[MLUG] choosing a technology platform (was: Job opportunity)

[Michael <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

Does anyone else get annoyed at the 'feature creep' of what businesses 
want? A lot of smaller businesses must really buy into buzz words. First 
everyone HAD to write everything in Java. Now everyone has to write 
everything with .NET and C#. It's no wonder so many businesses do so 
poorly with their IT needs if they can't even stick to one proven 
programming platform for more than one project cycle. IMO Java and Linux 
are just now getting to the stage of maturity where I'd consider them 
for serious projects if I was a business. .NET is at least another eight 
or nine years away from the same kind of maturity. If a technology lasts 
a decade and moves beyond buzz words then you can put a little trust 
into it.9

Then you get businesses on the other end of things that refuse to stop 
using Fortran and COBOL. For code that 'just works' that might be okay 
but I'd imagine that in most cases there are none of the original 
programmers still working on that code base. A rewrite would be useful 
just so that the new group of programmers you have can really learn what 
the code is doing. Translating it to a new language every couple decades 
ensures that future programmers you hire will still be able to 
understand what the code does and that you can enjoy the benefits of 
newer technology. C is a pretty safe bet as a language to use. It's been 
around a long time and promises to be around a lot longer. I'd probably 
consider rewriting those old apps in a combination of C and some sort of 
scripting language that's been around for a long time. Scheme, Tcl, or 
Python would work well. Possibly Javascript. All of which are easily 
tied into a C program.

--
Michael <EMAIL:PROTECTED>
http://kavlon.org

_______________________________________________
members mailing list
EMAIL:PROTECTED
http://mlug.missouri.edu/mailman/listinfo/members