Java? It's So Nineties
Java? It's So Nineties
Peter Yared, CEO of software maker ActiveGrid, spent a critical chapter of his career steeped in Java, the programming language developed by Sun Microsystems (SUNW ). In the late 1990s, Yared was chief technology officer of NetDynamics, which pioneered an application server designed to boost the performance of Web sites. It was based squarely on then wildly popular Java. He went on to spend five years as an executive at Sun. So it's especially surprising that Yared holds this view: "Java is a dinosaur."
Peter Yared, CEO of software maker ActiveGrid, spent a critical chapter of his career steeped in Java, the programming language developed by Sun Microsystems (SUNW ). In the late 1990s, Yared was chief technology officer of NetDynamics, which pioneered an application server designed to boost the performance of Web sites. It was based squarely on then wildly popular Java. He went on to spend five years as an executive at Sun. So it's especially surprising that Yared holds this view: "Java is a dinosaur."
posted by vmguy at 12:57 PM
3 Comments:
I haven't read his position on why Java is a dinosaur, but I could speculate on a couple of reasons why he would say that.
First, Java is ten years old; it's reached maturity, and is in widespread use. Perhaps it has hit the crest of major innovation, and is at that point in its lifecycle where it's going to ride the wave of mainstream adoption, until another, newer systems programming language comes along and disrupts Java. It happened to C, why shouldn't it happen to Java? (although I don't know what the new challenger would be, or if it's out there yet)
Or, it could be that the rise in scripting languages has everybody confusing systems programming languages for "jurassic". It annoys me that people confuse the two types of languages (i.e., Perl/JavaScript/PHP/etc. vs. C/C++/Java/etc.). Different kinds of languages serve different purposes; we're at a point in web-based development where scripting languages are more useful than ever, but they don't do everything.
In my opinion, the best paper written that describes the differences b/w these kinds of languages was written by John Ousterhout, inventor of TCL:
http://home.pacbell.net/ouster/scripting.html
I'll stop there, and let you ponder that for a while.
An article providing broader coverage of
Peter's remarks, and why he made them.
* NetDynamics sells servers that don't depend on Java.
* He prefers Open Source LAMP
* Java usage is slipping among developers
* .NET usage grew in Europe and Asia, exceeding Java usage
* Java books are still popular at O'Reilly, but AJAX books grew 68%
* Google and Yahoo don't depend on Java.
* Newer programming tools are lighter weight than Java
* Red Hat: "If you want to do more sophisticated things, you have to use Java"
* Merrill Lynch: "Linux and Apache are superior at math-intensive apps" ... "it's closer to the metal (than Java)"
* Jupiter Report: 62% of midsize businesses have adopted .NET ... 36% for IBM's WebSphere"
* Microsoft: ""The future of Java is to become an underlying programming framework that nobody makes any money on,"
* IBM stands by it's committment to Java. "The culture at IBM isn't to get enamored with one technology"
* IBM is hedging it's bets: IBM is hedging its bets. Earlier this year, it threw its weight behind PHP as a Web programming language.
Jason Hines Java WebLog
grrr, why doesn't blogger offer an editor for blog comments? I'd rather hide this long URL.
http://www.informit.com/discussion/index.asp?postid=0aa00dd0-3534-451b-bfb5-4d860d38a159
2005 Java Predictions
1. Growth of J2EE in production environments
* .NET is not gaining ground. No major players.
2. Open Source
* Very little JBoss; No Geronimo
* JBoss/TomCat only used for internal apps
3. Market Consolidation
* IBM and BEA own the market
* Oracle fighting an uphill battle
Unforseen: Sun open source Application Server.
2006 Predictions
1. Application Server Vendor Consolidation
* None. Vendors focusing on long-term strategy
2. IDE Market
* Borland owned the market; it disappeared under Eclipse.
* People love open source
* Surprise entry: Sun Studio Enterprise
3. Java 5
* Cleaner interface; considerably more value
* 2005 3 quarters of no activity.
* 2006 WebLogic, WebSphere, JBoss all support Java5
* 60-70% of new activity on Java5
4. Java EE 5 and EJB3
* Biggest improvement to Java enterprise since it's inception
* No commercial offerings until 2006Q3
* Specification final by JavaOne?
5. Beyond the hype
* SOA and Web Services move beyond hype
* Early adopters provided better technology for implementation
* single interface between J2EE and .NET
6. Embracing the hype
* AJAX is the hottest new technology
"Asynchronous Javascript and XML"
For web based clients
Call back to server to refresh the gui, not the page
Web Apps feel more like local apps
* 2006 spent learning how NOT to use AJAX
7. Sun
* dumbfounded by Sun Open Source initiative
* Too late for commercial server offering; Prime player in open source
* OpenSolaris will give linux a run -- CIO's trust Sun
* 2006 will be Sun's year to blossom, build community and market share
* Not sure if services/support can support the business model
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