Microsoft BUILD 2015: Developers Rejoice!

And VS Code native on Linux?! I guess Linus has won...

I just fired it up for a couple minutes. I think they used Electron (io.js/chromium), so it's basically a reskin of atom.io with some plugins. Still neat though.

I'm almost certain they used Electron. I've been using Atom more and more recently, and I can definitely see the similarities. I'm a WebStorm guy, but I really like Atom. It's amazing for when you want to just throw a few things together. It basically does for me now what Sublime Text did for me in the past. Having something like Code built into Windows 10 in a similar fashion to Notepad as a quick but viable code editor without requiring someone to go out and find one would be awesome. It has just enough features to really be viable without being overwhelming like VS seems to be for a lot of people.

I think what excites me the most about all of this is Microsoft's new approach towards developers and their software ecosystem. Before it was very much about pushing Microsoft products in your face, but now, they're open sourcing projects, supporting things like io.js and node.js without shame, and overall, working to make Windows better for developers. Hell, they're even working on a real package manager, and in the Welcome tab for Code, they recommend scaffolding with Yeoman. Before Satya, that shite wasn't happening at all. Maybe they've finally realized that when developers love you, they'll really push to support you. If they stay on this track, they're going to do some awesome things.

Also, I just saw that they're using a site with feature requests that are voted on to determine what features to work towards and prioritize for Code, and they plan for the pace of shipping features to be pretty quick. As long as they don't bog it down, that'd be really, really cool.

The way things are going, Google is turning into Microsoft of the late 90s and early 2000s. They really had something awesome going, but their popularity and power is causing them to look a little stale and reactionary. They're becoming too focused on entering every market and competing with every popular product and spreading themselves thin. People are becoming tired of Google as they were of Microsoft for so long, and when you keep releasing things like Wave and G+ that is so hyped to be the next big thing that fails, you don't get the benefit of the doubt as much. Apple's popularity keeps rising because they stick to markets they know they're going to kill in. They focus on their portable devices and their core OS X users and market heavily. Google's not only entering a ton of markets, but they're also supposedly stifling a lot of the freedom and the results of that freedom that made Google so great for a while.

There's a lot of stories about developer unrest at Google and company culture going from one where Google was where the best and brightest went to create to a place where decent guys from schools that look good on resumes go to churn out whatever competing product they're launching in whatever market Google is focused on that year. People still want to go to Big 4 places, and overall, people would still rather work there than work at Bob's Software due to the prestige and what it does for them later in their career. That said, you'd be hard pressed to find a guy working at Google who would openly be too negative about working there, but the grumbles are coming up a lot more frequently now. Once their developers become really unhappy and their rep takes a hit, they'll start to suffer from the same issues that Microsoft suffered.

Their problem is really that Google as a company has an ego that hasn't ever truly taken many shots. They've always been beloved for the most part, and even after G+, they still seem to focus on entering a ton of new markets while they're slowly shutting off a bunch of their entries into markets from the past few years. As much as I'm bashing them, they're still a great company, but the signs of them showing that they bleed are there.

They're going to eventually turn it around, I'm sure, but it won't be until they remember something very important that is leading Microsoft's massive charge back towards popularity. They need to remember that at the end of the day, it's the developers who make or break you, and when you don't give them enough love or value, there will be a slow but steady exodus of people who previously would go out of their way to support you, your platform, and your products.

We can talk all we want about Microsoft's reemergence and attempt to say it's their products that did it. At the end of the day, though, it's clearly that they're giving developers a ton of love and a ton of reasons to give them another shot. It all starts with their own engineers and giving them the freedom to establish teams and work on things like a true package manager or greenlight things like VS Code. From the Xbox One turn around to their handling of Windows 10, they've done damn near everything right recently. The excitement from the development community is very evident, and when people like bloggers see that, they get more excited and Microsoft pieces are suddenly more positive and enthusiastic. It all starts at the top, and while Google still has a ton of success and a good reputation to coast on, they may encounter some issues down the line if they don't bring their culture back to one that promotes more freedom and creativity.

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Apple's popularity keeps rising

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not sure if serious

their stock hasn't exactly been awesome

quote:

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There's a lot of stories about developer unrest at Google and company culture going from one where Google was where the best and brightest went to create to a place where decent guys from schools that look good on resumes go to churn out whatever competing product they're launching in whatever market Google is focused on that year. People still want to go to Big 4 places, and overall, people would still rather work there than work at Bob's Software due to the prestige and what it does for them later in their career. That said, you'd be hard pressed to find a guy working at Google who would openly be too negative about working there, but the grumbles are coming up a lot more frequently now. Once their developers become really unhappy and their rep takes a hit, they'll start to suffer from the same issues that Microsoft suffered.

Their problem is really that Google as a company has an ego that hasn't ever truly taken many shots. They've always been beloved for the most part, and even after G+, they still seem to focus on entering a ton of new markets while they're slowly shutting off a bunch of their entries into markets from the past few years. As much as I'm bashing them, they're still a great company, but the signs of them showing that they bleed are there.

They're going to eventually turn it around, I'm sure, but it won't be until they remember something very important that is leading Microsoft's massive charge back towards popularity. They need to remember that at the end of the day, it's the developers who make or break you, and when you don't give them enough love or value, there will be a slow but steady exodus of people who previously would go out of their way to support you, your platform, and your products.

We can talk all we want about Microsoft's reemergence and attempt to say it's their products that did it. At the end of the day, though, it's clearly that they're giving developers a ton of love and a ton of reasons to give them another shot. It all starts with their own engineers and giving them the freedom to establish teams and work on things like a true package manager or greenlight things like VS Code. From the Xbox One turn around to their handling of Windows 10, they've done damn near everything right recently. The excitement from the development community is very evident, and when people like bloggers see that, they get more excited and Microsoft pieces are suddenly more positive and enthusiastic. It all starts at the top, and while Google still has a ton of success and a good reputation to coast on, they may encounter some issues down the line if they don't bring their culture back to one that promotes more freedom and creativity.

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good info that I didn't realize most of it. will be interesting to watch google and microsoft going forward. they're doing some exciting things, apple not so much.