Re:Leaving .Net
by kenjackson on Wednesday December 15, 2010 @12:58PM
(#2009030)
but having to choose between 2 similar products, going with the one that's open-source is a no-brainer in most cases.
Is it? First, you have to define "similar".
Would you rather have Quake (open source) or Black Ops? Both shooters with zombie like monsters.
Is MySQL the same as the SQL Server? Sure, to the uninitiated they look the same, but there are lots of little differences that, depending on your goals, can make one vastly more valuable than the other.
Would you prefer Mono or the CLR? While Mono has an enthusiastic and strong dev community, I bet dollars to donuts that even among informed devs, most would chose the CLR for the job at hand. And I bet even among informed CIOs they'd prefer the CLR for their shops.
OpenOffice Calc or Excel? Again, depending on your usage scenario, there are things you can do in Excel that simply aren't there in a reasonable way in Calc, although again, to the unitiated they're both spreadsheets.
My point? You rarely have the option of choosing between a closed source version and open source version of identical products. What you do tend to do is to look at two (or more products) and figure out what addresses your need the most, with open source being one of many metrics. When I decide which spreadsheet for my org to use, of course we consider OpenOffice, but the fact that it is open source has very little impact on our decision. The probability of us fixing a bug in OpenOffice is about equal to the chance that the bug fixes it self through the right sequence of bits being affected by cosmic ray. But maybe for you the fact that you can go and implement missing features in OpenOffice is important.
Is it? First, you have to define "similar".
Would you rather have Quake (open source) or Black Ops? Both shooters with zombie like monsters.
Is MySQL the same as the SQL Server? Sure, to the uninitiated they look the same, but there are lots of little differences that, depending on your goals, can make one vastly more valuable than the other.
Would you prefer Mono or the CLR? While Mono has an enthusiastic and strong dev community, I bet dollars to donuts that even among informed devs, most would chose the CLR for the job at hand. And I bet even among informed CIOs they'd prefer the CLR for their shops.
OpenOffice Calc or Excel? Again, depending on your usage scenario, there are things you can do in Excel that simply aren't there in a reasonable way in Calc, although again, to the unitiated they're both spreadsheets.
My point? You rarely have the option of choosing between a closed source version and open source version of identical products. What you do tend to do is to look at two (or more products) and figure out what addresses your need the most, with open source being one of many metrics. When I decide which spreadsheet for my org to use, of course we consider OpenOffice, but the fact that it is open source has very little impact on our decision. The probability of us fixing a bug in OpenOffice is about equal to the chance that the bug fixes it self through the right sequence of bits being affected by cosmic ray. But maybe for you the fact that you can go and implement missing features in OpenOffice is important.