Check, buddy... this ones for you.
A few years ago I argued with Check that .NET was the superior development platform by comparison to LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP)... and that's before I knew that MySQL doesn't even support stored procedures! Check kept arguing that it was free, and counted on all the cheapskates out there businesses to prefer the LAMP platform because of cost and scalability. It didn't matter that .NET was a superior product. Check, in fact is a VB.NET programmer. However, at night he turns into a LAMP jockey, his blog is even b2Evolution - definitely LAMP-based. What's worse is that he recently ranted to me about just how bad that software is under the covers! <shiver> Evil! How could you go back to LAMP every night once you've used .NET? It's like driving a Ford after driving a Lexus. Then again, he does drive a Ford... and I do drive a Lexus. ;)
I countered with a plan for Microsoft to put .NET ahead of the inferior (in many cases) LAMP platform alternative:
- Make a free edition of Visual Studio
- Make a free edition of SQL Server
make IIS robust and scalable so it can support multiple small sites (with easy partitioning for customers)
- Create a cheap edition of windows so that Host Providers could easily deploy the technology to their customers.
I never told anyone; but I suspected Microsoft would eventually make it happen. They had to because the *inferior technologies* were all the rage. In fact it was rare you could find an ASP.NET hoster; but you could easily find a PHP hoster. Well Microsoft figured it out, and here is what they're up to:
- Visual Studio 2005 Express is now FREE - or at least Joe Wilcox at Jupiter Media thinks it will be
- SQL Server 2005 Express is now FREE
- IIS6 introduced application pools making it easier to isolate sites
- IIS7 is going to be easier to deploy - because the IIS metabase is disappearing in favor of a completely XML configuration system (allowing configuration backup and migration between servers)
- Windows 2003 Web Edition is the cheapest edition of Windows YET
- Microsoft now has a Web Hoster Program to address the needs of ISPs/Web Hosters
There's only one thing else you might be wondering: Will SQL Server 2005 Express run on Windows Server 2003 Web Edition? YES. That's another nail in the coffin of the ASP3/Access-like LAMP.
For the LAMP guys; turn out the black-light before you leave the industry. Heh.
