Michal Paszkiewicz

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Hololens, Raspberry Pi2, Core CLR

A lot of good news is always welcome. A lot of good news for Microsoft developers is especially more than welcome! It looks like we are starting to arrive at a new era of Microsoft development, and here I will try to explain what is going on.

Microsoft is going open source!

Many of you already know this, but most people have not heard about this and quite a few people don't really understand the concept of open source.

Open source code is code that can be copied, changed and used by ANYONE. A lot of major companies keep their code to themselves, to help ensure that noone discovers vulnerabilities in their systems, or tries to steal their work.

Microsoft has previously been notoriously closed source, shrouded by secrecy. The move to open source means that one of the world's most valuable countries is now trying to work with the coding community. By releasing their code to the public, we will now find a lot more people with in depth understanding of Windows, of programming skills and we will see geniuses raised with incredible understanding of how everything works from the bottom to the top. Or, we may also see tonnes of people exploiting bugs in Microsoft systems - but then, eventually, this will also mean there will be a decrease in them.

Microsoft is currently sticking all of its code on a popular file-sharing site called GitHub. Most C# developers are going berzerk due to the release of the Core CLR code. CLR is the Command Language Runtime and is the engine of all .NET development. For more info, check this thing out! That's right, please use Wikipedia more. Scott Hanselman, one of my favourite programmers (who is YOUR favourite programmer?) has kindly ran the CoreCLR GitHub repo through Power BI to get us some statistics. This stuff is crazy - additions and deletions on the scale of hundreds of thousands.

Raspberry Pi 2

The Raspberry Pi 2 is now on the market for just $35. This new release may not be exciting for everyone, but Microsoft developers must surely be happy that the newest Pi now has an ARMv7 processor that will work a lot faster and even let you run Microsoft Windows 10! Wowza!

Hololens

Last, but definitely not least, we are seeing the introduction of the Hololens.

Everyone had best hide their google glasses, because they are about to be severely outclassed.

Watch this video and try very hard to realise that this technology is not sci-fi, but something just around the corner.

It is clear that not everything in this video has already been achieved, but what we can be sure about, is that with the new technologies coming out, these things WILL be possible to achieve.

Software developers as a group are now going to need to spend more time thinking about creating 3D visualisations. For many, this is a nightmare. But for the rest of us, this looks like a field of opportunities.