I admit that Microsoft’s software wouldn’t be my first choice for building a web application, but a small consultancy decided to give it a whirl with its Meet with Approval application. As is often the case with Microsoft (to its credit and shame), its tools took care of the heavy lifting of writing code:
Visual Studio provides a number of prebuilt web controls that we were able to drag and drop onto our pages and granted us to get a considerable way before having to write any code. A criticism of this approach is that such controls output bad HTML or restrict design however we didn’t find this. We were impressed by the way in which .NET produced relatively little code and we were able to apply all styling via CSS. Visual Studio 2008 offers a full WYSIWYG editor with CSS support that we found to be superior than Dreamweaver even though we did find rendering problems within the IDE when coding for cross browser CSS.
So, pluses and minuses. But what about the end result?
Pretty good, according to the developers and according to a swift review of the site. That said, plenty of critics have weighed in suggesting that the same results could be had more affordably and in a more sustainable fashion using open-source tools.
… Source:The Open Road
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Filed under: Deals, Top deals, Financials and analyticals, Bain Capital, Thomas H. Lee Partners, Morgan Stanley Capital Partners, Citigroup
The nearly never-ending Clear Channel Communications Inc. (NYSE: CCU) buyout may finally clear. Numerous reports speak about a settlement was reached this weekend between the banks and the buyers. The New York Times has a full report, while the WSJ also has data on its reporting too.
A year ago, Bain Capital and Thomas H. Lee Partners concurred to buy the largest U.S. radio broadcaster for $39.50 per share but the deal delayed after the six banks failed to provided promised financing. The New York trials between the banks and the buyers were set to begin this morning and the judge postponed the trial until Tuesday, largely thought to allow more time to complete a settlement. The new terms for the buyout reduced the price to $36.00 per share, according to someone familiar with the settlement. The six banks include Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Deutsche, Credit Suisse, Royal Bank of Scotland, and Wachovia.
Clear Channel shares jumped on the news over 10% to $33.20. The 52-week range is $25.90 to $38.58.
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You may never have heard of BitRock, the company that has traditionally competed with OpenLogic, SpikeSource, and SourceLabs in the “open-source stacks” business but has seen much more success with its excellent installers, which upwards of 60 percent of commercial open-source projects use including SugarCRM, JasperSoft, Ringside Networks, and more. The name might be unfamiliar to you, but not for long.
Why? Because BitRock is about to claim the center of the open-source world’s attention, as Stephe Walli, an advisor to BitRock, pointed out two months ago following the Open Source Business Conference. It’s called the Network, you’re apt to be buying into one very soon, if you haven’t already.
As open-source companies seek ways to monetize their code, a common theme has emerged: Networks. Red Hat has Red Hat Network. JBoss developed the JBoss Operations Network (recently graduating to 2.0 status). MySQL has its Monitor. And so on.
The problem with this approach is twofold: 1) It forces vendors to reinvent the Network wheel over and over again and 2) It leaves both vendors and customers isolated within one vendors Network offering. BitRock resolves this by providing a common infrastructure upon which the open-source vendor community can build, as Stephe notes:
… Source:The Open Road
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Today I received word that Microsoft owns a small piece of the California government.
I, um, rolled to a near-stop on a right turn at a red light and Mr. Traffic Camera sent me a ticket. Spoiled my day.
Even worse, however, was when I went on the web to try to …
Source:The Open Road
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