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Like others I've been caught off-guard by the new Platform. I collaborate with other Telerik users and we've shared similar thoughts, some of which have already been expressed in this forum but I'll itemize for completeness.
- Now that we understand where RadControls/DevCraft/UI fits, we're OK. It took a while to get there.
- Concerned about a shift from Visual Studio to a new IDE. Despite marketing reassuring us to the contrary, we're going to be wanting for a number of features and can only hope Telerik responds quickly enough.
- Too new to recommend for new development, and yet this seems like the ideal platform. That's a very frustrating position to be in. We want to start using it but fear the ramifications.
- As with any new tech, the best approach to a new project with this would be to not make commitments based on deadlines. If we commit to functionality by a given date, and Telerik can't help us to deliver, people will be unhappy. To eliminate that, develop first, and when it works, tell people what's already there. But don't make any promises for the future.
- Here's yet another platform that's going to vie for our time, like Silverlight, MVC, HTML5, each of the mobile OS's, and every one of the frameworks that "simplify" development. We've been down this path before and it's dark. Xamarin, PhoneGap, and other tools all have their issues and concerns and we're going to need to figure out the new concerns for the Telerik Platform as fast as possible so that we can see where it fits, and not. I really hope Telerik will provide technical marketing materials to get us over the humps quickly so that we don't need to struggle in the school of hard knocks like we do everywhere else. We've done this too many times and it's tough to buy into yet another "does everything" platform - even for those of us who love Telerik and everything they produce.
- Not sure how our existing code fits with the new platform. We have Business and Data access classes for our own data sources. How do we call these functions within the platform framework? Do we host these components and call them via web services? So a mobile client will be calling to Telerik's servers for analytics and the other value-add features, And to our servers for rules? We can deal with that. But we can't limit our development to only the languages, database models, and services that Telerik provides or certifies.
- There needs to be more separation of user roles in access to projects. Managers should view analytics from a live app, not all developers. A software house will write software for an end-user. Each entity needs access to code, analytics, etc. We need to work out situations where one party writes an app for ad
revenue, and passes the app to someone else for analytics and other ownership/management rights. We need to be able to clone or share code or projects between accounts. - People are uptight about "single point of failure" with Telerik servers and Telerik as a business entity. It's not that we don't trust the company but that it's traumatic for any company to put it's complete faith in any other company, especially for a new platform. And with cloud solutions, shared hosts, email providers, and other SOA/SaaS, people are used to this kind of thing now, whether they realize it or not, but they need to be re-sold on it with every new opportunity. In addition to selling our offerings we now need to convince our clients that it's a good balance to accept this relationship as a price for cross-platform development - oh yes, and the actual price too. And as resellers, or at least entities that recommend technology, we need to indemnify ourselves against failures of the platform in development and production.
- How many projects do we get per account? What happens to projects that we put on hold? How do we ensure that we have control over our IP?
- What about companies or government agencies that need more control over their source, or where open sourcing or public domain is a requirement? We need to work out if and how we can sell apps into these sector which are dependent upon Telerik and it's "closed" (?) silo.
- Not sure off-hand if Kendo UI comes with the Platform. As DevCraft/UI subscribers we're now wondering if we need to subscribe to the platform And purchase Kendo licenses? This whole area is still a bit confusing. The Platform is used with HTML5. For hybrid/native apps we're assuming we need other for-fee components, and not sure how much non-Telerik technology we can bring to bear on Platform-hosted projects. So what are the requirements, the options, and the costs for various development scenarios?
- We're eager to get started but note a number of features that will go production sometime in 2014. That's great but that means we can't commit to many projects in 2014 using the Platform, until we see those features go production and then go through the first few bug/fix releases.
- And I'm confused about what I read here about Visual Studio Ultimate. Most serious .NET developers I know have Professional, v2010, v2012, and/or v2013. What are the requirements for the VS addins?
We could be basing a lot of our concerns on misconceptions. Please help us to understand and navigate this new ecosystem so that we can make good decisions quickly. Thanks.