5 ms·

It's an obvious move to make migration easier for devs. I certainly don't want JSON project files, I just want to be able to take my existing .NET projects as

It's an obvious move to make migration easier for devs. I certainly don't want JSON project files, I just want to be able to take my existing .NET projects as is and build them on Core. The only place I ever want to see JSON is as a response to some client side JavaScript call, that is its only valid use imho, everywhere else it's not as good as the alternatives.

pjmlp 10y ago
Same with me. I like XML, the automated tooling it allows for and never got the point of the XML hate. It was made for tools, not to be written by hand.
- gnaritas 10y ago
  Agree, XML is fantastic and a much better choice than JSON for everything except being parsed by JavaScript. JSON has one use in this world, JavaScript.
  - amarka 10y ago
    Yea well, that's like, your opinion, man.
    - gnaritas 10y ago
      Yes, it is.
- intrasight 10y ago
  "tools" don't always exist or may not be available. So, as with all software, it must be possible to edit the files as text with a good developer experience.
  - pjmlp 10y ago
    Yes, but that should be the exception, not the rule. I think that the hate usually comes from the PDP-11 programming crowd, whose only tools are the CLI and an editor.
    - ubertaco 10y ago
      >Yes, but that should be the exception, not the rule Yeah, like it has been with .NET development on platforms where Visual Studio doesn't exist (read: all of them except Windows). "should be" is a very different creature from "is", and is also very different from "will be". > the hate usually comes from the PDP-11 programming crowd, whose only tools are the CLI and an editor. Also known as "the every other platform except Windows" crowd, which apparently is substantial enough that even the one outlier -- Microsoft -- finally is trying to move in line with the rest of the world by allowing Bash and Linux tools in Windows 10. You can be dismissive all you want, but that doesn't change the reality that CLI+editors are modern development (see also: almost every new language's ecosystem pivoting on CLI tooling and editor plugins), not the past.
      - pjmlp 10y ago
        > Also known as "the every other platform except Windows" crowd I am yet to see iDevices and Android developers being PDP-11 devs or guys doing development on our Fortune 500 customers, regardless of the customer OS.
        ubertaco 10y ago
        Strange, it sure looks like that at Amazon, at Netflix, at McKesson, at Facebook, at....you get the idea But enough empty hot-air "name-dropping"; just cool your bluster, dude. You don't have to get all "look at me I'm better than you, I have all the best words, great words like 'Fortune 500'" just because you don't like CLIs.
    - intrasight 10y ago
      You might be surprised to hear, then, that the vast majority of programmers are in the PDP-11 crowd
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  > It was made for tools, not to be written by hand. ...but people too often end up needing to read or write it by hand. That's the problem with XML. (Well, the other problem is that there is lots of data for which you'd want tooling for which a text-based markup format isn't ideal in the first place.)
  - gnaritas 10y ago
    I don't recall ever having a problem with hand editing XML, how is that the problem with XML?
  - tomc1985 10y ago
    Or the fact that in a lot of XML 90%+ of it is markup?
oblio 10y ago
XML is one thing, MSBuild is another one. It's the only widely used tool where you can't really hand-craft (and therefore fully understand) a complete build file. Compare Maven's pom.xml with a MSBuild file. Both XML, both verbose, but other than that, radically different.
- WorldMaker 10y ago
  There was a (very) brief period where I used a few hand-crafted MSBuild files. I don't remember it being all that bad (other than heavy learning curve) and there were even some things you could do simpler and nicer in a hand-crafted MSBuild file than what you see in Visual Studio's usage of MSBuild and the build files it generates. I think a lot of people's issues with MSBuild are more to do with how Visual Studio uses MSBuild than with MSBuild itself. MSBuild has just about always supported wildcards and deeper incremental and partial build support, but Visual Studio hasn't. A lot of the hoops in hand-crafting an MSBuild file are there mostly if you want to make sure that Visual Studio can open the file...
- gnaritas 10y ago
  Sure, but you have to look at the target audience, existing .Net developers; these devs in large already use MSBuild. They don't want Maven, they want their existing projects and solutions to simply open, build, and work as is. It's hard enough changing OS's, the last thing they want is for all the tools to change as well.
  - oblio 10y ago
    Microsoft is doing this because the .Net developers numbers are most likely dwindling (or at least stagnant, which is just as bad since it means there's not enough young blood coming in). As a result the new solution must also cater to the new recruits they're trying to draw. I doubt many of those would like MSBuild, since it's not even liked by existing .NET devs :)
SideburnsOfDoom 10y ago
> I certainly don't want JSON project files, I personally don't care much if it's XML or json, I just want it to be simpler and easier to use. And the RC1 demos of adding nuget packages by typing 1 readable line into project.json certainly where that.

