Slipping schedules aren't good for anyone

It appears that Longhorn is going to be less than we had hoped for. According to News.com, some features will be left out just so they can finally get it out the door. Personally, I don't care that much, but I know the Windows developers that have been working with the alphas are disappointed.

.NET v2.0 seems to be on a mystery schedule as well. It's great that we have beta 1, but I think people are hungry now for beta 2, especially Visual Studio 2005. Microsoft's openness in this development is a real double-edged sword. On one hand, they've got people excited about the new product, but on the other hand, it opens them up to criticism when schedules keep on slipping.

My position isn't a toddler's "I WANT!" cry. I can get along fine without .NET v2.0. It's the tool, Visual Studio, that I need. Why? Because every time I go back to using VS 2003 for production work, I realize just how broken it is. I have to revert to my defensive coding to keep VS from mangling everything I do.

To be truthful, I don't care when v2.0 is finally released. To Microsoft's credit, the beta is stunning in terms of stability, and it would easily meet my needs in production today. I'll be perfectly happy with that "go live" license when it comes around with beta 2. That can't come soon enough.