This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Ruby Buzz by David Heinemeier Hansson. Original Post: 12 reasons MS doesn't cut it for web development Feed Title: Loud Thinking Feed URL: http://feeds.feedburner.com/LoudThinking Feed Description: All about the full-stack, web-framework Rails for Ruby and on putting it to good effect with Basecamp Latest Ruby Buzz Posts Latest Ruby Buzz Posts by David Heinemeier Hansson Latest Posts From Loud Thinking

Robert Scoble has an honest and poignant analysis of why the Microsoft suite of tools just doesn't cut it for web-application development at the moment.

One example of how we feel this with Rails is by how hard it is to retain a maintainer for the SQL Server database adapter. None of the developers that have been or are working on it are in it for the long term. It's just that they need it while they either migrate their shop over to open-source alternatives or find a new job that doesn't force them to use Microsoft tools.

Naturally, that's a pretty self-selected pool of talent. And its very easy to adopt the view that nobody interesting are using Microsoft for the web anyway. That Microsoft is for medium-sized businesses full of sales people and techies past the expiration date. Surely, that isn't so.

But the reason that this is even a viable caricature comes from that fact that Microsoft is now entirely optional. No part of the stack needs Microsoft. Not on the client, not on the server. And I think that's a pretty tough challenge for a company that used to be a necessity. You have to compete very differently when you're just one choice out of many instead of the only show in town.

To be frank, I don't ever see the good times coming back for them. Microsoft will have to move to higher grounds. Get out of the infrastructure race. Like Apple did. There is no dominant future for the Microsoft tool chain for web development in sight. But I doubt the company will acknowledge that before it's game over.