Slashdot Mirror
Java To Overtake C/C++ in 2002
jarek writes "ZDNET has an article that talks about latest research data.
It talks about how Java is overtaking C/C++ next year. The article also talks about developers adopting linux and putting linux to use in mission critical tasks." It's evidently taking developers from the C/C++, but also the Visual Basic camps, with strong growth overseas.
The word overtake is questionable here. Do we mean that more developers will be using it (that's what they mean), or that all that the tasks that those languages have previously been put to will be done in Java?
I think we can make a pretty good case that right around the same time, three toolkits came into existance, the Java widget set (SWING, I believe), Gtk+ and Qt. I notice that 99% of the apps on my Windows desktop are the old C++-based MFC widgets, and my Linux desktop is split between Qt and Gtk+. I never see a Java app unless it's the back-end technology for a Web site (but, more often that's PHP, Perl, Python or VB).
So, from whence comes this figure?
Well, most of it is based on the growth of Java as a wizzy buzz-language in the dot-com startup arena 1-2 years ago. Some of it is based on the fact that in the financial market, in-house apps are very often written in Java because it's something they can hire hordes of programmers to write, and it keeps them happy because their skill-sets are current. Remember, these are the folks that bought WAY into COBOL....
Java's a cool language, and I actually think it puts C++ to shame in terms of the cleanliness of its OO system, but it's just not useable for most of the large-scale development out there (can you imagine how much slower Mozilla or GCC would be if they were written in Java?)
C will continue to be the right language to choose, but C++ will continue to be chosen a large percentage of the time because people only think about the performance of critical sections not the maintainability or cleanliness of development.
Troll? No, just firm opinions that I have formed over the last 10 years watching first C++ and then Java become the darling languages of the "if it's OO it's good" programming set (not that the converse is true either....)
I don't see number of developers as being all that meaningful a measurement. I'd guess that the vast bulk of Java development is for relatively small applets and servelets, and since that sort of programming is considerably easier than serious application and OS development, the bar for being a Java developer is lower than for being a C/C++ developer. Developer hours, though harder to measure, would probably provide a more meaningful representation of how "big" a language has become.
That being said, unlike a lot of posters here, I don't see speed as being a permanent impediment to Java's growth. We're already at the point where some serious Java apps are fast enough for everyday use, and I expect that to be more true over time as a) hardware continues to get faster and b) OS support for Java gets faster and more integrated. Mac OS X does a truly beautiful job of integrating Java support into the OS (ironically, better than anything from Sun itself) and some Linux solutions aren't far behind.
And it's nice to hear that it's taking market share from VB. Java may never live up to Sun's early visions of taking over the desktop, but if it helps slow down or even stop the progression of VB/C#/.NET (and yes, I know these are three different things, but they're all clearly connected as elements of Kaiser Bill's Evil Plan) then that's a good thing.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Seriously, folks. Does one avoid taking this kind of study with a grain of salt simply because it supports a Slashdot Approved Technology?
If this had been a study sponsored by Microsoft presented at a Microsoft conference supporting Microsoft technologies, people would be gathering up the pitchforks and flaming torches.
Feel free to mod this down to the pits of Hell, but we both know it's true.
OK I've read a dozen or so posts dissing Java because it's "Stupid" or "Slow" or "None of the apps I run are written in Java" or whatever -- which forces me to say this: Programmers who write in Java are writing code for distributed enterprise applications. They're professional computer programmers, not ether breathing geeks such as ourselves. I say it's waaaay past time that we all collectively pull our heads out of our asses and realize that the world doesn't revolve around Linux/Perl/GCC and Kernel patches!! There's a whole world of programmers out there (who DON'T generally post to this forum because they're too busy getting work done) who don't live and breath everything Linux day in and day out. They work for a living.
End of Rant.
Unfortuantely I see Java being used more and more as a teaching language in universities, ergo more and more developers graduating out of schools are learning Java. Very few college programs will teach anything like C or C++ when they can teach object oriented programming using Java. These developers then move into the private sector and recommend developing using Java to their superiors. It's a vicious cycle. this is also the natural progression for those who are "saved" by Object Oriented methodologies.