Comments on: Get Thee Behind Me, Microsoft! http://www.suicidebots.com/2006/12/14/get-thee-behind-me-microsoft/ Thu, 04 Dec 2008 01:08:54 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.3 By: Ian http://www.suicidebots.com/2006/12/14/get-thee-behind-me-microsoft/#comment-407 Ian Mon, 18 Dec 2006 05:03:03 +0000 http://www.suicidebots.com/2006/12/14/get-thee-behind-me-microsoft/#comment-407 Well ... I'll give you that the Visual Studio environment can be overcomplicated at times ... but as someone who works regularly in it AND who has taught functional computer programming at the Jr. High and High School level, I'll say that it's really not as ugly as you're making it out to be. Visual Studio is geared strongly towards a specific kind of developer - the professional corporate software developer. For the hobbyist, it's way overkill; for the operating system or game developer, it's way too dumbed down. But MS isn't stupid; for the majority of coders in the world (which is, sadly, those working on corporate intranets and the like), it fits the bill nicely. In any event, it's far from the "Roach Motel of development hell" - at least, anything .NET and onward (I'll agree with you, Visual Basic 6.0 can rot in Hades for all I care). In fact, the .NET framework and dev environment are relatively elegant, from a coder's point of view. That said, I haven't used the robotics stuff with it, and I'd be surprised if it catches on (because, again, the people most familiar with MS dev aren't usually those inclined to build robots). Well … I’ll give you that the Visual Studio environment can be overcomplicated at times … but as someone who works regularly in it AND who has taught functional computer programming at the Jr. High and High School level, I’ll say that it’s really not as ugly as you’re making it out to be. Visual Studio is geared strongly towards a specific kind of developer - the professional corporate software developer. For the hobbyist, it’s way overkill; for the operating system or game developer, it’s way too dumbed down. But MS isn’t stupid; for the majority of coders in the world (which is, sadly, those working on corporate intranets and the like), it fits the bill nicely. In any event, it’s far from the “Roach Motel of development hell” - at least, anything .NET and onward (I’ll agree with you, Visual Basic 6.0 can rot in Hades for all I care). In fact, the .NET framework and dev environment are relatively elegant, from a coder’s point of view.

That said, I haven’t used the robotics stuff with it, and I’d be surprised if it catches on (because, again, the people most familiar with MS dev aren’t usually those inclined to build robots).

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