Anti-Microsoft zealots generally annoy the you-know-what’s out of me so it surprised the-other-you-know-what’s out of me when I joined them briefly.
When I updated my PC it came with Windows XP Home. Fair enough, I think. It was only when I delved a little deeper that I found out you couldn’t run Personal Web Server on it – a functionality I needed to develop web sites using databases. Oh crap, I think, and then hit Google looking for answers. Apparently Microsoft have made sure that if you want PWS then you need to fork over an additional $400 for the ‘Professional’ version. Bugger that, I think, I’m not paying four hundred bucks for one tiny piece of software.
Well it took me a day and a half of searching and fiddling but my spanky new machine is now running Apache web server and ChilliSoft ASP – Apache is free and the ASP server was free for developers.
Sorry Microsoft, that’s $400 of mine I am keeping.