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I have been making a living for over 15 years with primarily, Microsoft products. Whether I like it or not, they help me get paid.
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Exactly. I've been writing code to Microsoft since DOS 1.1. MS is as good a platform as any, better than some.
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My university years were spent on VAX/VMS systems and I can understand why you are grateful to Microsoft.
The concept of an IDE was foreign to my entire degree course.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
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GuyThiebaut wrote: The concept of an IDE
What? You didn't have those wonderful VT100s? They gave access to the editor, compiler, linker, debugger... all from one big solid device. 
Well, OK, we also had Turbo Pascal to show us what we were missing.
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It was back in 1988 so I don't remember much other than the orange dumb terminals and the 2 hours of logon time we had in the first year.
Yes 2 hours of computer time on a computer science degree course!
They wanted to train us to figure everything out on paper and use the 2 hours for just typing in and running the code.
So the IDE was in effect paper and pencil 
I looked up the VT100 and it looks fairly advanced.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
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That was actually how I learned as well...paper and pencil...get away from the computer to do your actual writing and thinking...it was actually sort of better but took longer...not fast enough to suit today's environment.
I kinda miss those 80x25 screen layout grids...things were so much simpler before 'WYSIWYG'.
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DaveX86 wrote: paper and pencil...get away from the computer to do your actual writing and thinking...it was actually sort of better
Yes, much better. At least for student-sized projects. 
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Wow! Blast from the past! I was in CS for a couple of years around that time. I think I had special graph paper (80 columns I think) for writing out programs in BASIC, Fortran, Pascal, and C. The lab was just a bunch of dumb terminals where you typed in your program, sent the job to the compiler and prayed. Homework was turned in on greenbar with code and results. The lab closed promptly at 8 each night which did not fit in with the part-time job I had to take at the time...that led to dropping out of uni and working 10 years in manufacturing before going back to finish. Everything was different in the late 90's! I remember feeling awestruck when I discovered that I could write and compile code at home, anytime I wanted! I hadn't been able to do that since retiring the TI-99/4a. Great times then and since! 
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
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I really liked the VT100 once I got to use one. I think we got some when we switched to the VAX. Prior to that we had a PDP-11/23 and used mostly MIME-2As emulating a VT52. On VMS we used DEC's Pascal, ED2, and scripts for building. And we liked it. IDE? No, thanks. 
BDF
The internet makes dumb people dumber and clever people cleverer.
-- PaulowniaK
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The high school computer lab (circa 1983) had a VT52, a VT100, a couple of VT100 clones (Wyse?), and the all-important DECwriter hard-copy terminal. These connected to a PDP 11 (/75?).
Most of my college classes were on DEC equipment as well, but a few used PCs, ergo Turbo Pascal and Turbo C. The biggest benefit of the PCs was the ability keep a soft copy of what we wrote.
I'm sure DEC made a large effort to ensure that their equipment was in all the colleges in Massachusetts.
Big Daddy Farang wrote: And we liked it.
Yes, indeed.
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We were able to keep soft copies on floppy disks. As you would expect, these were the 8 inch floppy disks. I had one that was two-sided. You could turn it over and use the other side. It said right on it, "flippy" disk.
BDF
The internet makes dumb people dumber and clever people cleverer.
-- PaulowniaK
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Oh NOOOO! (Said the Hazeltine 1500 Terminal with the BIG UGLY orange letters)
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No, it had upper case, lower case and (some) symbols. Actually, the 1500 was one of the best all-around (very) dumb terminals of the time. Unfortunately, I was a poor CS student at the time and I couldn't afford it, so I ended up buying the HeathKit machine and then spent a whole summer with a soldering iron in one hand and a creased and worn assembly manual on the other ... not that any one of us buzzards highly respectable developers would do anything like that today! 
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VT100's and RSX 11/M. I had a hallelujia breakdown when they came out with the 102's!
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Believe it or not, I still work on a VAX system (when my primary customer gives me the time).
If I have my way, the system will be moved to a Windows solution as soon as I find a bucket of spare time.
Charlie Gilley
<italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape...
"Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
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charlieg wrote: I still work on a VAX system
Details!
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It's a manufacturing system from circa 1981 (I think when DEC was breaking out). Lots of reporting, *very* custom sorting (makes my eyes water), all FORTRAN 66 (think short variable names).
Years ago, there was a "consultant" whose one claim to fame was to keep the VAX running. He had it in his basement. I have no idea how much $$ he made supporting this vax, but if you know anything about the DEC hardware back then, it was built like a tank. They just sit in the corner and run.
The system has now been migrated to a VAX emulation system (Charon VAX) that runs on a $500 PC.
Charlie Gilley
<italic>Stuck in a dysfunctional matrix from which I must escape...
"Where liberty dwells, there is my country." B. Franklin, 1783
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
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charlieg wrote: Years ago, there was a "consultant" whose one claim to fame was to keep the VAX running. He had it in his basement. I have no idea how much $$ he made supporting this vax, but if you know anything about the DEC hardware back then, it was built like a tank. They just sit in the corner and run.
They certainly did and they certainly were. At that company I worked at (circa 1982) we were using a big PDP-11/44 running RSX/11M. There were something like 6 RL02 units plugged into it (those cool 10MEGA BYTE removable hard drives) and we finally got a big 80MEGA BYTE fixed disk. This system supported 15 developers on a network of VT100 terminals too. We wrote a heck of a lot of software (DEC FORTRAN and Assembler) on that system.
Toward the end of my time there we started getting mini-VAX system which I didn't get a chance to work on but they (like the PDP) were really tough. We were installing that hardware in water and wastewater treatment plants.
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I like their stuff, especially recently.
I prefer the general development ecosystem on Linux based platforms. But the amount of really high powered tools and technologies in the Microsoft toolchain that "Make it easy to do big things" makes development fun again.
But I'll always be a pure "platform agnostic" C++/perl/SQL guy at heart.
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mikepwilson wrote: "Make it easy to do big things"
Unfortunately, it can lead to making small things more difficult.
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Thus they are a necessary evil.
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That's the spirit! Just enjoying the "coolness" of what you're doing without all the analysis and paralysis. Good for you! 
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VT100 was advanced technology! How about an IBM 360 with punch cards via COBOL! First program ever was 250 lines(cards). Got the program back from the University data center and it had 700 errors! lol. (circa 1970). C# and .Net have been great but I think the industry is now embracing JavaScript (TypeScript would be nice) and Angular along with a barrage of JS libraries. Microsoft has some serious catching up to do. They should have made .NET native to the IE browser. Never developed anything in Silverlight but it was a good idea. Cheers to all.
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Tim Carmichael wrote: Since I stopped developing almost exclusively on VAX/VMS, I have worked with Microsoft based systems.
Looks like we old farts all have something in common! 
I still remember the day in '92 I decided I'd learn Windows instead of MacOS. I had 2 books in front of me - Petzold's Programming Windows 3.1 and a couple of Mac programming manuals. After a brief read, I decided to go with Windows. Owning a PC helped. I haven't looked back since. I continue to have a lot of respect for Apple's software and UX - I just don't program for it.
Have once again started to feel the rush as I delve into Android (using C# as a development platform). 
/ravi
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