>I don't see how you could ever be stuck with the direction MM.Net goes in. If it changed significantly you can always choose not to upgrade and you have all the source code to maintian yourself if you like.

Yet another who doesn't get the point! I'm not specifically attacking MM.NET, I'm just saying a commercial framework will never be quite as flexible as your own.

>If a developer like myself, having little .net experience, wants to write a really robust commercial application that uses a database and have it be flexible and scalable it would take many hours of research to be able to build the framework for that application. MM.Net allows me to build a commercial application without all that research. Sure I might not have learned as much as I would have rolling my own but why would I want to learn how to write a flexible data access class when it only needs to be written once.
>

It doesn't take that many hours of experience, at least not many more then learning a commercial framework like MM.NET. I think most of the people in here know HOW to write a flexible Data Access class, (at least I hope). I mean there are some serious conceptual changes of .NET from other languages, but those need to be learned no matter what framework you use.


>The other benefit of using a commercial framework is you have many, many users testing the framework in other applications built on that framework.
>

Now, this is a great benefit that is more difficult to get if you write your own. This is the first point, which I would give to commerical frameworks.

>The .Net framework itself is a commercial framework.

Techincally it is. Just like Microsoft is lik ANY other computer software company.. Hmmm... Yeah.. .NET Framework is commerical true, but that is like saying Yoda was just another plan Jedi.

>IMO, all Kevin has done is give us features now, many of which will eventually be in the .Net framework. For example two-way data binding in MM.Net now will eventually be a feature in ASP.NET out of the box. I think you could say Kevin is making the .Net framework what it is supposed to be and what it will be eventually.
>
he might make some great features that will be coming, but it is scary to have a small group of ppl.. (even if they are UTers) determine the direction of ASP.NET or .NET.

That is a pretty bold statement saying where it is "suppose" to be and where it will be. It might be a nice framework, but after all.. It started in FoxPro, how good could it REALLY be? (Sorry.. needed to take a shot at VFP).

>Using a commercial framework that you have confidence in allows business and developers to focus on what makes money, business rules. This has always been the intention of .Net, Kevin is just helping it along.

Making money is the point, but I think in the long run, you will have less headaches, better skills as a developer, and more flexible and solid product, if you build your own framework. IMHO.

Morgan