Feedback for the ASP.Net MVC guys | The Coffeehouse

Rossj

I've just been reading this, and although I haven't had time to play with the MVC stuff yet it has me a little worried - can anyone who has played with it comment on their thoughts with it so far?

From the article wrote:
Building models with LINQ is death by a thousand cuts. PAINFUL.
...
If your app doesn’t fit the square peg, you get to chisel it out with a spork.

Wonder if there is anything about MVC at HHH?

Ray6

Rossj wrote:
I've just been reading this, and although I haven't had time to play with the MVC stuff yet it has me a little worried - can anyone who has played with it comment on their thoughts with it so far?

From the article wrote:
Building models with LINQ is death by a thousand cuts. PAINFUL.
...
If your app doesn’t fit the square peg, you get to chisel it out with a spork.

Wonder if there is anything about MVC at HHH?

From reading his post, it seems that his problem is the lack of documentation, which is hardly surprising; as far as I know, this MVC framework hasn't been released yet while, DJango has been available for quite some time.

And of course it also depends on what you're familiar with. For some developers,

"Step 1 - Install Linux"

might actually increase the development time considerably.

Personally, I wouldn't use anything that hadn't been officially released on any real project.

vesuvius
Das Glasperlenspiel

Rossj wrote:
I've just been reading this, and although I haven't had time to play with the MVC stuff yet it has me a little worried - can anyone who has played with it comment on their thoughts with it so far?

From the article wrote:
Building models with LINQ is death by a thousand cuts. PAINFUL.
...
If your app doesn’t fit the square peg, you get to chisel it out with a spork.

Wonder if there is anything about MVC at HHH?

I have only been programming for about 4 years now starting in C++. A lesson I have learnt in the last 6 months is that software changes do not happen overnight. Most of the time, new technologies create as many problems as they fix.

Take Linq for example. Exceedingly powerful yes. Exceedingly versatile to implement in the real word, erm certainly not! Useful in some cases (XML/Objects), a real pain in others (SQL).

MVC is another of those things that will take a long time to get right. As will the ADO entity framework.

Microsoft do NOT release anything near completion nowadays. It's always 60% there. Linq will be exciting, along with WPF and the ADO entity framework in three years time. Until then, the tried and tested will suffice. .NET 2.0 web or smart client was pretty good (and a long time coming).

What will IE8 give me that IE 7 does not, not a great deal, it's juts a web browser. I am constantly bemused by the 'ants in the pants' pandemonium that occurs with IE or Firefox for that matter.

MVC also will not be mature for a few years, and I don't waste my time with immature projects anymore.

stevo_
Human after all

Ugh, why even bring this up like as if anyone would take any level of that blog seriously..

seang

(I'm the post's author)

Are you saying that feedback from, horror of horrors, the user is not valuable?

Thanks!

seang

Ray6 wrote:

Rossj wrote: I've just been reading this, and although I haven't had time to play with the MVC stuff yet it has me a little worried - can anyone who has played with it comment on their thoughts with it so far?

From the article wrote:
Building models with LINQ is death by a thousand cuts. PAINFUL.

...

If your app doesn’t fit the square peg, you get to chisel it out with a spork.

Wonder if there is anything about MVC at HHH?

From reading his post, it seems that his problem is the lack of documentation, which is hardly surprising; as far as I know, this MVC framework hasn't been released yet while, DJango has been available for quite some time.

And of course it also depends on what you're familiar with. For some developers,

"Step 1 - Install Linux"

might actually increase the development time considerably.

Personally, I wouldn't use anything that hadn't been officially released on any real project.

(post's author here):
My main beef is the lack of documentation... as well, like webforms, the MVC is trying to be everything for all people and, well, that's a big bite!

And installing Linux isn't trivial, you're right... I've been using Windows for a LONG time (3.0 days at least) and Linux since the late 90's so I guess my learning curve isn't as steep any more as it used to be.

I've had some successes using pre-release software for "real" purposes, but there have been some pretty bad blowups (mostly in the Java world, a long time ago). Normally I'm more hesitant to use beta things, but there's a lot of "shiny" objects out there now Smiley

Soviut

seang wrote:
I've had some successes using pre-release software for "real" purposes, but there have been some pretty bad blowups (mostly in the Java world, a long time ago). Normally I'm more hesitant to use beta things, but there's a lot of "shiny" objects out there now.

This is the same stuff people were dealing with in the ASP.NET alpha and beta releases back when .NET wasn't released yet. Everyone struggled with a new paradigm (event based serverside programming) that was wildly different from the sequential style they were used to with ASP 3 and PHP.

stevo_
Human after all

seang wrote:

(I'm the post's author)

Are you saying that feedback from, horror of horrors, the user is not valuable?

Thanks!

Yes, when one of their points was "I HD 2 LERN SUM LAMBADA BULL?!"

seang

stevo_ wrote:

seang wrote:
(I'm the post's author)

Are you saying that feedback from, horror of horrors, the user is not valuable?

