Roy Schestowitz wrote:
> Brits! Act now to save the BBC from Microsoft
>
> ,----[ Quote ]
> | The BBC are holding an open consultation regarding how they're
> | going to delivery on-demand content, they want answers to
> | questions like: "How important is it that the proposed seven-day
> | catch-up service over the internet is available to consumers who
> | are not using Microsoft software?"
> `----
>
> http://www.boingboing.net/2007/01/31/brits_act_now_to_sav.html
>
> In bed with Microsoft? (see below)
>
With the many areas of the BBC web site that need daily input, they are
bound to take a look at the easiest way to do that. Preferably in a way
that the editors and jernos can update their own areas easily, without the
need to bother the html chaps. Plus the interactive side has been building
for quite some time.
.NET2 is bound to be attractive for that sort of work. But of cause we have
simmilarly easy content managers.
Flaming the BBC with calls of 'Lockout' isn't going to convince them,
instead the posts have to offer viable alternatives that can be carried
into the meetings for discussion.
There are of cause the php content managers, but there is also the likes of
Rubyrails. Then for proper active web sites ajax and/or mono.
Unfortunately, many of these php content managers are a touch tricky to use
in real life. (I think I just heard someone spill their coffee while
reaching for the keyboard), but I'm not changing my mind on this, a lot of
those content managers are poorly documented. It is very easy to make a
change that has a knockon effect through many pages, or a change might
crash the code. Then of cause there is still the problem of going to the
commandline to repair or customize areas directly, you can't use an editor
that leaves an end marker in the file, or you have to put your edited files
through a bit of filter code to knock it off. If not the site crashes to a
halt. But the editing itself is risky, because so often you are having to
do a fair bit of reverse engineering to ensure you are not going to affect
other areas of the site.
So, the current php content managers that I have looked at, I would say are
not up to the job. I couldn't join the BBC discussion and reccomend those
as they are currently, perhaps some of the commercial versions are better,
I'm not willing to pay to find out. Of cause I am certain that the php web
content managers have a place, it's just that this isn't it.
So we come to what is probably our only true alternative to .NET2, which is
mono. I haven't used mono, but it is receiving a good press and it is
already being used commercially. Here are two examples I took from the list
of mono sites, because I thought they stood out as good examples of nice
neat but active web sites,
http://pnunit.codicesoftware.com/opproducts.aspx
http://banshee-project.org/index.php/Main_Page
Probably the only thing that might hold it back, and I would love to be
proved wrong on this one, is that MS put out a very good free tool for
.NET2 development, it makes life extreemly easy for those taking it up,
particularly for those that come from the VB world. Of cause, that same
tool can be used to produce mono applications, but if the developer is sat
at an XP using the MS tools, then it is very likely that he/she will debug
in the .NET framework, just easier and quicker.
So mono on its own isn't the end of the story. Assuming that those starting
from the Linux platform will want to work in php, perl, python or one of
the others, they has to be some damn good documentation easily available.
And there is, it is part of the mono-project site and mono-tools. It makes
taking up mono very easy.
But pause here a moment, because there is a side of all of this that you may
not have thought of straight away.
Mono doesn't only have to do with web sites and web applications, but even
if that is your goal, you are sat on an ideal machine for your own personal
web applications. You have apache, you have php/perl/ruby/python modules,
you have full blown cgi at your disposal. But you also have Mono for Gnome
applications.
What I am saying is that mono can be a part of your personal life on a daily
basis, your own snippets of code, with extremely easy interface to Gtk or
use it on your own machine as web applications.
Now mono Is something that I would take into that BBC meeting with me, and I
think it is that that we ought to reccommend is we join their discussions.
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