The logical progression to asp.net

I’ve been doing some more asp.net stuff recently as it seems the logical technology to concentrate on having made a living using asp for the past 4 years. As far as adoption goes, i’ve seen it creeping into commercial use over the last couple of years and it seems to have made it onto most commercial hosts now too, so those two hurdles are falling out of the way.

This leaves just one hurdle: asp.net is not cross platform, it can only be hosted on a Microsoft server. So am I cutting myself out of the market? In theory yes, in practice no. I remember a similar dilema when I started doing asp stuff – shouldn’t I concentrate on php instead? I took the precaution of learning the basics of php and mySQL just in case. Over 4 years working in a commercial environment no-one ever asked us for something written in php.

My situation is the similar now – I have improved my knowledge of php sufficiently that I can handle commercial php projects when they land on my desk, but more commercial interest seems to be coming in for asp.net stuff.

Frankly I can’t wait – php seems like a toy when you compare it to the power of asp.net. This statement i’m sure will wind up thousands of php users the world over, but I stand by it as a user of both technologies. As with linux versus microsoft arguments I refuse to let prejudice obscure the facts.

Oh and then there’s that political slashdot ranting teenybopper anti-MS thing. Even though I like, use, and see the benefits of open source I would be a hypocrite to slag off Microsoft, whose products I have used virtually every day for over a decade, the past five of which earning me a living….

There, i’ve said it – I sold my soul to bill gates!