Java to be Open Sourced in October

thePowerOfGrayskull writes "Sun is now stating that the Hotspot JVM and javac will be open-sourced in October of this year, with the rest to follow by the end of 2007. There is still no word as to which license it will be released under. For those who haven't seen it yet, Sun has previously opened a public developer community site for soliciting feedback and providing updates about the process."

Comments

eh?

[slummy]

"Source code for Java already is available and has been for 10 years", said James Gosling. I guess Open Source means they want free developers.

Re:eh?

[squiggleslash]

It's part of the easing of license restrictions that currently make it difficult to incorporate Java in certain types of Free Software project, and that cause hassle for companies like RedHat and Novell/SUSE who sincerely want to distribute Java but more than that want their operating systems to be 100% Free Software.

It's funny. The prime difference between Open Source and Free Software is that OSS is married to a community based development model whereas Free Software is just the basic principle of it being Free. Everyone keeps using "Open Source" here, but Sun has, actually, been following the community based development model part of Open Source for years without making Java Free Software. If it's not Free Software, it's not Open Source, but Java's certainly proven you can have the advantages of Open Source without actually making your software open source.

So why are they doing this? Well, like I said in my first paragraph, the current license and environment is too restrictive for many significant potential adopters. They're finally recognising people want the freedom, not just an open development model.

Re:eh?

[FST777]

In the long run, this will make Java more portable too. It took the FreeBSD Foundation some serious time lobbying before they could distribute Java as a package. Even from ports (source, for the non-BSDies here), Java is a pain on FreeBSD, because the lack of support, crazy patchwork and the need to download everything by hand, whilst signing agreements.

I really hope that we can look forward to a working, recent Java version on FreeBSD without the old bugs and the trouble with OSS-principles in the near future. Kaffe / Classpath just isn't doing the trick. I wonder what this will do to OpenOffice.org.

It all depends on the license. I do hope this will draw some of the fine folks at Kaffe / GNU / Apache who have done a great job by recoding Java to Java itself. But then, if it isn't the GPLv3, RMS will probably keep screaming for a "real free" reversed engineered version of Java.

Well then, off to Flash... Adobe?

Re:eh?

[jesuscyborg]

> "Source code for Java already is available and has been for 10 years", said James Gosling.
> I guess Open Source means they want free developers.

A trollish comment from Gosling about FLOSS doesn't surprise me; after all, he sold out emacs in the 80's.

Re:eh?

[TrekCycling]

I know I'd switch back to FreeBSD in a heartbeat if this came to pass. I loved running FreeBSD. I just didn't enjoy the hassle of running Java on it.

Re:eh?

[aCapitalist]

A trollish comment from Gosling about FLOSS doesn't surprise me; after all, he sold out emacs in the 80's.

Actually, you're bitter that it's the truth and he's not drinking the kool-aid.

Re:eh?

[Kent Brockman (Host]

Well, I for one believe it's about fucking time.

Re:eh?

[MechaStreisand]

There's actually now a binary jdk port that you can download for x86 FreeBSD called diablo. I discovered it when updating ports one day. Rather than have to download three seperate files yourself, two of which require a stupid registration and login at Sun, you download just one from one site, and then it doesn't have to be compiled. It made the whole process a lot less painful. Sure, you do still have to download it yourself, but once you've done that it's installed right quickly. It's an improvement.

October Revolution

[Anonymous Coward]

Java to be Open Sourced in October

Hey, it's another October Revolutinon!

Long live the programmer-letariat!

"While the Copyright exists, there can be no freedom. When there is freedom there will be no Copyright."

Re:October Revolution

[dolson]

I thought Nintendo was releasing it in November? Well, let's hope it's October, the earlier this revolution starts, the better!

Re:October Revolution

[pyros]

Will tens of millions have to die for this horrific mistake too?

Just the Bothans.

Big deal for OSS

[andrewman327]

Depending on the license that they choose, OSS purists can now utilize Java in their programs. OpenOffice.org ran into some issues when it began using Java to power some of its components. Hopefully the license under which this is released will be acceptable.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[Anonymous Coward]

"Hopefully" it will be open sourced enough to placate the OSS zealots, yet not so open sourced that Joe Six-Pack-o-Jolt can release his own Java interpreter that fuzzes the meaning of the source code, presenting interesting and unintended execution problems. Repeat that for every distro of Linux and Java will be dead.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[silvaran]

Well Joe can release whatever Java interpreter he wants, there's no guarantee that anyone's going to use it. You could have 500 different forks of the Java code (license permitting), but unless they provide some huge advantage and become mainstream (see egcs/gcc, which turned out to be a good thing from what I've heard), the conformant Java interpreters/compilers/runtimes are going to remain the de facto ones to use. And Joe can sit there and run his modified version of the Java platform all he wants, while everyone else happily sticks to the comformant platforms.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[nuzak]

Yeah, look what happened to perl and python thanks to their open license. Incompatible bytecode everywhere.

