Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!aries!mcdonald
From: mcdonald@aries.scs.uiuc.edu (Doug McDonald)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms
Subject: Re: Windows Programming
Message-ID: <1990Jun12.191500.5223@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu>
Date: 12 Jun 90 19:15:00 GMT
References: <1990Jun11.110735.13581@usenet@kadsma> <1990Jun12.010850.17716@sun.soe.clarkson.edu> <22139@boulder.Colorado.EDU> <NELSON.90Jun12132554@image.clarkson.edu> <22165@boulder.Colorado.EDU>
Sender: usenet@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (News)
Reply-To: mcdonald@aries.scs.uiuc.edu (Doug McDonald)
Organization: School of Chemical Sciences, Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Lines: 53

In article <22165@boulder.Colorado.EDU> wallwey@snoopy.Colorado.EDU (WALLWEY DEAN WILLIAM) writes:
>In article <NELSON.90Jun12132554@image.clarkson.edu> nelson@clutx.clarkson.edu writes:
>>....I understand that they
>>shouldn't give it away.  But they could *at most* sell it for the price
>>of the materials.
>
>MicroSoft isn't in software just for us programmers or to see Windows to
>become popular(although they would like it very much).  They are in it
>to make a profit!  The amount of money(and time) that MS has put into the 
>Windows SDK warrents that it be somewhat expensive. Also MicroSoft will
>charge what they think the market will accept.  (That is--The market
>that they want to sell to...) 
>
>As far as costs go, the manuals that came with my SDK 2.1, are probably
>worth $100 alone!  
Hogwash. Disks cost about $1.00 apiece. These is one manual worth anything at 
all - $20. So it should sell for roughly $60.

> The way that it should be paid for is by
>those who use it--the developers, not the users of windows, for they
>already have large enough costs as it is with the applications software.
>They shouldn't have to pay for your and my development utilities. 
>
The point is that morew programs make Windows sell more.

>Also the ~$325 mail order price is actually very good considering what
>can be done with it!  You can do alot more with the ~325 SDK kit than
>you can do say with comparable priced software like Lotus 1-2-3 ver 3.0
>or Excel or Word for Windows, etc. You have to think of it just as
>another application and a powerful one at that! 

Well, considering that a large fraction of the software I use daily 
costs exactly $0.00 ...............


>
>Another thing that the price does for MSWindows is make sure that only
>serious people use the development kit.  MSWindows programming, although
>not impossible, is not for the 'Average joe'.  This way MicroSoft can
>design the SDK and have their support for the "Big Guns" rather than
>hundreds of thousands of programmers.  I know this sounds elitist, but I
>think this is how MicroSoft views the world.
>
Problem is that that is not how the world works. A large part of popularity
comes from making things - uhhhh - "popular" rather than the opposite.

Also, I point out that Microsoft DOES NOT SUPPORT THE WINDOWS SDK per se.
If you buy it they give you **ABSOLUTELY NO SUPPORT AT ALL**. 
Their price is awfully high for a complex piece of stuff sold with absolutely
no support. (If you disbelive me, try calling them with a question - 
they will laugh at you - "IF you want support, pay us another thousand bucks".

Doug McDonald