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Microsoft Products Developed in .NET

One of the questions/issues that comes up periodically is "Is Microsoft using its own platform/tools (.NET) to develop its own products ?"   While we could have a great discussion about the correctness of writing an Operating System totally in managed code, there are many elements and products from Microsoft that do already incorporate alot of .NET code. 

Here are some number that I got from Microsoft:

Microsoft products that contain millions of lines of managed code:

- Visual Studio 2005: 7.5 million lines

- SQL Server 2005: 3 million lines

- BizTalk Server: 2 million lines

- Visual Studio Team System: 1.7 million lines

 

These products have hundreds of thousands of lines of managed code:

- Windows Presentation Foundation: 900K lines

- Windows Sharepoint Services: 750K lines

- Expression Interactive Designer: 250K lines  

- Sharepoint Portal Server: 200K lines

- Content Management Server: 100K lines

 

9 Comments

  • it would be a problem if the dogs wouldn't eat the dog food........

  • I can't even begin to imagine that much code.

    This realy looks like .net is catching strong roots.



    But I would like to know what's the percentual increas in managed code in one year over native code if that info is available.

  • When (if ever) will we see MS office built entirely in .NET?

  • It would be nice to see the number of non-managed components and code lines that are underneath some of these products.





    I think that the comparing the managed to unmanaged quantities from VS.Net 2003 and VS2005 would show that MS is "going whole hog, even the postage".





  • While I clearly agree about the ratios, I'm not so sure that the OS itself should built from the CLR.

    I do think it should be part of the default install of Vista.





    I think a large part of the idea of providing extensive COM interop was to not have to rewrite Office to make it work with .Net.



    If I'm not mistaken, VSTO (Sisual Studio Tools for Office) requires .Net. That seems to me to be a commitment to .Net in a major revenue generating product.

  • They also "dog food" on their own websites now too. They'd be daft IMO to write the OS in managed but they'd be equally crazy to not realise the benefits of writing apps in managed, many other people are !!!

  • Another thing to consider is that when you upgrade products you don't normally want to scrap all the code you have from previous versions. Anytime you re-write code you increase risk. Increased risk mean longer development cycles and none of wanted to wait longer for Visual Studio 2005 now did we?



    MS is being prudent by not jumping whole hog into code replacement for the sake of having a higher .Net line count. To the vast majority of end users the .Net line count is meaningless, but they will notice right away when the Numbering and Bullets feature doesn't work.



    I agree that Office, Visual Studio or any other product written completely in .Net would be cool, but it would be a bad business choice.

  • Microsoft must 'trust' the framework if SQL Server 2005 really has 3 million lines of managed code in it. SQL Server is one of Microsoft's BEST products! I highly doubt that they would risk using the framework on SQL Server product if they didn't believe in the framework.

  • Thanks for the good comments! I know that there some open questions that have been posted, and I am trying to get some answers. I'll post any additional public information, as soon as I can.

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