The return of multi-platform, part two

Building software to run on one platform is hard. Building software to run on multiple platforms is harder. So why would one? The short answer is: Because you have to.

When Microsoft dominated IT, one could live entirely within the Microsoft world. Microsoft provided the operating system (Windows), the programming languages (Visual Basic, Visual C++, C#, and others), the programming tools (Visual Studio), the database (SQL Server), the web server (IIS), the authentication server (ActiveDirectory), the office suite (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook), the search engine (Bing), cloud services (Azure), ... everything you needed. For any question you could pose (in IT), Microsoft had an answer.

But the world is a large place, larger than any one vendor and any one vendor's offerings. Ask enough questions, try to do enough things, and you eventually find a question for which the vendor has no answer (or no suitable answer).

Microsoft's world ends at mobile devices. The Surface tablets and Windows phones have seen dismal acceptance. Instead, people (and companies) have adopted devices from Apple and Google. If you want a solution in the mobile space, you have to work with those two. (Well, you can limit your offerings to the Microsoft platforms, at the cost of a large portion of the market. You may be unwilling to make that trade-off.)

Microsoft has decided to expand to multiple platforms. They offer Word and Excel on Android and iOS devices, which means that Microsoft is *not* willing to limit themselves to Windows mobile devices. They are not willing to make the trade-off.

Beyond office applications, Microsoft has started to open its .NET framework and CLR runtime for other platforms (notably Linux).

With Microsoft embracing the notion of multi-platform, other vendors may soon follow. I suspect Apple will remain a "closed, everything Apple" company -- but they focus on consumers, not enterprises. Vendors of enterprise software (IBM, Oracle, SAS, etc.) will look to operate on multiple platforms. IBM has supported Linux for quite some time.

Microsoft's support of multiple platforms gives legitimacy to the notion. It's now "okay" to support multiple platforms.

The mobile/cloud revolution has no center

In some ways, the mobile/cloud market is a re-run of the PC revolution. But not completely.

The PC revolution of the 1980s (which saw rise of the IBM PC, PC-DOS, and related technologies) introduced new hardware that was cheaper and easier to use than the previous technologies of mainframes and minicomputers. Today's mobile/cloud revolution shares that aspect, with cloud-based services and mobile devices cheaper than their PC-based counterparts. It's much easier to use a phone or tablet than it is to use a PC -- ask the person who installs software.

The early PC systems, while cheaper and easier to use, were much less capable than the mainframe and minicomputer systems. People ran large corporations on mainframes and small businesses on minicomputers; PCs were barely able to print and handle a few spreadsheets. It was only after PC-compatible networks and network-aware software (Windows 3.1, Microsoft Exchange) that one could consider running a business on PCs. Mobile/cloud shares this attribute, too. Phones and tablets are network-aware, of course, but the whole "mobile and cloud" world is too new, too different, too strange to be used for business. (Except for some hard-core folks who insist on doing it.)

Yet the two revolutions are different. The PC revolution had a definite center: the IBM PC at first, and Windows later. The 1980s saw IBM as the industry leader: IBM PCs were the standard unit for business computing. Plain IBM PCs at first, and then IBM PC XT units, and later IBM PC-compatibles. There were lots of companies offering personal computers that were not IBM-compatible; these offerings (and their companies) were mostly ignored. Everyone wanted "in" on the IBM PC bandwagon: software makers, accessory providers, and eventually clone manufacturers. It was IBM or nothing.

The mobile/cloud revolution has no center, no one vendor or technology. Apple devices are popular but no vendors are attempting to sell clones in the style of PC clones. To some extent, this is due to Apple's nature and their proprietary and closed designs for their devices. (IBM allowed anyone to see the specs for the IBM PC and invited other vendors to build accessories.)

Apple is not the only game in town. Google's Android devices compete handily with the Apple iPhone and iPad. Google also offers cloud services, something Apple does not. (Apple's iCloud product is convenient storage but it is not cloud services. You cannot host an application in it.)

Microsoft is competing in the cloud services area with Azure, and doing well. It has less success with it's Surface tablets and Windows phones.

Other vendors offer cloud services (Amazon.com, IBM, Oracle, SalesForce) and mobile devices (BlackBerry). Today's market sees lots of technologies. It is a far cry from the 1980s "IBM or nothing" mindset, which may show that consumers of IT products and services have matured.

When there is one clear leader, the "safe" purchasing decision is easy: go with the leader. If your project succeeds, no one cares; if your project fails you can claim that even "big company X" couldn't handle the task.

The lack of a clear market leader makes life complicated for those consumers. With multiple vendors offering capable but different products and services, one must have a good understanding of the projects before selecting a vendor. Success is still success, but failure allows others to question your ability.

Multiple competing technologies also means competition at a higher level. In the PC revolution, IBM and Compaq competed on technology, but the basic platform (the PC) was a known quantity. In mobile/cloud, we see new technologies from start-up companies such as containers and new technologies from the established vendors such as cloud management and the Swift programming language.

The world of mobile and cloud has no center, and as such it can move faster than the old PC world. Keep that in mind when building systems and selecting vendors. Be prepared for bumps and turns.