[XML-DEV Mailing List Archive Home] [By Thread] [By Date] [Recent Entries] [Reply To This Message] Re: Steve Ballmer is cracking up
Let's put this into context... even during the days of the Browser Wars, Microsoft engineers internally fought over XML, whether to use it and whether it could be avoided with existing technology. Was XML really new or was it an old sheep dressed in new wolf's clothing? After many intense battles, the XML proponents won. I wonder why that is... did XML make software less brittle, easier to prototype, easier to integrate, ... I suspect it's all of these things and more. Did it matter that XML is 'open' .. I'm sure Microsoft didn't care much about openness at the beginning, but now I think they understand that openness is a necessary evil, if only to keep their thousands of programmers in line. These things are all orthogonal: GUI, PC, XML. They all help solve a problem in a different way. Windows isn't going anywhere, neither is Gnome etc. These things are all very "big" and it's difficult to say which is biggest. It hardly matters. Who knows what Steve really thinks about. It doesn't matter much when you're the 800 pound gorilla, does it? At least MSXML3 works, and MSXML4's bugs will get fixed, maybe at least by the time it is released "for real." I'm happy that a parser ships with every copy of Windows, although exactly which set of functionality is always a crap shoot. And finally, Microsoft is bigger than all of us combined. I guess Steve didn't think it would help his cause had he mentioned that. But anyway, to sum up: XML is officially in the mainstream even though many developers are losing their jobs day after day after day. Who knows what is in store for us in this insane technology universe. How are companies like Ariba going to pull out of the tailspin? Live by XML, die by XML. In 1998, XML was a great marketing tool. Market caps soared just by announcing "plans" to incorporate XML into products. Today it's just technology that can be used effectively or not, like SQL or anything else. But for the most part, the investment community just yawns. Been there, done that, lost $100 million. The money has scattered like cockroaches leaving many of our employers in the dust. Last stop: http://fuckedcompany.com I'm sure most of you out there are reading this email on Windows. XML or not, Microsoft wins. XML will no doubt help them get to where they want to go. Probably faster than their competition. And by the way, this is not a diatribe against Microsoft. The US Attorneys General can shove it. They've done enough damage already, and I'm sure my friends at IBM, Sun, and Oracle pine for the good old days before they heard the words "Judge Penfeld Jackson" ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sanjay Sharma" <leoaugust@y...> To: "Ken North" <ken_north@c...>; <xml-dev@l...>; <veillard@r...>; <tbray@t...> Sent: Friday, June 22, 2001 1:55 PM Subject: Re: Steve Ballmer is cracking up Tim Bray <tbray@t...> wrote ... he hollered (but then he always hollers) "XML IS BIGGER THAN THE GUI! BIGGER THAN THE PC! _________________ I think the situation is completely the reverse. 1.. GUI is bigger than XML. 2.. And, GUI is bigger than the PC. 3.. And, PC is bigger than XML (because it would be hard to implement XML efficiently without a Digital Computer).
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