Hot fixes issue and the Java world

microsoft.public.dotnet.framework

12 Dec 2006 2:41 PM

Spartaco Giubbolini

This is something I have always thought about since a few months ago, when I
subscribed to the kbalerts newsletter, that notifies you whenever a new KB
article is added to the MS knowledge base.

Well, I noticed that almost every week a new bug is found for the .net
framework and sometimes there are fixes for problems, some other times no,
but anyway, these fixes are available only by calling a technical support.
Most of the times they also say to wait for the next service pack release,
if you do not have the problems that the fix correct, rather than installing
it.

Now, 2 years after the launch of the 2.0 release of the .net framework, we
have the 3.0 release, meanwhile a lot of bugs with related hotfixes have
been released for the earlier versions, and developers are still waiting for
this "service pack" release...

Let's see what happens in the Java world: public hotfixes are released
periodically and installed automatically so you are quite sure that at least
the most known problems are fixed in your VM, and I feel confortable with
this, I feel like there is a real support that always keeps you updated.

Why this is not happening with MS? Why waiting so long until a new public
service pack release, why is OUR business checking for hotfixes after hours
of debugging around a known bug, instead of THEIR interest in making the
developpers life easier?

I could continue by saying how much serious is this approach, but I stop
now.

thanks to everybody