ctodx - All Comments

re: Out from the dark of the lab and into the silver light

Dennis — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 19:57:54 GMT

I also would like to see silverlight work as I have a stake in this for an RIA implementation. But as I currently see the future, silverlight 2.0 has a some major problems with stability. After visiting liquid silverlight, a site that specializes in silverlight controls, it caused my browser to become highly unstable. While the silverlight portion worked, once I navigated to a site away from the silverlight, it caused any external IE window to hang upon creation. The only way to fix it was to reboot the machine. Not even going to task manager to kill the processes fixed the problem. It didn't matter which site you visit after. If the site created a new window, it caused a complete hang on IE after visiting a silverlight site. I did not install any prior versions of silverlight other than version 2 and I am running IE7 currently patched to the latest version. I need something like this to be super stable, and right now we are invested in the .net platform. So even pushing out a small test version of the ria won't do us any good if it causes them to lose work in other parts of their system unrelated to our app. It would be a really hard sell to explain to a customer that the thing we trusted was more like an alpha software versus a beta software.

re: Is .NET too successful?

Paul A. CHEVALIER — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:54:52 GMT

I would just like to add my vote for caution. Microsoft has a long history of floating technology ballons, just to see if anyone uses them. All to often the technology is quickly abandonned and we are left holding the bag (I am still supporting XSL-WD, Microsoft JavaVM and a host of other applications that still work, but all references to the technology have been "disappeared").

This said, ORM is particularly hard and has even been refered to as the "Vietnam of computer science" (see blogs.tedneward.com/.../The+Vietnam+Of+Computer+Science.aspx). All this argues for extreme caution when adopting these competing APIs.

cheers,

dennis.

re: Windows 7 news starts filtering out

richard morris — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 14:17:32 GMT

All Microsoft need do apparently is slap a "Windows 7 - Mohave" sticker on every box of Vista.

re: Installing Visual Studio SP1 wiped out my item templates

Roman Eremin — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 06:45:04 GMT

Alex:

community.devexpress.com/.../201.aspx

re: Installing Visual Studio SP1 wiped out my item templates

Alex Hoffman — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 01:58:00 GMT

I didn't know you took such phone calls from customers - can you let us all know your number please? Who needs customer support queues! :)

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

Mehul Harry (Developer Express) — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 23:29:20 GMT

Interesting take from an MVP who teaches SL: wildermuth.com/.../Silverlight_and_Line_of_Business_Applications

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

Brendon Muck — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 22:07:12 GMT

So much for impressing everyone at the gym with my DX t-shirt.

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

Julian M Bucknall — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 17:10:20 GMT

Brendon: you blew it, man.

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

Brendon Muck — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 16:12:11 GMT

So you're telling me I could have taken 2nd place with my "Hello World!" control?

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

Neal — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:02:27 GMT

No surprise! No one has the time to learn XAML - WPF/SL will be VERY slow to adopt other than by those with too much time on their hands OR have nothing to do other than learn cutting edge "new" technologies. For those running businesses and developing applications today, we don't have time to learn something minimally supported. We are going to focus our time on mature technologies with robust support to get the job done. Granted, MSFT is pushing WPF/SL hard and saying Winforms 2.0 is dead, well, this is bringing back memories of VB6 days and those "data forms" or whatever it was called that never took off! WPF is still 2+ years away from "adoption" and SL has momentum from MSFT's emphasis and probably "commanding direction" from the leadership that everyone "will use this" - but that will be only for those affected internally at MSFT. The rest of the world will remain using what they use now, enjoying .NET 3.5 and Winforms/Webforms.

My $.02 on the matter.

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

Geoff Davis — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 08:25:44 GMT

Wow, I'm gobsmacked. What an eye openner... I suppose the only reason as to why I won't use Silverlight is because of SEO, I just wish this could be easy to do.

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

Rollie Claro — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 05:53:54 GMT

IMO, nobody is interested.

take look at WPF, it has been in the market since last year. does anyone care to write apps under this technology? i guess a handful. devex even cannot write a set of controls for WPF.

now silverlight? common.

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

Doug Leadley — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 04:37:28 GMT

Even with the contest open to only US citizens, that should be a large enough demographic to get participation, so I would reject item one as being a root cause of the issue.

re: Silverlight Control Builder Contest '08 complete

CESAR F. QüEB — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 03:22:30 GMT

Yeah!.. the point of discord was that contest was open only for US citizens. Many people was not agreement with this rule.

Regards

re: Is .NET too successful?

Garth Henderson — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 00:12:01 GMT

Aloha Julian,

Very good topic. I vote that “. . . we be more cautious, and test the waters a little with some experimental products before jumping in . . . “

My recommendation is that we help to constrain the “multiheaded hydra” by clearly identifying the scope and goals of DevExpress with a listing of the selected group of .NET technologies that best align with our community goals. There are many strong and worthwhile .NET concepts and technologies that DevExpress aligns with. Based on the DevExpress technology foundation (and the support of a few brief white papers) the wisdom of the DevExpress direction should naturally be self-evident to discerning developers.

As commercial developers we require a stable programming environment with thoughtfully controlled improvements that continually increase our revenue stream.

Logically, it makes a lot of sense for MS to apply the thousands of experienced Dynamics employees to “eat their own dog food” in writing a pure .NET business application. Dynamics set this target a few years ago as Project Green to consolidate the four Dynamics legacy products (most written in the ‘80s) into a single .NET product. The success of their professional product will prove the validity of a comprehensive environment for scalable business applications. To date, Dynamics is using .NET much the same way that IBM has been using Java to front end legacy RPG and COBOL applications.

The continuance of a small team, sophomoric, piecemeal approach to .NET enhancements, as David Worthington’s article points out, doesn’t serve the best interests of our global business community. A clear big picture architectural approach is needed.

We need improvement. Change without improvement is counterproductive.

Thanks,

Garth