[Mono-osx] Opinion Please - honest answer? Java or .Net

[Frank Mantek]

Sorry for the eventual double post, i used the wrong email for the  
first attempt...

 From my standpoint, as a developer working primarily on the mac with  
Mono, using Windows for the occasional debugging and having shipped an  
open sourced toolkit with roughly 170K lines of code, and 300  
downloads a day on average....

(which of course is still a very different beast than writing a  
commercial application in the vertical space).

-> the mono community has, on average been very helpful. This is a  
good point.  I did not need a lot of help, but when i had a problem,  
questions were normally answered very fast and precise

-> Mono is very stable. I am a decent developer, and most of the time  
i just work in mono, and only use windows to debug hard problems. That  
for me is the way to go and the reason VMWare exists for me :). Yes,  
there is MonoDevelop etc, but for now, nothing beats debugging .NET  
code in VS.NET if you need to debug at all. No complains here.

-> Mono is very compatible to .NET 2.0. I am not using LINQ etc inside  
the mono world

-> Ui is a challenge. Now, i don't write that much UI code (most of  
the code is service layer) so i can not speak for that part too much.  
A mono app, on my default Mac installation, that is a windows form  
app, runs. But heck, it sure does not look good. That's the main  
problem. It also feels a tad slower.

-> UI is a challenge in java as well. While the java app looks nicer  
on the mac than the mono app, writing cross platform UI is always a  
challenge. Java apps on Windows don't feel correct either.

-> UI: So you loose either on the mac or on windows. That's a given,  
in my opinion. In all cases there is a lot you can do about it, but it  
requires extra effort. So what's your MAIN platform?

-> if you go .NET/Mono, you need to be aware that a lot of the very  
new concepts in .NET 3.5, or WPF etc,  are not yet available in Mono  
(at least to my knowledge, please correct me if i am wrong).

I did not catch any data about numbers of installations. I would argue  
that if you have more macs than windows machines, java is probably the  
better choice. If it's the other way round, i would certainly go .NET/ 
Mono. To quote an old favorite of mine: "The needs of the many  
outweigh the needs of the few...."

Frank Mantek
Google
All views expressed here are my own and do not reflect my companies  
view points, or if they do, than by accident.


On Aug 28, 2008, at 7:42 PM, Liam Coughlin wrote:

>
> On Aug 28, 2008, at 12:12 PM, Geoff Norton wrote:
>>
>> There are several companies using Mono on the mac today.
>>
>
> Sure, but that doesn't mean that any given company should.  I'm sure
> they know what they're getting into, and have the expertise to support
> themselves directly.
>
> The OP though, didn't seem like he was in that position at all at
> all.  Encouraging people who are unsure of what they're doing to jump
> into something they're not ready for doesn't help the platform or the
> community.
>
>
>> -g
>
> I didn't want to chime in, mostly because I don't think this is the
> right place for that sort of discussion, but I wanted the OP to get
> some realistic input as well.
>
> -L
> _______________________________________________
> Mono-osx mailing list
> Mono-osx at lists.ximian.com
> http://lists.ximian.com/mailman/listinfo/mono-osx

On Aug 28, 2008, at 7:42 PM, Liam Coughlin wrote:

>
> On Aug 28, 2008, at 12:12 PM, Geoff Norton wrote:
>>
>> There are several companies using Mono on the mac today.
>>
>
> Sure, but that doesn't mean that any given company should.  I'm sure
> they know what they're getting into, and have the expertise to support
> themselves directly.
>
> The OP though, didn't seem like he was in that position at all at
> all.  Encouraging people who are unsure of what they're doing to jump
> into something they're not ready for doesn't help the platform or the
> community.
>
>
>> -g
>
> I didn't want to chime in, mostly because I don't think this is the
> right place for that sort of discussion, but I wanted the OP to get
> some realistic input as well.
>
> -L
> _______________________________________________
> Mono-osx mailing list
> Mono-osx at lists.ximian.com
> http://lists.ximian.com/mailman/listinfo/mono-osx

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