Why is it only Java is so fragile that it can't withstand openness?

Re:Big deal for OSS

[mrogers]

There are already free JVMs and free Java compilers. The problem is the class libraries. Java's standard libraries are huge, and free reimplementations are having a hard time keeping up. Without the libraries, open source versions of javac and the JVM won't bring us significantly closer to the goal of a completely free Java platform.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[_Swank]

but the source or the java libraries IS available. i've been able to look at the source for the standard libraries for years (it's available with the Sun SDK). so am i missing something or are you complaining about the license the source is available under? if it's the second, why? why would java need to be under a more GPL like license? what are the real benefits?

Re:Big deal for OSS

[molarmass192]

You can LOOK at the source all you want, but why don't you make a change, say renaming the util package to utility, post your source code, and send Sun an email with a link to your modified source code. You'll be asked to remove your modified code lickity split. The SCSL is open source but NOT redistributable. So why a less restrictive license? Say I have a KDE based distro, I want to package Java with that distro, but there's a bug in java that breaks the clipboard under KDE but not GTK (this is a real life bug) and Sun refuses to address it because they only support GTK. Under the SCSL, you're toast. Under something less restrictive, you can patch the affected class, and distribute your "fixed" rt.jar.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[Waffle Iron]

Java - the current, close source Java - is unstable enough that most commerical Java applications come bundled with a specific JRE that's the ONLY JRE they'll run under.So for every Java application I have installed, I get to waste 50MB on yet another JRE install for whichever patch level of Java is required for that given application.

Sun can't keep their own internal, closed version of Java stable between releases. It's no wonder they don't think anyone else can, either.

So you've just proved that more Java forks won't create any problems that people don't already have. And I agree: you'd have to be crazy not to ship nontrivial Java-based software without the exact JRE that it was tested with.

Hopefully, Sun will remove the onerous requirement to ship *all* of their cruft with each JRE. That way, most private JRE installations could probably get stripped down to a more manageable 5MB or so.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[owlstead]

For that they need a method to split everything in modules. OSGi would be a very good choice for that. Acutally, I believe some guys once already did this. I agree that one should not have to download 35 MB or more just to run some applets. A small, well defined API would do much better.

For some interesting stuff about splitting it all up, look at http://docs.safehaus.org/download/attachments/2995 /osgi-apachecon-20060628.pdf

I heard that Sun however had some problems within the OSGi alliance (Eclipse is build on OSGi, making it more or less a competing technology). One miracle at a time I guess.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[insert_username_here]

...why don't you make a change, say renaming the util package to utility...

Say I have a KDE based distro, I want to package Java with that distro, but there's a bug in java that breaks the clipboard under KDE but not GTK (this is a real life bug)...

These two scenarios are wildly different - while they both involve making changes to code (both of which would be allowed under the GPL), one involves making a (very large) change to the interface that is exposed to Java programs, while the other changes only the implementation of that interface. This difference is absolutely crucial, given the whole point of Java is "Write once, run anywhere" (and yes, we know it doesn't work that way in practice).

Even if they do release Java under (say) the GPL, Sun are probably going to do everything they can to prevent people from changing the interface, as they've already been bitten by these changes in the past (remember Visual J++ anyone?).

Re:Big deal for OSS

[hritcu]

They plan to open source the Java SE Development Kit (JDK). That includes the class libraries.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[mrogers]

Thanks for the information - in that case I guess the only remaining hurdle is the license, and this page seems to say they're looking for an OSI-approved license.

Re:Big deal for OSS

[Marcus Green]

Microsoft did produce an incompatible version of Java, or "polluted" as they called it. Were you aware of this?

Re:Big deal for OSS

[DragonWriter]

"Hopefully" it will be open sourced enough to placate the OSS zealots, yet not so open sourced that Joe Six-Pack-o-Jolt can release his own Java interpreter that fuzzes the meaning of the source code, presenting interesting and unintended execution problems.

As gets pointed out each time this gets discussed, once the first genuinely open-source cleanroom Java implementation was released, that was already a possibility whatever Sun did, so the whole issue is largely moot.

