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James Gosling on Java

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the man-himself dept.

prostoalex writes "It's been ten years since the official introduction of Java - a programming language combined with virtual machine and a class library. ZDNet published an interview with James Gosling, the creator of Java, who talks about the project's past, present and future."

2 of 356 comments (clear)

  1. Re:If only by $RANDOMLUSER · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I think the speed complaint is a red herring.

    Yes, Java is slower to run than C++. However Java is faster to write than C++; and I think that's the real issue.

    In terms of power of expressivity, I think they're about the same, but I find Java easier to read than C++, and I find that mid-level programmers make far fewer subtle "shoot yourself in the foot" mistakes in Java than they do in C++. The run-time array bounds checking, lack of pointers, checked exceptions, and the lovely NullPointerException serve to keep a lot of people out of trouble. The embarrassing wealth of pre-written, tested, free, source-available modules Java has, over the reinvent-the-wheel approach of C++ goes a long way in improved programmer productivity. Here's a test for you: have one of your middle-skilled programmers do some network communication in Java and C++ and see which program takes less time to write and works better.

    --
    No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
  2. It's all about the sandbox by lonedroid · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Of the thousands of security holes that exists, on every OS, how many are due to buffer overflow (buffer overrun)?

    There are other attacks, but most of the "exploits" are due to a buffer overflow (90% of all exploits? 95%?). Heck, if I'm am not mistaken it was a buffer overflow that put an end to the "x years without a hole in the default OpenBSD install" slogan :(

    Now how many buffer overflow did happen in the JVM in the last 10 years?

    I think the answer is zero. And if it's not zero, it's only some implementation of the JVM that was at fault.

    For me it's all about the sandbox. Java, Jython, Groovy, you-name-it... I don't care. As long as it targets the JVM. It's tried, lean, mean, rock solid technology. You just ain't escaping it.

    In TFA (yup, I did read it), Gosling says that "The only serious divide is they (C# / .Net) have this unsafe mode which they use a lot. One of the principles I believe in is there shouldn't be an unsafe mode."

    That's a good principle to believe in.