![]() ![]() Stormcrash: "I hope they add an X server to WSL. This is all interesting yet it does make me wonder how many developers will enjoy having their development system reporting everything they do, every application they use and every other thing that MSFT wants to know about sent home to Redmond? That alone would keep me from using WSL for development just as it is keeping me from running W10. MSFT wants that market but how much of it is trying to reach more developers for their products by enabling a write once distribute anywhere model? I would suspect the only reason is to try to expand the number of apps for their ecosystem, not replacing the development model for the dominant platform. ![]() The comparisons to VS is quite dramatic and not in a good way. Working with multiple systems and distributed work is not effortless but it is definitely much easier than W* will ever be.Īs far as OS X goes, it is the system of choice for iOS. One thing that isn't understood much or even addressed in this article is how completely functional the multi-machine development process is in the Unix/Linux environment. Also Ballmer had pushed the GPL cancer lie to many in the executive suites so using Linux/Unix was only acceptable when they were the underpinning of the business unit. I used to know some that had to develop on it for corporate mandated reasons. I don't know anyone that prefers W* to develop on. He supported the idea of forks of the software that supported Windows, but nothing that would impede development of the core product.Īre Technica readers had a few thoughts of their own to share about Microsoft and Linux:ĭarkness1231: "An interesting take on WSL. Salvatore Sanfilippo, developer of top NoSQL data store redis, has refused to accept patches to make the software run on Windows, not out of any particular hostility towards Microsoft, but because he saw no need for it. The popular node.js environment was born on OS X and Linux, and for a long time could not be effectively run on Windows. Getting Ruby running well is awkward on any platform, but Windows is arguably the worst. Setting up a Ruby development environment on Windows is a wretched experience. It's no great surprise, then, that MySQL proliferated in a way that PostgreSQL didn't.īut things don't work that way any more. PostgreSQL's developers, on the other hand, didn't appear to prioritize any of these things, and while it wasn't impossible to run the database on Windows, doing so meant forfeiting the creature comforts that MySQL offered. It had an easy Windows installer, it had good Windows software for managing databases and writing queries, and it had good ODBC drivers. ![]() In spite of this, MySQL won considerable market- and mind-share because it was a much better development platform. While it is better today than it once was, MySQL has always been regarded as second-best when it comes to important considerations such as technical capabilities and data integrity, with PostgreSQL generally held to be the much better database. A prime example of this is the MySQL database server. This in turn had consequences for software, where solid Windows support could drive server-side usage. There simply wasn't any good alternative. This made Windows the development platform of choice by default. OS X was in its infancy, and only ran on weird, expensive, underpowered PowerPC hardware. Linux was already an important consideration for servers, but on the desktop was even less of a concern than it is today, reserved only for the most hardcore fans. Wind the clock back 15 years and Windows was the only serious platform for software developers. Supporting Linux apps in Windows is a significant move for a company that has spent decades promoting its own APIs and application platform, and it's unlikely that the company would make such a move just to provide a few creature comforts to developers. Microsoft deciding to support Linux software on Windows is a surprising move, and the obvious question is, why? Superficially, the answer is easy - developers like these tools, so supporting them makes developers happy - but the story runs a little deeper than that. ![]()
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