The only company that could benefit from doing that (because they also have the market power to get people to use their incompatible implementation rather than one that works properly) has already chosen a different route to try to destroy Java, by releasing their own platform targetting the same market.

And, of course, there are clean-room open-source implementations of that competitors platform as well...

Re:Big deal for OSS

[ultranova]

Well Joe can release whatever Java interpreter he wants, there's no guarantee that anyone's going to use it.

Actually, Joe can't release an incompatible Java virtual machine, since "Java" is a trademark so Sun can bitchslap Joe if Joe tries to claim that his non-conformant VM has anything to do with Java, just like they did Microsoft. Now, Joe can release a piece of shit Java VM, but it must comform to the Java spec to be called Java.

In any case, I for one wish that someone fixes the bugs in Sun's implementation of Graphics2D; the documentation specifically states that certain drawing methods can't block, but they do anyway, and always return "false" to make things even worse.

Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is this "open source" as in "open source"?

Is this "open source" as in Apple's "public source" Darwin project, where they're basically going "you can see and compile all the code, but no way are you going to be redistributing this as any kind of commercial project"?

Is this "open source" as in Microsoft's "shared source" projects, where it's totally not open source at all except in a PR sense?

Is this "open source" as in Sun's Solaris "open sourcing", where it's open source in all technical senses, but it's under an unbelievably elaborate license which exists for no reason except to engender GPL incompatibility and keep Linux from benefiting from the source release, which effectively scares everyone away from the project?

Cuz really, unless "Java to be Open Sourced" really means "Java to be Open Sourced", it won't make a difference, acceptance of Java will continue to be held back by the perceived closedness of the Java language and real linux-unfriendliness of the Java runtime, and languages like C#/Mono will continue to make inroads until Apache finishes their Harmony project.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[FooBarWidget]

Uhm no. Have you ever heard of commercial open source software? If not, then you have now. Commercial and open source are not mutually exclusive.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[Kunta Kinte]

Is this "open source" as in Sun's Solaris "open sourcing", where it's open source in all technical senses, but it's under an unbelievably elaborate license which exists for no reason except to engender GPL incompatibility and keep Linux from benefiting from the source release, which effectively scares everyone away from the project?

Care to explain this a bit?

Sun Public License is an official open-source license. What is "unbelievably elaborate" about it?

And what did they do to 'purposely' endanger GPL compatibility?

Should the Berkeley people complain about GPL 'purposely endangering' BSD compatibility?

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[squiggleslash]

Some major things in no particular order:

1. Open Source means Open Source. There's a list of approved licenses. Sun are aware of this, they participate in the OSI, they've submitted licenses before for approval. They're not saying "Open Source" when they mean "Shared Source" or anything like that. Who do you think they are, SGI? ;-)

2. Jonathan Schwarz has specifically stated that the GPL is under consideration. (See his blog) It sounds like they're interested in GPL3 but obviously want to see what it has to say first.

3. OpenOffice.org is available under the GPL. Releasing Java with a compatible license would help resolve some of the issues there are in integrating Java code with OOo code, which is a live issue right now.

4. This is a major issue. Right now, the two major enterprise distributions, RedHat, and SUSE, are promoting alternatives to Java, be they attempted workalikes like GCJ or full blown rivals like Mono. Both RedHat and Novell are being clear on this: they don't want Java in its present form because it's not Free Software. Sun has to act. They're saying they're going to act. This is, stategically, one of their most important projects, if not their most important (Solaris wasn't, StarOffice wasn't even close. By comparison, Java is something dear to Sun's heart as the only technology they own that truly does influence the direction the entire computing industry is going in.) So you can't blame them for taking baby steps. But when they say it's going to go open source, I believe them. And when Schwarz talks about the GPL and uses phrases like "Free Software" and "Open Source" with fairly clear deference to their supporter's meanings, it's hard for me to believe they haven't done their homework, that they're not aware of the damage they'll do if they don't follow through, and that they have no intention of following through.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[mrchaotica]

Should the Berkeley people complain about GPL 'purposely endangering' BSD compatibility?

No, but they do anyway...

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[Elektroschock]

"Is this "open source" as in Microsoft's "shared source" projects, where it's totally not open source at all except in a PR sense?"

Microsoft also has REAL open source licenses that are free as in free-issimo.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[mark-t]

The GPL would be catastrophically inappropriate for Java, due to library linkage issues.

If Java were GPL'd it would require that every single project that use it also be GPL'd.

GPL'ing Java would kill virtually all commercial usage of it.

LGPL'd, maybe....

