IBM's WebSphere vs. Microsoft's .NET - Who's Winning?

Is Microsoft Selling an EDSEL?

[cyril kearney]

Here's the URL to the article: [story.news.yahoo.com...]

If you add IBM buying PwC Consulting to the mix: [theregister.co.uk...]

. . . and factor in the forthcoming anti-trust suit penalties, in my opinion Microsoft may not be the dominant player in the emerging Web Services area.

From my perspective as a consultant, this is what I am seeing. My clients are not migrating to .NET. They are playing wait and see. This includes the early adopters.

The feeling is that there is NO benefit NOW only costs; that .NET can't be easily explained so that the guys holding the purse-strings can understand enough to commit budget and that implementation would require massive retraining. Most of my clientss are working with reduced budgets and unwilling to commit budget for pie in the sky.

Still the feeling isn't negative. It is more that the ball isn't really rolling yet for .NET so there won't be much catch up if a site waits. Managers are talking about 2004 implementations.

In short, I can't sell consulting services to smaller and mid-size companies for .NET services now.

What is everyone else seeing?

[Xoc]

The larger the company, the slower they will move. Most large companies have at least a two year cycle of adopting any new technology. For some it is five years. I know of many companies that are finally getting off of Windows 95/98/ME and moving to 2000/XP just now as a company standard.

I think .NET has what it takes, but it will be at least two years until it is really being used a lot, especially for mission critical applications. Most companies are eyeing it suspiciously and poking at it to see if it will move.

[cyril kearney]

Xoc, I generally agree with you and that is why I am worried. In large companies in my experience, new technology appears first in pilot projects, management gains an understanding and a core of techies gain experience. About two years later the organization begins widespread adoption.

This period is passing for some of my larger clients. The leading-edge techies hooked onto .NET during its very long beta or when first released. They have fiddled with it and seem to have come to the conclusion that it is the wave of the future but not really worth investing in before 2004.

Mid-size and smaller clients often adopt things sooner because they are less complex. They are more benefits driven. It is the lack of a clear benefit that is holding back acceptance.

The small consulting companies that I know invested time and effort very early but now can't sell any business. A big part of this is the depressed demand for consulting services in general but beyond that is this wide-spread lack of articulated benefits of .NET.

[Xoc]

I think Microsoft has done a poor job of defining what .NET is. I mean, what the heck does "one degree of separation" mean? How about a slogan like "connecting business to business", or "making things that were really hard nice and simple", or "Do your C++ and Java programs keep crashing and/or run slower than molassas--try C#"?

There are clear benefits of .NET, but I don't think most businesses understand them yet. However, I taught a VB.NET class in Chicago in May. There were two university professors in my class from two different universities, who likely were going to start teaching it fall semester. So there will start being a group of college kids trained in it. Eventually that filters into companies.

I think the best thing for a consultant right now is to get as much .NET experience under your belt as possible, so that when companies start advertising that they want someone with 10 years .NET experience, you can at least have a larger number than the competition. .NET is large and complicated and understanding what part of it is the solution to a particular problem takes time.