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From the "What to write" article: This means you need to playtest the tutorial under all sorts of different circumstances, making sure that it always works (ev

by arohner 16y ago

From the "What to write" article: This means you need to playtest the tutorial under all sorts of different circumstances, making sure that it always works (even on Windows) Just a little offhand comment. MSFT is totally screwed when this is the average developer's mindset. We were always so worried about 'Linux being ready for the desktop' that nobody noticed that Mac & Linux have owned the developer desktop for years, long enough for the author's comment to be not even noteworthy.

GeneralMaximus 16y ago
I usually have to struggle to make things work on Windows. I have a friend -- an electronics hacker -- who insists on using Windows for everything. He recently wanted to play with a couple of web frameworks so he could pick one for a website he's building for an early stage startup. Getting him set up with Symfony and Rails was crazy. Now I fear the day he might want me to set up Django or Pylons :( I once tried to set up a decent development environment for myself on Windows 7. Needless to say, I failed. Windows is excellent for .NET development (VS has no competition), but for anything else you're better off with a decent UNIX.
- mseebach 16y ago
  If he insists on using Windows, you should insist on installing VMware. Or, at the very least, Cygwin.
- tomjen3 16y ago
  Almost, but not quite. Java (with eclipse) is actually better on windows, but for most of the other languages it is not.
- technomancy 16y ago
  > I usually have to struggle to make things work on Windows. My strategy for this has been to start with a "any Windows support is entirely accidental" approach, and then once someone steps forward to fix it place them in charge of Windows compatibility. There are never very many Windows users who are actually interested in helping though, especially compared to the number who complain about it not working.
cheriot 16y ago
We just bought a half dozen MacBookPros so the QA team would be on something the Dev team could write automated testing tools for. After seeing how much time we had been wasting on Windows, when we finally asked for the switch, management didn't even flinch. You could say it was a cost saving measure.

by arohner 16y ago

GeneralMaximus 16y ago

I usually have to struggle to make things work on Windows. I have a friend -- an electronics hacker -- who insists on using Windows for everything. He recently wanted to play with a couple of web frameworks so he could pick one for a website he's building for an early stage startup. Getting him set up with Symfony and Rails was crazy. Now I fear the day he might want me to set up Django or Pylons :( I once tried to set up a decent development environment for myself on Windows 7. Needless to say, I failed. Windows is excellent for .NET development (VS has no competition), but for anything else you're better off with a decent UNIX.

mseebach 16y ago
If he insists on using Windows, you should insist on installing VMware. Or, at the very least, Cygwin.
tomjen3 16y ago
Almost, but not quite. Java (with eclipse) is actually better on windows, but for most of the other languages it is not.
technomancy 16y ago
> I usually have to struggle to make things work on Windows. My strategy for this has been to start with a "any Windows support is entirely accidental" approach, and then once someone steps forward to fix it place them in charge of Windows compatibility. There are never very many Windows users who are actually interested in helping though, especially compared to the number who complain about it not working.

cheriot 16y ago

We just bought a half dozen MacBookPros so the QA team would be on something the Dev team could write automated testing tools for. After seeing how much time we had been wasting on Windows, when we finally asked for the switch, management didn't even flinch. You could say it was a cost saving measure.