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[Talchas]

With java you have to be a bit clearer about what you mean. If it was to go all GPL-style code then the JRE and SDK programs should be GPL, but the standard libraries should be LGPL. So if they GPLed the compiler and runtime, no problem, if they GPL the library, they're crazy.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[Wesley Felter]

Solaris is under the CDDL, not SPL. But other than that I agree. The CDDL is basically the MPL; I don't see what's so bad about it.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[squiggleslash]

Well, kind of. Nothing stops Sun from dual licensing the system, nor from adding a waiver for applications that merely link to documented Java libraries, nor from chosing one license for the JVM and another for the library. So there are a bunch of ways in which this can be played out.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[BranMan]

No, I don't see that at all. GCC is GPL, but the code you compile with it is NOT GPL (unless you want it to be). If they GPL Java compilers and runtime it would not force anything using it to be GPL. Now, if the Java libraries are GPL (which I can see them being in their code form - i.e. you can't modify the library code except under GPL) that might be a problem, but I can see them being set up so the code of the libraries is GPL, but their use as libraries is LGPL.
    That would satisfy Sun I think - the main deterrent to open sourcing Java has been MicroSoft getting their grubby hands on it again. With GPL, that can't happen (in theory at least).
    Remember, a GPL word processor does NOT make your letters GPL. A GPL Java environment would NOT make your Java programs GPL.
    Commercial use can continue, without modifying Java itself - which is exactly what we have today.
    I don't see a problem.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[mark-t]

True... but Java isn't just a compiler.

It's a whole language, and Sun's implementation of it includes a collection of classes that virtually every Java application ever written uses to some extent.

That's why it would be bad to GPL Java.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[Peter La Casse]

That's why it would be bad to GPL Java.

Or good, depending on one's point of view.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[asuffield]

Open Source means Open Source. There's a list of approved licenses. Sun are aware of this, they participate in the OSI, they've submitted licenses before for approval.

These days, OSI does little more than rubber stamp any license that smells like a free one. They don't really do a very careful job of reviewing these things. As such, their involvement doesn't really tell you anything.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[kaffiene]

Well, given that the code is *already* availble, it's clearly not any of the straw-man options you've raised. Typical /. when FUD like that gets modded as Insightful. You know, a few facts don't ACTUALLY hurt a discussion.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[squiggleslash]

That's completely untrue. The default with the OSI these days is to reject a license unless it can prove not only that it conforms to the Open Source Definition, but also that it doesn't add too much to license fragmentation, which is an issue being taken seriously (at least) and has been for over a year. Some companies have even gone so far as to deprecate their existing, already approved, licenses to help out.

I have my beefs with the OSI, but they are doing something about license proliferation, and I'm very glad for that.

To the best of my knowledge, the only time the OSI rubber stamped a license rather than thoroughly reviewed it was the original APSL. You'd have thought they'd have learned a few lessons from the fall-out from that incident, and it's my reading that they did. (Alas, "Don't take ESR seriously" wasn't one of them.)

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean?

[arose]

It sounds like they're interested in GPL3 but obviously want to see what it has to say first.

The timing certainly fits.

They Haven't Picked A License YET!

[Anonymous Coward]

In both the summary and the article, they stated: "There is still no word as to which license it will be released under."

Your post doesn't add anything to this discussion, we're all aware of the many different meanings of 'open source' as well as 'free.' This is Slashdot where people nitpick all day, the article clearly says that they haven't released license details yet!

Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[Anonymous Coward]

So explain to me how the C#/Mono project is better for open source purists?

C# is Microsoft's solution to the Java problem and most definately will never be open sourced. There are also potential patent issues (I can't believe that there would be _no_ patents that cover C#.)

So because people hate Java (not open sourced), they're embracing an open source implementation of a different closed source project. That makes sense how?

On wait, this is the open source community and what it does doesn't necessarily make sense, there are just emotional responses because someone does something a little bit differently.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[powerlord]

C# is just a language. There is a specification for it that has been submitted to ECMA, as there are for lots of the pieces that make up MicroSoft's ".Net" initiative. Not all their ideas are bad ones, and anyone is free to implement standards.

To quote Mono's FAQ page:

The Mono Project is an open development initiative sponsored by Novell to develop an open source, UNIX version of the Microsoft .NET development platform. Its objective is to enable UNIX developers to build and deploy cross-platform .NET Applications. The project implements various technologies developed by Microsoft that have now been submitted to the ECMA for standardization.

Personally its a rather nice language.

Oh, as far as:

There are also potential patent issues (I can't believe that there would be _no_ patents that cover C#.)

