NET Core, the next-generation version of the .NET platform which is open source and cross-platform. This is a bigger update than the RC2 name implies. Since the release of RC1 in November, Microsoft has introduced new command-line tools for .NET Core, called …
> If it is truely open source, how long before someone releases it with the default to no spying \w telemetry?
It may be 'open source', but that not mean that it includes a licence enabling anyone to modify the source, recompile it or distribute it. Nor, indeed, does it necessarily allow any of that source to be used in other products or derivative works.
I get that The Reg isn't the best place to get a fair and honest answer to this, but how many people might consider running .Net on any platform other than Windows (yes, yes, MS=evil, why would I cripple etc etc etc)?
I'm a C# dev, very comfortable with the language and .Net framework programming, but have more than a passing familiarity with Linux or OS/X. Conversely, I guess most Linux or OS/X devs don't know much about .Net? Then again, Mono had a reasonably successful business model merging the two. Just wondering what the market is, really...
I think it's reasonable - if it works. C# is a nice language, .net is a consistent framework if you avoid the new stuff. Linux is a cheap and stable platform, and can be lightweight in the right circumstances.
But like you say, lots of ill feeling in some parts of the Linux world.
"But like you say, lots of ill feeling in some parts of the Linux world."
yes.
I don't like '.Not's bass-ackwards way of doing things, being inefficient among other stuff. CAIRO, OpenGL, and other standard graphics libraries have been around for quite a while in the open source world, to abstract graphics from the display surface or OS. But they're not "Microsoft's Creation". Same with whatever ELSE ".Not" might do 'for you'. Poorly.
The _ONLY_ reason '.Not Core' would exist is for Microsoft to "leverage" every non-Windows operating system too, like the way they build TELEMETRY into it and require "opt out" to get rid of it. "Their fingers in EVERYTHING" in other words.
A few years ago a single 'Mono' "app" [tomboy] was added to the default Gnome 2 install. HOWLS ensued. *NOBODY* WANTED to haul in the 'mono'-lithic pile of CRAP that was needed to support THAT! ONE! APPLICATION! [one I don't even use]. It was subsequently REMOVED and eventually replaced with something that did NOT have a "mono" dependency.
I doubt ".Not Core" will be any BETTER than mono. More ginormous monolithic inefficient libraries, I'm sure.
I'll stick with gtk, qt, or native X11 coding thanks, or use something like wxWidgets which can be adapted from an MFC C++ application with some effort. [gtk and Qt and wxWidgets are _ALREADY_ cross-platform, too!]
".NOT," really? I'm surprised you didn't use the "M$" moniker. 2002 called, they want their sick burns back. SCO rulez!
All kidding aside, I'd write C# for Linux. It's free, so the client doesn't have to pay the OS license. It's a pretty good language, I've made a ton of money off of it.
"But like you say, lots of ill feeling in some parts of the Linux world."
Indeed. Let me explain what happens out of the UK (maybe it is different in the UK... don't know).
The bad feelings will stop the day M$ (and the hardware vendors) will end the racketeering: forcing you to buy their software whenever you buy a PC, even if you never intend running any of M$ crapware on said PC.
That is illegal in France (bound-sales law) but do you think the (corrupt) government cares to have this law respected? And sure, as it is illegal, you can sue and you are (almost) certain to win, but why bother the trouble for 100€! So they continue, knowing they will have to pay for 1 on 100 000 sales (the 1 that took the trouble going to court) for the licence + attorney fees, since this proportion ensure they still get a comfortable benefit from the 99 999 that didn't get to court!
All that disgusts me.
I like Free (as in Free Speech) Software. I also understand that some people like M$ products, as some like Apple, and are ready to pay for that. As I believe in Freedom, I have no objection if people fancy spending their own money with M$: after all it's their own money, they use it as they see fit (as long as it is not illegal). But in return, I will like the Freedom NOT to spend my money with M$ when I buy a PC. [For Apple it is easy: I don't buy their machines!]
