Catching Up On the Server Side
Fat and Rich—Furthering the Lead
The Microsoft Mobility Mission
Forms, Clients, and Developer Kudos
End-User Productivity Really Does Matter
James Governor
September 24, 2002
From a rich-client perspective, Microsoft is a long way ahead of the competition, plowing a lone furrow. Unless and until BEA, IBM, Sun, and others get serious about the rich client issue, they leave Windows and the Visual Studio .NET development tools in the catbird seat. Microsoft will remain there for the foreseeable future when it comes to rich applications and satisfied end-users (IT ops staffs probably have a different take on this issue).
Microsoft's competitors need to understand that the end user experience and end-user productivity really does matter. Consumer web services need to be easy and intuitive to use. In many cases that entails some local data storage and modeling—just the sort of thing that Curl, Esual, and Macromedia are working to add to the browser model. The local executable model is gaining traction even among thin-client enthusiasts, but the major Java vendors have yet to really start driving it.
This is not to say that non-Microsoft architectures won't get there eventually, providing the kind of deployment flexibility and related user experience advantages, tied to a Java/XML Web Services architecture. But this will be a long road. If the decision is made on the basis of end user functionality and the ease with which that functionality can be developed, then Microsoft wins—hands down, every time. For the rest of the industry, rich clients remain the last major challenge in competing with Microsoft. The Microsoft rich client advantage endures.
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