.NET Developers Give Chrome a Peek
As some of you may know, the VSLive!
New York conference is taking place this week in Manhattan. This long-running
confab has been helping Visual Studio programmers and .NET development managers
grapple with technical challenges for years. RDN Executive Editor Jeffrey
Schwartz is at the event and offers his insight:
While Microsoft has had little to say about Google jumping
into the browser market, .NET developers certainly have shown interest.
During a keynote session at the VSLive! New York show today, half of those
attending the session said they have downloaded Chrome. Moreover, a quarter
of those said they're still using it. Granted, that's not a scientific survey,
but it bears noting that those attending VSLive! represent an audience with
a vested interest in Windows and the .NET Framework.
"I have to admit, I went in thinking it wasn't going to be very good,"
said blogger and Redmond magazine columnist Mary Jo Foley, who is also
author of the book Microsoft
2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era. Foley
presented the opening keynote session at VSLive!
"It is really fast and it's really innovative," Foley added. "I
think the IE team is going to have some competition on its hands."
Could that have an impact on the final release of Internet Explorer 8, which
was just
released to beta less than two weeks ago and is expected to ship this fall?
Foley said she wouldn't be surprised, though Microsoft has been characteristically
quiet regarding Chrome. "The reaction is typical Microsoft," she said,
noting later that Microsoft would be served well by rethinking its approach
of not responding to competitors.
That's especially questionable in Microsoft's
new advertising campaign, which uses comedian Jerry Seinfeld to go after
Apple, yet fails to acknowledge its rival.
"You've got to say the A-word [but] Microsoft doesn't want to go there
and sometimes that's to their detriment," Foley said.
Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/09/2008