[Mono-list] .Net App Server

[Tom Reilly]

I'd like to apologize for starting these J2EE threads, I'm attempting to take them off list.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Pavel Tcholakov [mailto:pavel@linux.zonebg.com]
> Sent: Friday, July 19, 2002 5:59 AM
> To: Tom Reilly; 'Miguel de Icaza'
> Cc: Dave Bettin; mono-list@go-mono.com
> Subject: Re: [Mono-list] .Net App Server
> 
> 
> On Thursday 18 July 2002 19:15, Tom Reilly wrote:
> > The market for app servers in 2003 is around 2.5 billion dollars
> > according to IDC so maybe you're right ;-)  Of course your 
> competition
> > includes the likes of MS, IBM, Sun, and Oracle.
> 
> On the one hand, we've got J2EE and on the other - .NET. Now 
> the cool thing is 
> Microsoft has already done their marketing for .NET and 
> everyone has at least 
> heard of it, and all the kids who attended the Microsoft 
> Developer Days on 
> .NAT and got free books and CD's think it's the best thing 
> after sliced 
> bread. If a theoretical Mono App Server could deliver on the 
> Microsoft 
> implementation's shortcomings, I believe the organizations 
> backing it stand 
> to gain a LOT. If you go and read that discussion on 
> theserverside, you will 
> see in the forum that the (J2EE) people are mostly 
> complaining about the lack 
> of choice when it comes to .NET development. You can only 
> deploy on Windows, 
> which mean only Intel hardware, limited database 
> connectivity, only one  IDE 
> etc etc. An open source Mono App Server running practially 
> everywhere would 
> make those people reconsider. Even further, the .NET API's aren't yet 
> established, which means that if Mono offers a better 
> alternative to a badly 
> implemented Microsoft idea, people wouldn't be held back by 
> compatibility 
> concerns.
> 
> > Open source app servers haven't fared so well, corporate IT
> > departments like established companies, consulting and support
> > services and all that (and that's where these companies make most of
> > their money, not on the software licensing).  Also, all open source
> > app servers (that I know of) are Java based and never 
> managed to reach
> > critical mass (mostly, I believe, because of the lack of a 
> first class
> > open source Java VM).
> 
> Sun does provide a first class free-as-in-beer JVM for many 
> operating systems, 
> plus source code. Furthermore their JCP process is very much 
> open to anyone, 
> thus IMHO the benefits of open source development are 
> available to java 
> users. In other words, there is a pretty good JVM out there 
> that's free and I 
> don't see how that has anything to do with open sourced 
> application servers' 
> popularity.
> 
> On top of that, a recent survey showed that JBoss is prefered 
> by more than 50% 
> of interviewed developers - that has to say something?! For me, as an 
> individual, if I wanted to learn about J2EE technology, open 
> source is the 
> only way to go considering commercial J2EE vendors' pricing. 
> I can tell you 
> for sure that JBoss and Tomcat (for those not in the know, 
> Tomcat is the 
> Apache J2EE Web container - JSPs/servlets etc.) being used in 
> the enterprise 
> a lot more than you can imagine. My friends at two very large 
> businesses (a 
> bank and a medical aid company) have told me they use a 
> commercial J2EE (BEA 
> or IBM) app server for their core business logic, plus JBoss 
> for deployment 
> of additional components (not that critical or at branch 
> offices for example) 
> and development.
> 
> This all proves that the open source app server market is 
> there and there's a 
> lot of interest in it. If somebody implemented an open source 
> .NET app 
> server, they could quite successfully ride the wave of 
> Microsoft marketing to 
> reach those that wouldn't consider Microsoft otherwise.
> 
> Pavel.
>