On APIs and losing an API war
Of course, I can't keep my mouth shut on Joel's latest rant How Microsoft Lost the API War.
Joel, keep in mind that there are lots of applications out there used by millions of customers which won't migrate to the web any time soon.
Do you really think Adobe, Autodesk, Microsoft, Lotus, Quark (just to name a few) will move their vastly successful rich-client applications to .NET/WinFX/... in the foreseeable future? Think again. Most likely, they will stick with their tools and technologies and APIs as long as possible. Which are based (way down in the systems where rubber meets road) Win32 on Microsoft Windows. And Carbon on MacOS.
Win32/MFC/COM etc. won't go away for a very long time. I agree, it has become an unholy mess. But we gotta deal with this mess.
A more interesting discussion on APIs would be: How do we marry existing application ecosystems, plug-in architectures and APIs with new technologies like .NET, scripting languages, ..insert-your-favorite-technology-here...?
For example, how do we enable an AutoCAD plug-in developer to take advantage of the productivity gains found in .NET?
Uhm, on a second thought, let me rephrase my example: How do we enable a VectorWorks plug-in developer to take advantage of the productivity gains found in .NET or Cocoa? :-)
Wer hat eigentlich die Zeit, so lange Rants wie den von Joel zu lesen? Das ist ja unglaublich. Ich muß was arbeiten, und Anton hat auch schon wieder Hunger.
Aber mal im Ernst: Was soll leading edge? Unser Markt ist so langsam, daß wir in 5 Jahren mehr drüber wissen, wie wir .NET in VWI integrieren.
Joel ist da, glaube ich, etwas hysterisch. Technologie ist doch nur Mittel zum Zweck.
Richtig, aber in einer managed-code Umgebung zu arbeiten würde viele Dinge auch in der Plug-in Entwicklung wesentlich vereinfachen. Ich sage nur GC.