Can: Answers

Consumers worldwide now have another way of seeking help from peers. Microsoft has today launched Microsoft Answers BETA: http://answers.microsoft.com/windows for providing community support for Windows Vista. If you have an issue or want to learn a few things about Windows Vista, this may be your destination.

Microsoft Answers Website is:

· A rich, interactive community self-help experience moderated by Windows Vista support engineers.

· One place for consumers to quickly and easily find Windows Vista support content from Microsoft and the community.

· A site built with consumers in mind—from content to tone to aesthetic.

Till The landscape for Windows community support has been dominated by 3rd party communities e.g. neowin, winsupersite.

If you are in India, there is an option that you may want to explore. The community at www.merawindows.com has been active for more than 2 years and has an impressive base of over 6000 users. The forums are extremely active there and the latest news is shared by community from all over India.

Check Microsoft Answers and let us know what you think about it!

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In one of the startup groups, there was a question on the commercials of doing a startup with Microsoft Technologies. Specifically, the question was:

“I would like to know the commercial implications on developing a solution on dotnet.
Is there a license one needs to purchase from Microsoft for developing a software on dotnet platform?
When the software is sold then does each commercial license of software requires dotnet license to be purchased from Microsoft ?”

While many folks would already know about the above, I am reproducing my answer in order to help any startup out there looking for information on using Microsoft technologies. So here it goes:

Upfront, one thing should be clear as water -

.NET framework is completely FREE of cost to install.

The tools to develop on .NET is a IDE called Visual Studio may be needed to be bought. However, MS has come out with various programs that give out .NET Development tools for free. These options includes FREE Visual Studio and SQL Server Express products. The BizSpark program and WebSiteSpark program offers the development tools free for all startups. So, adopting .NET development tools may be made a zero investment effort.
.NET development shines out in the productivity boost it offers leading to quicker Time to Market for products/ solutions. In addition, the resources/ manpower on .NET can be hired for cheaper from the market. A certain degree of expertise can be assumed by folks who have .NET Certifications.

When your software is sold, the customer does need to buy infrastructure technologies supporting the solution (e.g. SQL Server, Windows Server). The customer doesn’t need to buy Developer tools (and I already mentioned that .NET is FREE to install for everyone).

Finally, costs to the customer on selling the software depends on the solution type you are building (e.g. if you are using SQL Server). There are free/ cheaper options available there as well. This would depend on the solution/ product you are building.

Are you a startup looking for any clarifications on .NET technologies? Please feel free to post a comment here and I will be happy to answer for you.