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Comment by hamidpalo | Hacker News Reader

What is "enterprisey" about .NET?

Mono is a real alternative, many businesses run it production, including the likes of Fog Creek.

Just so we're all on the same page here, Fog Creek is not currently using Mono in any part of Kiln or FogBugz On Demand. We use Mono to allow FogBugz to run on Unix systems for on-site installation, and we're looking at using Mono in Kiln for similar reasons. At the moment, though, Kiln and FogBugz On Demand are 100% WISC deployments.

Sorry should have clarified that it's not run in-house but rather supported for full-on production deployments, from what I have heard.

.NET is very "enterprisey". It seems to be designed to make creating line-of-business applications easier.

What exactly makes it enterprisey? I am always really unclear on what makes something "enterprisey" other than perceptions.

IMO, complete integration (one solution, one vendor) across the board (from OS, to IDE, to Database, to Frameworks, etc) is what makes something "enterprisey". That, and a large and mature ecosystem built around it.

But that's not true. Plenty of .NET users do use other OSs (through Mono) and databases (I use MySQL). Sure, the best IDE is VS and there's tons more docs and support on using it all on Windows, but the same can be said of Rails with Linux and Textmate for example.

Enterprisey is a matter of perception and shouldn't be a slur.

If you step outside of the startup bubble, you'll find that the bulk of .NET stuff is boring line-of-business apps developed by large corporations using the MS stack from top to bottom because MS is "safer" than open source.

I actually work at a .NET startup doing non-traditional things with .NET and we have the hardest time hiring new developers because of the "enterprisey" nature of .NET and the type of developer that generates.

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