O/R Mapping Tools for .NET RSS

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  thona

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  Re: O/R Mapping Tools for .NET

  Dec 13, 2003 09:28 AM|LINK

  ::Unless I'm missing something, Microsoft can compete in the O/R space. Oh, they can COMPETE. They just must make sure (due to laws in place) that there is a place for COMPETITION. ::The only thing is they are adding their tool to an IDE. This is wrong. They add the tool not the the IDE (costing money), but to a free giveaway (the .NET framework). This means they do NOT enter into competition, but basically use their power of monopole (to distribute the .NET framework on windows) to also push ObjectSapces out to the end user. And then they dont ask for money to recover their costs (for creating and supporting ObjectSpaces) but they subsidize this cost. Both parts are NOT "entering competition", but are "stopping competition from developping". If they would want to enter competition they would: * Make ObjectSpaces separate from the .NET framework as download, so that it is not automatically vailable. * Have a busines model to recover their costs of developing and maintaining it. This COULD be done by merging it into Visual Studio (which not everyone uses) and putting the budget out into the VS.NET budget. This thing is getting even more interesting because ObjectSpaces is sitting on top of ADO.NET and there is nothing IN the framework using ObjectSpaces. There would be no associated loss in functionality besides ObjectSpaces from unbundling ObjectSpaces (not like Internet Explorer which is used internally in help system). There is technically no need to bundle ObjectSpaces into the .NET framework download. On top of this, though, this does give them certain technial advantages (like they run an installer in a hosting environment which we can not do) which make certain things much harder for us (as in: getting the web hoster running our installer - XCopy only has certain limitations). Right now the fact is that in most countries you are not allowed to give your product away for free in order to drive a competitor out of business. Especially not in an environment where you control the market. If you come up with the Netscape ./. Internet Explorer sample, btw., it was questioned whether Netscape was ever a product (just putting a pricetag onto something does not mean you seriously sell it - way most Netscpae licenses were used for free). And STILL the finding of facts was that MS abused their monopole.
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  ericlandes

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  Re: O/R Mapping Tools for .NET

  Dec 15, 2003 01:07 PM|LINK

  Thomas, Thanks for the comprehensive explanation. This makes much more sense, and while I don't know that I agree with your interpretation, you do have some valid points. I am sure Microsoft has another explanation that is a little different that yours, which I've not heard yet. But I would imagine your product has a large leap on at least the functionality of Microsofts, which gives you a huge advantage (given Microsofts history of realease 1's). So perhaps you can use that to become the premium choice of .NET O/R mappers. Eric L.
  Eric Landes
  
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