5 ms·

Why is supporting .NET evil?

mikewarot 5y ago
It locks you in to Microsoft (or it did back then), it's unnecessary. It serves no actual purpose, other than to support that lockin. A win32 exe will run on Windows 95 through Windows 10, for the most part. You don't need .NET for that to happen. It's a trap, in other words.
- timomax2 5y ago
  C# is what python programmers wish they had.
  - CodeGlitch 5y ago
    As a Python programmer I completely agree. Only last week I started to look into C# and the cross platform capabilities. I have to say it looks really good these days. Wish I learnt C# years ago now...
- binarynate 5y ago
  Microsoft's .NET runtime and C# compiler have been open source and cross platform for a long time now. Even before then, MS published ECMA standards for .NET and C# since the beginning, and the Mono runtime and compiler for C# have been open source and cross platform since the early 2000s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software)#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software)#History
  - aninteger 5y ago
    Yes, of course this is true but the tooling ecosystem still hasn't made great strides over to Linux. Rider does exist but is not open source. As far as I know the debugger is not open source as well.
    - WalterGR 5y ago
      So much goalpost moving.
    - keithnz 5y ago
      you can do a lot of it with vscode and the CLI. Lots of the other tools probably won't be taken to linux, but mostly you don't really need them, all the non windows specific stuff is pretty well supported across platforms
    - kingcharles 5y ago
      https://vscode.dev/ https://vscode.dev/
    - MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago
- smackeyacky 5y ago
  It's biggest competitor (Java) has exactly the same ownership issues. C# and .NET Core in particular give me the ability to deploy server or utility software on pretty much anything. You can build a completely self contained executable which is fantastic for deploying software on machines where you can't control the infrastructure. So, sort of the opposite of lock in.
  - kaba0 5y ago
    Java has multiple independent implementations of the JVM spec, so while I don’t think there is any danger in either choice, java is strictly better in this regard.
- miffy900 5y ago
  > It's a trap, in other words. Usually with a trap, there's typically some sort of follow-through. Let's say I fell for Microsoft's .NET trap 10 years ago. What did Microsoft do, now that they trapped me? 1. Ported .NET to Linux and MacOS with .NET Core. 2. Rebranded the formerly paid-for standard edition of Visual Studio as the Community edition and gave it away for free, even for commercial use so long as your business revenue was below $1mill. 3. Completely open-sourced the .NET Core runtime, base class libraries, JIT and C#/VB.NET compilers. 4. Also open-sourced formerly closed tech like WPF, WinForms, ASP.NET. Every new project now is just an open source project on github, like github.com/dotnet/machinelearning or example. In a way, Microsoft still is trying to lock me into continuing to be a .NET developer - by just treating the platform and its developers really well. Gee, such a wild thought to think that maybe companies can change over time?
  - Clubber 5y ago
    I'm trapped in the MS ecosystem hacking C# on an M1 Mac and deploying on Debian. Oh wait.

It locks you in to Microsoft (or it did back then), it's unnecessary. It serves no actual purpose, other than to support that lockin. A win32 exe will run on Windows 95 through Windows 10, for the most part. You don't need .NET for that to happen. It's a trap, in other words.

timomax2 5y ago
C# is what python programmers wish they had.
- CodeGlitch 5y ago
  As a Python programmer I completely agree. Only last week I started to look into C# and the cross platform capabilities. I have to say it looks really good these days. Wish I learnt C# years ago now...
binarynate 5y ago
Microsoft's .NET runtime and C# compiler have been open source and cross platform for a long time now. Even before then, MS published ECMA standards for .NET and C# since the beginning, and the Mono runtime and compiler for C# have been open source and cross platform since the early 2000s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software)#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software)#History
- aninteger 5y ago
  Yes, of course this is true but the tooling ecosystem still hasn't made great strides over to Linux. Rider does exist but is not open source. As far as I know the debugger is not open source as well.
  - WalterGR 5y ago
    So much goalpost moving.
  - keithnz 5y ago
    you can do a lot of it with vscode and the CLI. Lots of the other tools probably won't be taken to linux, but mostly you don't really need them, all the non windows specific stuff is pretty well supported across platforms
  - kingcharles 5y ago
    https://vscode.dev/ https://vscode.dev/
  - MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago
smackeyacky 5y ago
It's biggest competitor (Java) has exactly the same ownership issues. C# and .NET Core in particular give me the ability to deploy server or utility software on pretty much anything. You can build a completely self contained executable which is fantastic for deploying software on machines where you can't control the infrastructure. So, sort of the opposite of lock in.
- kaba0 5y ago
  Java has multiple independent implementations of the JVM spec, so while I don’t think there is any danger in either choice, java is strictly better in this regard.
miffy900 5y ago
> It's a trap, in other words. Usually with a trap, there's typically some sort of follow-through. Let's say I fell for Microsoft's .NET trap 10 years ago. What did Microsoft do, now that they trapped me? 1. Ported .NET to Linux and MacOS with .NET Core. 2. Rebranded the formerly paid-for standard edition of Visual Studio as the Community edition and gave it away for free, even for commercial use so long as your business revenue was below $1mill. 3. Completely open-sourced the .NET Core runtime, base class libraries, JIT and C#/VB.NET compilers. 4. Also open-sourced formerly closed tech like WPF, WinForms, ASP.NET. Every new project now is just an open source project on github, like github.com/dotnet/machinelearning or example. In a way, Microsoft still is trying to lock me into continuing to be a .NET developer - by just treating the platform and its developers really well. Gee, such a wild thought to think that maybe companies can change over time?
- Clubber 5y ago
  I'm trapped in the MS ecosystem hacking C# on an M1 Mac and deploying on Debian. Oh wait.