10 years of .Net Framework

Folks,
It’s been 10 years since Microsoft originally announced the .Net framework for windows. It has since been the de-facto framework/platform for developing applications targeting the Windows platform – both for the Client as well as Web development. Dot Net has achieved many goals and still has a long way forward with many new features yet to be achieved and implemented.
It all began when Microsoft’s attempt to use Sun’s Java on Windows through it’s own licensed-JVM failed drastically ending up in a law-suit with Sun for not completely compatible with the original JVM by Sun. This provoked Microsoft to make their own platform that is common to all the PCs. Not only the JVM, even the Java language syntax was almost mimicked in C#. But there it ends.
Though the foundation is from Java’s ideas and breakthroughs, the main achievement from Microsoft’s side is the evolving nature of .Net. One can easily agree that the .Net platform is the fastest growing platform and the platform that focuses on developer’s productivity to the maximum extent. The amount of development and the funding on R&D by Microsoft has really worked and will really show the potential of .Net to it’s competitors.
But, one may argue with the fact that Microsoft’s platform succeeded due to the popularity of Windows OS and the platform’s tight integration to the OS. Yes, the above point also aids the fact that there has to be a platform that is tightly integrated with Windows and at the same time being portable. It’s a business trick that Microsoft’s been relying on for each technology it produces.
Disadvantage of .Net:

• Doesn’t work outside the Windows environment – although Mono does this job, it’s not directly from Microsoft.

The fact that .Net can’t be used in Linux, Mac, Unix is a big minus. For example, if ASP.Net is used for Web development, it has to be hosted on Windows Server which has IIS. This means that the popularity of PHP and Python with only flourish in the year’s to come as there are many enthusiasts using these OSes and the government organizations moving to Open source.
The ultimate choice is left to the developers and the users choosing the OS. Let’s realize that every vendor makes “good software” in order to compete among their peers only to make the end users perfectly happy with their experience using software.
And yeah…finally it all get’s down to Darwin’s theory – “survival of the fittest”.