Category IBM/Lotus

Ever notice when lots of little indictators slowly build momentum until the obvious is revealed? Websphere is coming on strong. It's most significant competitor is Microsoft's .NET, which is struggling to maintain a rapid pace of innovation as it integrates across Microsoft's server, client OSes and applications.

Last week, SDTimes had a great article on Microsoft's C# language. While the forthcoming C# 2.0 promises generics, iterators, anonymous methods and other significant advances, most developers whill not begin using them until the release of Visual Studio 2005, which SD Times has learned might be delayed until early 2006. Innovations emerge slowly from the Microsoft Cathedral.

Meanwhile, developers using the community-advanced Java language have breen enjoying generics since last September's release of Java 5, and are likely to gain a whole lot more when Java 6, code-named Mustang, is unleashed in 2006.

So, Java is looking good.

Then, I'm reading the BBC business section and find that Microsoft is looking soft on many fronts:

"Microsoft is in its most vulnerable moment in history, just like IBM in the 1990s," says George Colony, the chief executive of technology research firm Forrester.

So, why are questions about Microsoft coming from the financial page? Usually, it's the Open Source pundits and such who wag their fingers at Microsoft. Well, Microsoft's financials aren't looking so great. Jupiter research summarizes that the "core Office and Windows division revenues grew just slightly, along with Business Solutions products. MSN year-over-year revenue declined, fed in part by declining Internet access revenues. I am somewhat disturbed by the slow growth or declines in three of Microsoft's four profitable business divisions. "

Speaking of Open Source, BusinessWeek has an article criticizing the Microsoft funded studies which compare its OSes to Linux. "For example: a recent one put out by the Yankee Group. I just don’t trust its conclusions." Well, I find all of this discord over Microsoft oddly unifying--there are troubles abrewing for Microsoft's vision.

But, I haven't said anything about WebSphere, have I? All I have done is criticize Microsoft (or drawn together others to say it for me). I hope I'm not viewed as a Microsoft basher--I have deep respect for Bill Gates, and I think Windows 2003, especially, flat out rocks. That said, I also find that there are compelling reasons to choose other platforms and other systems for any number of tasks. So, how is WebSphere faring?

This time I went to my tried-and-true real-time meter for current value--the job market. If .NET is having trouble, then I'd expect that to have a positive impact on WebSphere. It doesn't have to, there is no economics formula that I can cite, just that I suspect these two jostling competitors to gain at the other's expense.

I like to use the Washington Post for gauging jobs in the Washington, DC area and I was genuinely shocked. I run a job query every few months, and WebSphere has been on the weak side, usually around ten or so offers. Today, I ran it again.