pjmlp 10y ago

Same with me. I like XML, the automated tooling it allows for and never got the point of the XML hate. It was made for tools, not to be written by hand.

gnaritas 10y ago
Agree, XML is fantastic and a much better choice than JSON for everything except being parsed by JavaScript. JSON has one use in this world, JavaScript.
- amarka 10y ago
  Yea well, that's like, your opinion, man.
  - gnaritas 10y ago
    Yes, it is.
intrasight 10y ago
"tools" don't always exist or may not be available. So, as with all software, it must be possible to edit the files as text with a good developer experience.
- pjmlp 10y ago
  Yes, but that should be the exception, not the rule. I think that the hate usually comes from the PDP-11 programming crowd, whose only tools are the CLI and an editor.
  - ubertaco 10y ago
    >Yes, but that should be the exception, not the rule Yeah, like it has been with .NET development on platforms where Visual Studio doesn't exist (read: all of them except Windows). "should be" is a very different creature from "is", and is also very different from "will be". > the hate usually comes from the PDP-11 programming crowd, whose only tools are the CLI and an editor. Also known as "the every other platform except Windows" crowd, which apparently is substantial enough that even the one outlier -- Microsoft -- finally is trying to move in line with the rest of the world by allowing Bash and Linux tools in Windows 10. You can be dismissive all you want, but that doesn't change the reality that CLI+editors are modern development (see also: almost every new language's ecosystem pivoting on CLI tooling and editor plugins), not the past.
    - pjmlp 10y ago
      > Also known as "the every other platform except Windows" crowd I am yet to see iDevices and Android developers being PDP-11 devs or guys doing development on our Fortune 500 customers, regardless of the customer OS.
      - ubertaco 10y ago
        Strange, it sure looks like that at Amazon, at Netflix, at McKesson, at Facebook, at....you get the idea But enough empty hot-air "name-dropping"; just cool your bluster, dude. You don't have to get all "look at me I'm better than you, I have all the best words, great words like 'Fortune 500'" just because you don't like CLIs.
  - intrasight 10y ago
    You might be surprised to hear, then, that the vast majority of programmers are in the PDP-11 crowd
dragonwriter 10y ago
> It was made for tools, not to be written by hand. ...but people too often end up needing to read or write it by hand. That's the problem with XML. (Well, the other problem is that there is lots of data for which you'd want tooling for which a text-based markup format isn't ideal in the first place.)
- gnaritas 10y ago
  I don't recall ever having a problem with hand editing XML, how is that the problem with XML?
- tomc1985 10y ago
  Or the fact that in a lot of XML 90%+ of it is markup?

oblio 10y ago

XML is one thing, MSBuild is another one. It's the only widely used tool where you can't really hand-craft (and therefore fully understand) a complete build file. Compare Maven's pom.xml with a MSBuild file. Both XML, both verbose, but other than that, radically different.

WorldMaker 10y ago
There was a (very) brief period where I used a few hand-crafted MSBuild files. I don't remember it being all that bad (other than heavy learning curve) and there were even some things you could do simpler and nicer in a hand-crafted MSBuild file than what you see in Visual Studio's usage of MSBuild and the build files it generates. I think a lot of people's issues with MSBuild are more to do with how Visual Studio uses MSBuild than with MSBuild itself. MSBuild has just about always supported wildcards and deeper incremental and partial build support, but Visual Studio hasn't. A lot of the hoops in hand-crafting an MSBuild file are there mostly if you want to make sure that Visual Studio can open the file...
gnaritas 10y ago
Sure, but you have to look at the target audience, existing .Net developers; these devs in large already use MSBuild. They don't want Maven, they want their existing projects and solutions to simply open, build, and work as is. It's hard enough changing OS's, the last thing they want is for all the tools to change as well.
- oblio 10y ago
  Microsoft is doing this because the .Net developers numbers are most likely dwindling (or at least stagnant, which is just as bad since it means there's not enough young blood coming in). As a result the new solution must also cater to the new recruits they're trying to draw. I doubt many of those would like MSBuild, since it's not even liked by existing .NET devs :)

SideburnsOfDoom 10y ago

> I certainly don't want JSON project files, I personally don't care much if it's XML or json, I just want it to be simpler and easier to use. And the RC1 demos of adding nuget packages by typing 1 readable line into project.json certainly where that.