28 June 2004

It's when I see something like this that Microsoft really disappoints me! I have just been sent details of this InfoPath web application by Microsoft.  I should have been pleased, but I was very disappointed, not by InfoView which seems to be a great way of publishing an InfoPath form so that it can be completed using a web form, but because Microsoft did not ship it!   Microsoft would have got such a different reception and eliminated a lot of trust issues if InfoPath had been positioned as a web form designer, offline editor and aggregation tool, with a complementary web forms interface for those not able to take advantage of the native client.  I can not believe that developed in parallel with the thick client developing the web client would have been that big a deal either.   Anyway Microsoft chose a different route and instead of being seen as producing a great innovative standards based product that demonstrated the best of rich and reach, they chose a route that exposed them to constant criticism over attempting to lock people into Office and Thick Client technologies!   Come on Microsoft examine everything you are planning from the perspective of those who are uneasy about your track record,  I think it will be your best long term form of marketing! 7:31:18 PM      comment [] Next steps I had some very good news today.  I am to be working for most of my time for probably 6 months or more on alternative desktop solutions,  looking at what the viable alternatives are to the Microsoft Desktop solution.  This is an end to end review, ie not just looking at the Operating System, but at: The operating system The layered personal productivity tools Integration with peripherals and PDA's The service and systems management tools The security tools The integration issues Application compatability and portfolio migration issues The data and personality migration issues The TCO issues The user change/culture change issues Changes to my companies service model and associated technologies Some of the issues that result from running a mixed environment, or a parallel environment, for example VMware hosted The architectural changes, eg thick or thin client, application delivery approaches Some of the strategic differences including those that arise from the different motivations of Microsoft and the alternatives The decision making process that a client needs to go through before choosing to go the alternative route I won't be posting much more detail than this in my blog, but you can expect some of the key questions that I am asking myself to be posted along the way as I try and pick my way through such a lot of different factors.  Its quite interesting to be starting work on this just a day after my posting on Zealots! If you look at my blog on posts related to this topic, these are the most important: Zealots Rich Versus Reach - my perspective Personal Information Disaster! Which Office Suite? Microsoft: Linux isn't cheaper More integration of Microsoft Products? Who will Longhorn appeal to? In pursuit of personal and team productivity 2:33:08 PM      comment []

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