> the arrival of the smartphone changed everything.
>
>You've said this several times and I honestly don't follow. How does this affect the DBMS features in SQL Server? Or maybe I've misunderstood your point.

John can certainly speak for himself so I won't try to speak for him. I don't think his point was about SQL Server at all; it was that the focus is increasingly on mobile devices. Here is another data point to add to that POV. The speaker at my local .NET user group last week was a guy named Clark Sell, of Microsoft. He is not the smarmy or sales-y type at all. One of his main points was that users increasingly prefer mobile devices. He said (paraphrased) that desktop apps have not gone away but if you ignore the newer platforms you are doing yourself a disservice. It was not a push for Windows Phone or any other Microsoft technology; it was a high level discussion of current strategic directions.

http://clarksell.info/