Fortunately, the end of the racketeering might come soon: when they move to an "as a service" model and everyone stuck with them will have to pay a monthly fee. This day I'll probably laugh from dawn to dusk! And after this good laugh, we will count all those trying to get out of the trap.
Till then, I keep away from anything M$ related, even if it is labelled "Open Source".
Also, as some other readers commented wisely, why on earth would you like to run a .Net based software on other platforms that W$. So in fact, even if it is "Open Source" you still need a proprietary O.S. to run it, which mostly nullifies the "Open Sourcing" of this framework.
P.S.: for those who are shocked, of course, I'll stop writing M$ and W$ instantly the day the racketeering ends!
I built a communications platform on C#/Mono/Linux, and it's been running 7+ years by a couple of companies that are household names in the UK.
I also wrote a C#/Mono app, that ran on an Android embedded hardware device, that shipped across the globe.
And right now, one of the biggest global courier companies, is evaluating a C# Android (Xamarin) app I put together, with C# Linux backend.
For years, people told me I was mad to use C# over Java, as Microsoft were going to sue me or my customers.
So, yeah, very comfortable. Thanks MS. Up yours Oracle.
It would take something extraordinary for me to consider using this stuff in my commercial Linux development work. Several reasons:
1. I have zero trust in Microsoft regarding sometime in the future tweaking this into a patent trap.
2. I have zero trust in them continuing to support any programming technology long-term.
3. I have zero trust in them not going after my customers for license / patent reparations, if I use this stuff in my commercial products.
Microsoft has repeatedly demonstrated that they're a trustworthy business partner in one and only one area of technology: they make decent mice.
@Ian 7 - "Then again, Mono had a reasonably successful business model merging the two. Just wondering what the market is, really..."
Outside of two niches (Xamarin's mobile business, and Unity 3D games), Mono flopped despite the rivers of money that Novel poured into it. Very few server or desktop programs were ever developed using Mono, and all of the well known ones appear to be abandoned or dead for several years now.
The niche that C# fills on Windows is taken by Java, Python, Ruby, Go, PHP, or Node.js on Linux. There is really nothing particularly compelling about Dotnet or C# which would attract existing Linux developers to switch to it.
The one market which it might fill is with existing Windows developers who want to port their existing software to Linux. Novel pissed away a fortune on Mono pursuing that goal, with noting to show for it in the end. That's why when Novel got acquired, the new owners binned Mono.
Will DotNet Core succeed where Mono failed? I wouldn't want to bet my own money on it. I guess it comes down to whether or not you think there will be shed loads of software companies abandoning Windows wholesale.
Personally, I doubt it. What I tend to see is that new companies with new products addressing new needs (or existing needs in new ways) develop software for Linux using the languages and tools which are well established there already. They tap into the existing community and environment. Companies which have Windows-only products rarely bother porting them to Linux. they just continue to sell it to existing customers.
Or to put it another way, Windows is the new mainframe, and C# is the new COBOL. Have a look at history to see what happened there.
"Novel pissed away a fortune on Mono pursuing that goal"
Now here is an admission, I worked (well shambled about) for Novel on the support boards for a while and: I saw that they were good in the biblical sense.
Me having used Linux for more than a decade.
Then after the SCO business (look it up links everywhere about MS , Oracle, Money) try Groklaw.
I still run Open Suse Tumbleweed and I like it, try my best to report stuff but being an old f*rt the old brain don't work so well, do not do windows at all except for people bringing the infected machine to me, their choice, or not knowing about alternatives, but when they see my set-up running from a mere laptop on multiple screens with (yes) wobbly windows and all that (because I like it that way) and after explaining that it is not Windows but it does for me in normal life then some of them have asked to try it, funny that they have not come back!!!! seem to have done myself out of income there, not that I am bothered they at least are a bit more secure than other people and understand the system more.
A Welsh Fart.
I used .NET some 10 years ago, before I moved to writing other things mostly on Linux. Even in early versions, it showed more promise than the rat's nest called PHP. It will be welcome addition to web platforms available on Linux. Yes there is plenty already, but they all have their faults (of course, .NET has different faults, so there is something for everyone).
