Subscribe to
Posts
Comments
NSLog(); Header Image

Made With Code

The continued exposure of programs like Made with REALbasic confuse me. Do customers really care how an application is made?

It's happened at least once. When Mac OS X was first introduced, "Made with Cocoa!" was an effective marketing strategy. Customers wanted "the new thing." Time, dissemination of knowledge, and a little work from Apple have erased the perceived and actual gaps between Cocoa and Carbon. It doesn't seem to matter much how something is constructed.

The "MWRb" program is even more puzzling. Rb has long had a reputation as a poor construction kit, so advertising the fact that your application is an Rb app may turn away customers. Furthermore, unlike "free" technologies like Carbon, Cocoa, Java, et al, REALbasic is a product - the only product - of a third-party company. A "Made with REALbasic" badge is nothing but free advertising for REAL Software, Inc.

Who cares how something is constructed so long as it works?

9 Responses to "Made With Code"

  1. It was designed to give some free advertising to small-time developers in exchange for some free advertising for REAL. It's somewhat attractive after the hit your wallet takes after purchasing.

  2. It's part advertising, part geek pride. Sort of like "Made with a Mac" badges in web sites.

  3. Who cares how something is constructed so long as it works?

    Well the folks at Perversion Tracker seem to care... but not in a good way 🙂

  4. A "Made with Java" label would be a negative for a Mac user who likes their software to work with Services.

  5. Remember those "Best viewed in Foo Browser 3.14" badges that people sometimes put on their sites, and then someone came up a badge that says "Best viewed in any browser!" or "Best viewed in a browser!" or something like that? Someone should do that for this. I'd like to start seeing sites advertising that their programs are "Made With Code!" or "Written in 100% Pure Syntax!"

  6. I'd like to point out that REALbasic's poor reputation is not deserved. The real reason for it isn't that REALbasic is bad, it's that people who suck at coding find REALbasic easier to learn than other languages, and thus churn out terrible programs. It's not REALbasic that's bad, it's the newbie coders that are bad. REALbasic is actually quite nice, especially for cross-platform work.

  7. “Best viewed with your eyes” was one of my favourite 90s Web-isms. Nice one, Adam!

    I have to say, “Made with REALbasic” is actually enough to make me hit ‘back’ — it suggests that the developers aren't capable enough to use another technology, that they haven't the sense to use something free*, or any number of other disparaging statements.

    * (Python + PyObjC, anyone? You can build Python Cocoa apps in Xcode! Or if you want cross platform, how about wxWindows?)

  8. Like John said, it's a reciprocal thing. Most developers (I think, a majority could just do it because they want to, I guess) participate with REALsoftware's "Made with REALbasic" program. REALbasic offers certain services and in return gets the advertising from the programs. What it says to the consumer, however, is up to anyone's guess. My first thought of a REALbasic applications is "bloated" because of the inflated file sizes, but that doesn't make them bad apps.

  9. Just take a look at all of the "Behind the Blog" badges on this page. Do we care that you use MySQL for this page? 🙂