Thanks!

Yes, when one of their points was "I HD 2 LERN SUM LAMBADA BULL?!"

Wow I guess you must have read a different post than the one I wrote.

seang

Soviut wrote:

seang wrote: I've had some successes using pre-release software for "real" purposes, but there have been some pretty bad blowups (mostly in the Java world, a long time ago). Normally I'm more hesitant to use beta things, but there's a lot of "shiny" objects out there now.

This is the same stuff people were dealing with in the ASP.NET alpha and beta releases back when .NET wasn't released yet. Everyone struggled with a new paradigm (event based serverside programming) that was wildly different from the sequential style they were used to with ASP 3 and PHP.

I was using the beta asp.net and (it's been a while) I remember most of the pain was with the new IDE and C#. Since I'd developed winforms in VB, the whole event based programming was actually like a breath of fresh air compared to the EJB (1.0/1.1), servlets and struts (an early version of struts) that I'd been working in.

stevo_
Human after all

seang wrote:

stevo_ wrote:

seang wrote:
(I'm the post's author)

Are you saying that feedback from, horror of horrors, the user is not valuable?

Thanks!

Yes, when one of their points was "I HD 2 LERN SUM LAMBADA BULL?!"

Wow I guess you must have read a different post than the one I wrote.

Sorry what? You've actually come here to try and defend your post? you actually believe you gave a fair assessment of the MVC? haha, anyone in the world can see your bias, and purposely trying to make the MVC approach look more complicated and still overall the worse..

Anyone who is interested in the asp.net mvc would of tried it, and given but 5 minutes of experience with the mvc would disregard your ramblings as utter puke..

I'd try and make sense of why you want to make something out to be terrible, so don't use it? why ramble on.. but this is blogging isn't it, how many sensationalist stories can you blab to get some 'publicity'..

Sadly for you, most blogs start off well meaning and corrupt over time.. you seem to have cut straight to the chase.

seang

Nice insults. How about you try and actually help the discussion?

Anyone that tries to use the ASP.NET MVC framework will likely go through the same pain I did. And if they'd not had experience with any other MVC frameworks, they might think that "oh, this isn't too bad" but it really *is that bad.*

stevo_
Human after all

Discussion on what? and I've used the MVC, and its not perfect yet but isn't a bad product, nor painful.. the key difference here seems to be about a generic level of understanding.. you picked on the MVC because you didn't understand some core concepts that it may have used.. you turned frustration into a rant.. frustration isn't synonymous with a product being bad or 'painful'.. believe it or not, theres at least one other big factor in that equation.. (feel free to take a bow).

seang

I'm still confused as to how you're adding to the discussion. You are still trying to attack me personally but it still is just making you look rude.

The MVC is not perfect, it's documentation it pretty weak (hey it is still in a beta state!), and there is a lot of confusing stuff in there (you can do x or y or both) that will make it very hard to adopt.

Anyway, I'm done responding to you until you can piece together a cohesive, non attacking arguement.

irascian
Irascible Ian

seang wrote:
I'm still confused as to how you're adding to the discussion. You are still trying to attack me personally but it still is just making you look rude.

If you'd been in the Coffeehouse for any significant period of time you'd know that that's what Steveo does. Best to just ignore it rather than rise to the bait.

It's early days for ASP.NET MVC and you won't be surprised to hear there's been a lot of criticism of it over on the ALT.NET discussion group (although at times the most prolific posters just seem determined to diss anything that comes from Microsoft, and "debate" gets so heated and dismissive of anyone not spending 100% of their time looking at every possible implementation of every possible framework as being "lazy" it all needs taking with a large dose of salt).

That being said, documentation other than dry, incomplete MSDN-reference material has never been Microsoft's strong point, even when stuff is RTM. There's an Early Access Program edition of Manning Press' "ASP.NET MVC In Action" available (only a few chapters have been published so far) which may help?

stevo_
Human after all

You've obviously got no context of what discussion is then if you don't take criticism..

If you want me to spell it out easier..

Go. Back.

Re. Write.

Minus. Frustration.

Add. Equality.

Don't you understand when making a comparison you should base each element on the same merits?

Its fatally obvious you are being bias when.. EVERY SINGLE POINT YOU MAKE IS BAD..

stevo_
Human after all

irascian wrote:
seang wrote: I'm still confused as to how you're adding to the discussion. You are still trying to attack me personally but it still is just making you look rude.If you'd been in the Coffeehouse for any significant period of time you'd know that that's what Steveo does.

I'd find its best to keep your personally issues with me to yourself, rather than trying to stack them here against me..

The OP has purpose to be awkward with me, he doesn't want criticism (or he wants me to sugar coat it in suck-arse social goodness).. you want to be awkward again because we've had the same issue in the past.. One might say "get over it"..

