Comments on: Why Microsoft-only development is foolish business logic

By: Michael Chui

Michael Chui — Sat, 17 Sep 2005 00:50:46 +0000

It works fine in Firefox about 90% of the time, and the one time it didn’t, I reloaded (Ctrl+F5) and it worked fine again. I’m guessing it’s a problem with Firefox’s interpretation of CSS… but I’m not knowledgeable enough to know what. Or how to reproduce it.

I’m running Windows XP Pro, Firefox. =P

Actually, being an undergrad looking at prospective industry jobs and internships, I’m utterly shocked by the listed requirements ennumerating a host of MS products. Apparently, I’m supposed to know how to use Outlook, Word, and Access, and usually Excel. It’s not that I don’t, or couldn’t figure it out, but I’ve been using Thunderbird, Firefox, OpenOffice, and MySQL for so long… because they’re FREE… that this just bewilders me.

By: zephoria

zephoria — Sun, 04 Sep 2005 21:38:01 +0000

I’m happy to fix any rendering problems that people are having but i do not see them on Firefox. Please send me screenshots and additional information.

By: Another Mike

Another Mike — Tue, 30 Aug 2005 09:38:24 +0000

“Hmm, very interesting, this page is almost unusable in Firefox because there’s no scrollbar, so the page just kind of “ends” unless you guess that you need to scroll down.”

Huh? Works fine in Firefox for me. Must be your computer that is messed up. What are you running, Windows?

“Software developers venturing into the Mac world have been burned far too many times, far too publicly.”

?!?!? How could Google get “burned” by making a Mac or Linux version of any of their software?? It’s all free! Even in the worst case scenario, they would still lose less money on the Mac or Linux version than on the Windows version, because the original version is always going to cost more to develop than the ported version.

By: Terry Maraccini

Terry Maraccini — Mon, 29 Aug 2005 17:04:55 +0000

Some good points here, but there is a need to dig further. Shipley is right in that in the Windows space there is a tendency to create many “me too” products in hopes of fracturing a Windows share of a given product sector.

As far as developers getting publicly burned by developing for Mac OS, I’s like to see it. Microsoft’s Mac BU is extremely profitable. Intuit’ re-entry into the market only came after others showed profitability in the accounting sector. Ultimately, the competitive nature of software development has been comodditized to the point of limited resources fighting over a fragmented market. Killer apps aren’t dreamed up. They’re deemed compelling enough by end users to have whole industries sprout up in support of their use. iTunes may be the best app for Windows out there.

By: Mike

Mike — Mon, 29 Aug 2005 16:44:33 +0000

Hmm, very interesting, this page is almost unusable in Firefox because there’s no scrollbar, so the page just kind of “ends” unless you guess that you need to scroll down.

The post works wonderfully, however, in Internet Explorer.

That simple fact completely destroys all credibility for this post.

By: paul

paul — Sat, 27 Aug 2005 11:23:36 +0000

Wil Shipley of Delicious Monster fame gave a fantastic talk on why developing software for the Mac makes sense. I didn’t get to see it myself, but he has put the slides and a podcast of his talk online.

A couple of slides on why developing windows software doesn’t make sense for small developers:

Windows users only ever use three apps
Word, IE (for e-mail), and iTunes
* Are you writing those apps?

By: zephoria

zephoria — Fri, 26 Aug 2005 10:45:23 +0000

Seth – sorry! Yes, i saw PCs and was surprised to learn most were running Windows (it required asking to get to that because the visual was just PCs). I didn’t really see Windows PCs but you’re right that i’m not being clear.

Jonathan – in recent years, i’ve gone to many events with the folks who are building the tools, advising the development and otherwise influencing the creation of Web2.0. More and more, they have been using non-Windows which was initially a surprise to me. I was surprised to see people switch back. There are different kinds of influencer crowds. I’m talking about the geek kind here.

aaronb – i’m not claiming that a Mac is more subversive but that it is a direct competitor to Microsoft, unfortunately far more than your concurrent OS machine. I would argue that yours is more resistant to hegemony.

Bill – it’s not just about Mac. It’s about Firefox. It’s about non-MS standards. It’s about supposedly being “open” and developing for one standard, one protocol and helping bury the same properties that Microsoft has been burying for years. It’s a question of alignment and who is actually competing with who. It’s not about a market war but about who is going to set the standards for everything that comes out on the web and on the machines themselves.

By: MSDN Search and Indexing Blog

MSDN Search and Indexing Blog — Thu, 25 Aug 2005 23:25:16 +0000

Filtered Search and Community searches

So this week we worked on the plans to support the move from the standard MSCOM search interface to the…

By: Steve Rhodes

Steve Rhodes — Thu, 25 Aug 2005 22:40:37 +0000

Google isn’t some small developer who might get burned by developing for the mac. It wouldn’t take much of the extra four billion they’ll soon have to hire enough programmers to offer
Earth, Desktop, Talk, and whatever is to come on macs and linux.

It is frankly stupid that the Google Video Viewer doesn’t work on a mac. And short

And contrast

Google Desktop isn’t currently available for Mac OS. Right now we’re putting all of our energy into making Google Desktop the best program we can. We realize that a lot of our users would like us to offer a Mac version, and we may consider this option in the future.

with

Can you tell me more about Google Talk’s commitment to open standards and user choice?

We believe that you should have a choice in how you communicate with your friends, that you shouldn’t have to use one service because that’s where you keep your contacts and other information. We launched free auto-forwarding and POP access for Gmail so our users could take their messages with them and use any service they want, and we’re committed to upholding this idea of user choice for Google Talk as well.

Today, with instant communications, you can’t talk to your contacts or buddies in one service while using another service. We hope to change that. We want to work with other willing service providers to enable their users to communicate directly with Google Talk users. And while we hope many people will use and like the Google Talk client, we’re committed to making it as easy as possible for you to communicate with your friends using the client that you want–even if it doesn’t happen to be ours. That’s why we’re also supporting open standards.

By: Bill Gusky

Bill Gusky — Thu, 25 Aug 2005 15:49:01 +0000

All of your arguments amount to nothing because they drift high above the bottom line. Very few companies develop for Mac because it’s proven to be bad business, period. This isn’t 1996. Software developers venturing into the Mac world have been burned far too many times, far too publicly.

Mac people lost the war for the market a decade ago. It wasn’t even close. You guys really must get over it. You’ve got 3 games, 2 graphics editors and a video editor and that’s all you’re going to get. Now please leave us Windows people alone. We’re cranky because our machines keep crashing and getting viruses.