Last Microsoft case study: a lesson in corporate Marketing

Dealing with Linux

To develop the Frontpath platform, Bradbury enlisted the aid of Cursivecode, a Seattle-based company that specializes in Internet and wireless solutions. Andi Rusu, a partner at Cursivecode, explains that developing the wine menu application in Linux proved to be “interesting.” “We had experience programming with Unix,” says Rusu, “so we didn’t have coding issues. At the same time, we were flying by the seat of our pants. Because Linux is very unpredictable, we knew the individual elements were working, but couldn’t really predict how they would act in concert when we fired up the device. It was a complete guessing game.”

Now start by a gentle slap on the face :

Also, unlike more mainstream development products, there’s little in the way of development support for Linux. “When you’re trying to develop a new product, it’s important to know where to go for help,” says Rusu. “That’s obviously something we didn’t have from Linux, because there’s no one to go to for support. Inventing everything as you go along has its own share of excitement, but if you’re trying to make money and run an operation, it’s not really preferable.”

And now ready for the big punch:

Hitting the Wall

Aureole deployed the Linux Web pads in 2000, generating a lot of positive press and customer feedback. The initial deployment involved 32 Web pads as wine menus, which were updated through a publishing system that delivered data through XML to the Web pads and to an associated external Web site. The pads featured the wine list database, a shopping cart, a survey engine, food and wine pairings, and multimedia presentations such as wine-maker features.

However, the Linux-based devices quickly reached their limits. “We had high aspirations for this solution,” says Bradbury, “and the Linux Web pad simply couldn’t take us there. About six months after launching, we realized that we’d reached the end of the road with this device.” He wanted the electronic wine menu to incorporate a backend retail component, with the capability of running real-time inventory using bar code scanners. He also wanted to develop a Passport-type architecture so wine lovers could put wine information into a personal history directory that would remain available in the future. He wanted the electronic wine menus to push and pull off the wine database servers in order to offer live searches of the wine database, track wine sales up-to-the-moment and do “live 86s” on sold-out wines. To provide the diner a better user experience, Bradbury also wanted to offer diners features like live video, handwriting recognition for wine searches, and digital ink for e-mail messages to the chef.

And if the beast is still alive, just some pokings and kickings:

“When we looked at these scenarios, Linux offered us nothing,” says Bradbury. “By this time, we knew that the Tablet PC was in development, and we knew it offered us the software architecture we were waiting for. In addition, it offered a smaller, sleeker design, more and faster processing power, and handwriting recognition and stylus integration – top to bottom, the Tablet PC was what we were looking for.”

Aureole retired its Linux-based Web pads and moved to Tablet PCs in November 2002. Porting the front-end Flash application from the Linux Web pad to the Tablet PC platform and working with the Tablet PC’s new technology was problem-free. When the Cursivecode team had questions as it began integrating unfamiliar features such as handwriting recognition, documentation was available and support from Microsoft was just a call away. “This is very unlike the experience with Linux,” says Rusu, “where we incurred unproductive time on the unknown. Especially during the testing cycle, we wasted time trying to figure things out.”