Re: Microsoft toolset vs. ???

["Tracy Nelson" <tnelson@fast.net>]

From: Eugene Sotirescu <eugene@vertical.net>
Subject: Microsoft toolset vs. ???


|>Source Control Technology  = Visual Source Safe

CVS or RCS will work.

|>Project Replication and Deployment Technology = Content Replication Server

?? Not sure how you're using this, rdist might do it.

|>Scripting Technology = VBScript

If you're talking about embedding scripts in a web page, you should be able
to use VBScript, since it's the broswer that handles this.  If you just want
an alternative, there's JScript.

|>Server Object Technology = ASP/Visual Basic DLLs

JavaBeans and/or any of the standard CGI tools like Perl should work here.

|>Relational Database Technology = SQL Server 7

I can only recommend Oracle, because that's the only one I'm familiar with.
When I originally started playing with Linux, it looked like none of the OSS
DB packages were really industrial-strength, but I just checked out the
PostgreSQL home page and it looks better than I remembered.  I can't tell if
it supports triggers or database events, though, and I seriously doubt if it
supports hot backups (which may not be necessary for your application).
Still, if you're creating a commerce-type app, I'd go with a commercial
product like Oracle or Informix (or DB2, if IBM ever decides how to release
it), just for the peace of mind.


|>One of the most impressive features of these tools are their integration
|>(i.e.:  I have a source code browser window embedded in my Visual Basic
|>development environment).

If this is something your friend finds impressive, I doubt that you're going
to sway her/him with OSS stuff.  M$ and Apple have made their fortunes off
of making people feel warm and fuzzy about their computing experience.  Real
productivity is incidental.

|>What toolsets could be assembled completely from non-Microsoft software
that
|>could compete with the feature set, cost,  and integration of these tools?

If you define feature set as "the set of features that fulfill the product
requirements", then you can assemble a toolkit from non-M$ products that
will certainly win on a cost basis.  If your friend just wants to sit in a
IDE and develop software by drag-and-dropping components and writing some
code to link them together, then I don't think there's anything out there
that can compete with Visual Studio and ASP.


Just junk food for thought.
-- Tracy

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