Bas
It finds lightbulbs.

stevo_ wrote:
you want to be awkward again because we've had the same issue in the past.. One might say "get over it"..

Actually, I agree. I think the blog post makes an incredibly poor and unfair comparison too, and I think this could've been pointed out and the whole issue could have been dismissed hours ago. But the conversation in this thread is so poor that nobody is going to touch it, now. So thanks.

PerfectPhase
"This is not war, this is pest control!" - Dalek to Cyberman

seang wrote:

(post's author here):
My main beef is the lack of documentation... as well, like webforms, the MVC is trying to be everything for all people and, well, that's a big bite!

Interesting, from most of the talks I heard by anyone involved with its development, the message seems very much to be 'this is not for everyone' almost to the extreme of it being a niche. Most people it seems are expected to stay with the current page model for some time.

Also have you seen the talks about MVC on visitmix.com?

stevo_
Human after all

Well, I'm actively aware I've destroyed the topic.. of which I apologize (but I don't think I've really destroyed a great topic).. My reasons for not sucking 'arse' on this are because my perspective is usually, you get what you give..

Write a crappy blog post insulting numerous developers needlessly (yes, developers actually made the mvc, not robots)

Then prepare not to get happy smiling faces in return..

Of course, most of the world does just smile and return an angelic response.. but thats not me..

But I'm bound by the laws of this forum as well as anyone here, so if you believe I've overstepped my mark, then feel free to initiate action.

Rossj

Crikey you wind me up.

stevo_ wrote:
Well, I'm actively aware I've destroyed the topic.. of which I apologize (but I don't think I've really destroyed a great topic)..

Your opinion, thanks for enforcing it and ensuring that anyone that doesn't agree with your opinion doesn't get the chance to have a conversation. Do you think I posted this because I like Django and it was critical of MVC, or that I thought it was worth trying to bring to the attention of the MVC team so they could see where people were struggling with it.

stevo_ wrote:

My reasons for not sucking 'arse' on this are because my perspective is usually, you get what you give..

Steve, I hate to be the one to break this to you, but being polite and respectful of other people's opinions is not sucking arse, it's just being polite and respectful. Can you *really* not see that, or do you get off on being 'that jerk on C9'?

stevo_ wrote:

Write a crappy blog post insulting numerous developers needlessly (yes, developers actually made the mvc, not robots)

I didn't read it as an insult, I read it as constructive criticism that'll help make the MVC framework better - but you, *anything* resembling criticism of your world view seems to justify baseless, unnecessary insults.

stevo_ wrote:

But I'm bound by the laws of this forum as well as anyone here...

Barely.

stevo_
Human after all

His post didn't illustrate anything, hence why I didn't think this was a good thread.. you say you want to illustrate problems to the mvc team so they can improve their product..

OK, guys; I found some random junk on the internet, some guy says our product is painful because he finds lambda expressions confusing..

Mmm, I'll get right on it..

You must be on glue if you thought any of that blog was constructive..

And hippy crap like respecting peoples opinions? what, does that even make sense?

If I said it was in my opinion that all white people are inbread rapists who deserve to be culled - would that mean people should be polite and tell me I'm wrong? no I'd well expect people to get a bit 'vocal'..

(and I am white, nor is that actually my opinion) before anyone wants to turn this into a 'PC'-fest).

Rossj

I refuse to believe you are like this off the Internet. Are you going to brum tomorrow? Gonna let me buy you a (decaf) coffee?

stevo_
Human after all

Hah, I'm not a bad person; and yea I'm more passive in life because people tend to voice their 'opinions' to the public..

I'd find it insulting if someone was to stand up infront of a bunch of people (me included) and ramble on like that, it influences people unfairly which frustrates me the most..

Tends to be, the internet is somewhat more unique for people being able to do that, so I imagine thats why..

Cause and effect, and all that..

And I was actually toying with jokingly asking you for a lift, fortunately for us all, I won't be going..

Rossj

stevo_ wrote:
Hah, I'm not a bad person; and yea I'm more passive in life because people tend to voice their 'opinions' to the public..

Well I'm no different IRL than I am here, but maybe I am just too laid back (at least until the 10th coffee).

stevo_ wrote:
I'd find it insulting if someone was to stand up infront of a bunch of people (me included) and ramble on like that, it influences people unfairly which frustrates me the most..

I think you over-estimate the effect of blog posts on people, but regardless if one developer with some asp.net experience finds it difficult in places surely it makes sense for Microsoft to focus on smoothing over the rough edges if they can.

There are plenty of comments on Sean's blog being critical of his ability, but even after all this time ASP.Net frustrates me enough at times that I have to let off steam before my computers ends up two floors down in various pieces.

stevo_ wrote:
And I was actually toying with jokingly asking you for a lift, fortunately for us all, I won't be going..

Fortunately for you, you haven't seen my driving Smiley

Maybe next time (at the MSDN roadshow in Manc)?