The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 4 (of 5) - What does "Our Technology" mean?

What does "Our Technology" mean?

I often hear people use the term "Our Technology" to describe their software. In fact I just read this on Eric Sinks blog:

http://software.ericsink.com

<<
Is Hatteras based on technology from Vault?

No. Just like Vault, Hatteras is built on SQL Server as the underlying repository store.
>>

Now what technology does Vault actually implement itself? I mean it takes data from a file and stores it in a database using ADO.NET. Perhaps it implements a web service or some other such nonsense but who cares? I do that all the time? What's so special about that?

So when companies use "our technology", I always take it to mean these guys made something new, when most of the time it means 'we made something useful out of existing technology.'

Is 'our technology' just a marketing term?

(Sorry to pick on Mr. Sink I think Vault is the best and do in fact use it myself.)

Anon
Wednesday, May 26, 2004

You can thank Microsoft for overloading the word "technology" to mean "reinventing the wheel our special way". I think there is a timeline with the precise date the term was overloaded in the Redmond museum.

hoser
Wednesday, May 26, 2004

> Is Hatteras based on technology from Vault?

Is Hatteras based on Vault software? You may ask because they're superfically similar: in that Hatteras, like Vault, but unlike Visual SourceSafe (Microsoft's other version control system), uses SQL as its repository.

> Is 'our technology' just a marketing term?

Usually it's a synonym for "our software".

Except, in Canada you can get an R&D tax credit for making a "technological advance" but not for a "technical advance".

Christopher Wells
Wednesday, May 26, 2004

I wouldn't be so quick to point the finger at Microsoft for this crime. Actually I think its more likely to be something like 'The Six Million Dollar Man' or somesuch. "We have the technology, we can rebuild him."

But what it actually means is that 'we made this product, and we made it so that other people can make other products and we can say, they are using our technology'. That is all.

Simon Lucy
Thursday, May 27, 2004

If you write an Access application, then you have something based on a Microsoft product.

But what if you write libraries for using files as data stores with some concurrent locking code and optimization routines; then you produce an application using those libraries to provide the data stores?

"Is the back end Access or MySQL?"
"No, we wrote the application using our own data storage [blank]" <- what word would *you* put in the blank?

Philo

Philo
Thursday, May 27, 2004

Philo,

Sadly, I actually was on a doomed project that actually did that. Good taste prevents me from quoting my word for [blank].

Bill Rushmore
Thursday, May 27, 2004

Whenever my wife would ask me to fill in the [blank], I'd say "monkey".

She rarely asks anymore...

KC
Thursday, May 27, 2004

<<we wrote the application using our own data storage [blank] >>

We wrote the application using our own data storage method.

Anon
Thursday, May 27, 2004

I'm absolutely certain [blank] has been censored for the sake of the kiddies.

You have my sympathies; "the database" is not on my list of wheels only because I've never worked for anyone stupid enough to ask me to reinvent it. Well, at least they stopped after I gave them the broad hints that it would be a Really Bad Idea (TM).

Mikayla
Thursday, May 27, 2004