I am referring to ASP.NET Core running on .NET Core and I am aware of the difference.
I can see that C# and .NET have very nice concepts.
But I stay away because:
- it _is_ a MS buy-in, "open-source" is just a label here (and this again proves it)
- MS has screwed up things too often, and there is no evidence they won't in this case
- I see a lot of "C# experts" who don't understand the technical details of their systems
Reminds me of snap-ins, where you buy a GUI (eg the Microsoft Management Console (MMC)) and in order to create anything usefully, have to pay piecemeal for the actual components. Under .NET Core of course using these components doesn't exactly make your code cross platform, as the code will not run natively on the foreign platform without the presence of .NET Core, either resident on the native OS or compiled into the application. Even then you need to compile a different version for either Linux or Mac. Not exactly write-once-run-anywhere. Deciding to move your own code to a third party platform would also be an impossible and hugely expensive undertaking. Selling this a cross platform is a bit disingenuous don't you think?
Is that screenshot really how Microsoft renders fonts nowadays? Because I remember the Windows 3.1 TrueType font engine shipping with better fonts than this.
My first thought was that Microsoft wants all your applications to be ugly. But then I corrected myself: Microsoft wants all your applications to be as ugly as theirs. My feelings about Microsoft are changing from active dislike and avoidance to dislike, bafflement and finally avoidance. Perhaps this is SatNad's new customer focussed approach. But who knows?
Man....still all this hatred against Microsoft (or M$ how some people still living in the pre Y2K-era would refer to them)!?
1. Depending on platform-specific .NET Core components cannot be called 'multi-platform' now? So there are different rules for MS technologies then? Because that's exactly what Java has been doing for 20+ years....
2. MS putting all open-source code, with the right license (MIT) publicly on GitHub still isn't enough 'open-source' for you, even though that's exactly the same as the gazillion other open-source are doing?
'But MS will come after you in the future...!' --> really, so this would actually mean that the MIT/GPL licenses are no good, meaning that all other open-source software might face this same issue....well....don't think so.
3. 'MS might change this technology in the future'. Yes, it might, and luckily they do. This is called innovation (and also partly economics :-) ), and this is what other open-source products are also doing...(Angular 2, iOS X,...) If they didn't we'd all still be using Windows or Linux 1.0, bcs they were already bloody infinitely perfect....
4. 'Why did they need to invent their own graphics library...', 'why did they need to invent their own crypto library...'. Well, they could also throw several open-source projects together and release their own 'Java' or 'Linux' or whatever. Why did someone make Cairo, while there already were several other open-source graphics libraries????
5. MS cannot make deals with hardware vendors for pakaging their OS? Even though most 'regular' people still prefer the Windows OS for desktops? Even though Apple is basically doing the same, only difference is they limit their OS on their hardware, and limiting their hardware to only run their OS (bare-metal). If you pay for their Parallels virtualization you are allowed to run windows too....
6. Microsoft is charging for their software. Yap, commercial entities to this. Red Hat is also charging for theirs. A lot!! like 600k€ a year for support for some servers running BRMS. For which support has been dropped one year after release!!!! But I guess this is ok since they are a truely open-source company (ahum!)
Please wake up to reality....
+1 and agree with you, except...
>MS might change this technology in the future
Well, yes and this has been a problem with MS in the recent past. Lots of their tech gets spouted off as the next big thing and then they lose interest/switch to another thing. Silverlight being one of many examples.
For the rest, I'd be somewhat inclined to go along with you and give them the benefit of the doubt. But they have a tendency to clean-slate their tech at a rate most open source companies/projects would find totally incompatible with keeping credibility. Angular 2.x vs 1.x compatibility (nasty) is one thing, but MS is more like 3 doesn't work on 2 which doesn't work on 1. Across multiple product lines.
So, yes, if you are inclined to do so, keep an open mind about them, but let's not forget that their recent abandonware attitude is a real risk for those making long term bets. Hopefully they will wake up to that and be more careful about commitments, but in the meantime I'd be cautious.
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