People typically partner with a vendor because it provides a product or service that they need but cannot create or fulfill in-house. These partnerships succeed or fail based on how good the vendor's service is and how comfortable its customers feel working with them. Point in case: many good Web servers are on the market, but I chose one that runs on a Unix variant because I'm more comfortable with what I get out of that platform.
Service and comfort are two very important factors in decision making. We use them, perhaps unconsciously, every day, so they largely determine the success of a product or service offering. This market truth is basically the crux of my discussion regarding Microsoft's new .NET technologies and service offerings. In this article I will tell you what the folks in Redmond have planned for .NET and why I think that could be another Microsoft "Bob" unless they adequately address the security and privacy issues that surround Internet-based, access-from-anywhere computing.
Breakdown of Microsoft .NET (No Pun Intended)
First off, I am in no way a Microsoft basher. I worked for a large Microsoft solution provider in New York for six years as a network and security engineer, and I am very pleased with many of Microsoft's new server products (Exchange 2000 rocks!). I even run both Windows 2000 and Linux on my laptop. But when I heard about Microsoft's .NET initiative, I shivered. For those of you who are living in total sensory deprivation (hi Mom!) and haven't heard about .NET, let me bring you up to speed.
In Microsoft's own words (from its "What .NET Means for Users and Developers" paper), the .NET initiative "extends the ideas of both the Internet and the operating system by making the Internet itself the basis of a new operating system." Um, okay. Microsoft goes on to say that ".NET is important to end users because it makes computers easier to use and far more functional. Specifically, it frees them from the artificial constraints of hardware: User data lives on the Internet, not on the laptop—it can be accessed from any desktop, laptop, cell phone, or PDA, and can be integrated across applications." Ah-ha! Finally, the folks in Redmond believe that, "software is not so much something installed from a CD, but is a service—like caller ID or pay-per-view television—to subscribe to through a communications medium." Hmmm.
So in easily digestible, low-in-saturated-fat terms, .NET will turn traditional products into subscription services, centralize data storage for access from anywhere, and provide developers with the tools to build and leverage similar distributed frameworks.
Nowhere in there did you see the words "secure," "private," or "protected." In fact, these words didn't appear at all in a search of the document ("What .NET Means for Users and Developers"). Perhaps security and privacy are undocumented features. However, we can ascertain the level of privacy and security in .NET services by looking at Microsoft's track record with online and data center products.
Before we get to that, let's look at the new server and developer services that will be backing up this effort.