Unless you know something the rest of us don't, this strikes me more as spreading FUD then anything else.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[SmokedS]

So explain to me how the C#/Mono project is better for open source purists?

It's released under open source licences. LGPL/GPL/X11 to be exact.

C# is Microsoft's solution to the Java problem and most definately will never be open sourced.

It doesn't need to be. We don't need MS code, just specs. And C# is an ISO standard.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[jeswin]

Mod parent up.

The patent FUD concerning Mono is now dead, and Mono is included in Fedora are Suse distributions. I am sure Novell would have invested considerable effort in analyzing potential issues. Mono is a from scratch implementation. And no surprise, Miguel appeared in the Microsoft Technet Video explaining Mono last week and it was on slashdot.

Here is a nice article by Paul Graham on SW Patents, which was Slashdotted earlier. What he says makes a lot of sense: But I doubt Microsoft would ever be so stupid. They'd face the mother of all boycotts. And not just from the technical community in general; a lot of their own people would rebel.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[k8to]

C# may just be a language, but much of the .Net library (I forget the official terms) is really just a paper-thin wrapper over win32. This means that writing C# on other platforms you are stuck catering to a wide variety of win32 idiom bleeds. This means that writing a C# runtime for other platforms, you stuck reimplementing significant numbers of Microsoft DLLs. I'm not clever enough to know if any of this leaves anyone exposed to potential legal issues, but it certainly sucks from a use and technical perspective.

This whole situations puts a big fly in the ointment of the ECMA specification, in that much of the language behavior in effect is outside the specification and in the win32 API and in some cases the implementation. Certainly you are free to create a C# implementation which is 100% compliant with the published specification. I don't know if there are issues like with Java where the compliance test is kept hidden. Aside from that, however, your 100% specification compliant implemention may not be capable of running code which was written to Microsoft's implementation, nor code which was written to the specification, due to the missing dark corners.

As for my personal opinion, C# avoids many of the medium to small grain mistakes in Java, while maintaining (for better and for worse) a more C++/C developer friendly set of syntax and idioms. On the very large scale, however, it repeats the same list of glaring productivity problems that plague C, C++, and Java: too verbose, too inflexible, too unproductive.

As for patents, I don't think it's FUD to say that there are potential patent issues, certainly it is not FUD to consider that it is quite likely that there are submarine patents which would affect C#. This situation applies to any software system of reasonable complexity. It might be FUD to claim that it specially affects C# and C# implementations more than other complex software systems.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[gral]

http://www.mono-project.com/FAQ:_Licensing

The patent issues are not with the Language itself as stated in the FAQ.

__quote__
The controversial elements are the ASP.NET, ADO.NET and Windows.Forms subsets. Those are convenient for people who need full compatibility with the Windows platform, but are not required for the open source Mono platform, nor integration with today's Mono's rich support of Linux.
__quote__

That is what is up for PATENT issues. Which basically means that at any time the ASP.Net, ADO.NET, and Windows.Forms could be ripped out.

Mono is not trying to create a complete 100% Microsoft.Net, thus working with VisualStudio.Net and saying Mono can be used to put everything on Linux is NOT a good statement. Try it. Use System.Data.SqlClient or even System.Data.Mysql namespace, and take the exe and put it on your linux box and see if it works.

With Java, it works on both systems after "one" compile with no changes. I have tried it. Not so with Mono and Microsoft.Net, and the Patent stuff hasn't even come up yet. Hell, even with a compile of the code on Linux, I ran into issues with Mysql.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[Lucractius]

Whos says i hate it cause its not open source... I have technical and actualy relevent to the language itself, issues with the damn thing.

Orthogonality, the property of a programming language being built from a set of defined basic constructs. C is a quintisentialy orthogonal language, you dont need X billion extra libs to use C. Java practicaly force feeds you libraries and methods till they start oozing out your rear end.
I understand java syntax, and im competent in using the languages basic constructs, but i cannot write anything seriously in java without reffering to the billion page documentation on the bloody thing... I want a date in my program, oh no i cant just use an array of ints, i cant override their methods, i cant even IGNORE them, i have to use the sql date format via the sql library, i cant even use the depreciated unix date format... and thats a reatively tame example. Im sure plenty of you have worse horror stories about the java libraries.

Java is a painfuly non-orthogonal language that thoroughly pisses me off to use. And being forced to learn it for practicaly everything at my university is a horror that i attempt to flee from at every turn. Thank god for languages like Python, and the C family (C C++ and Objective C) (not counting the bastard child of java, C#)

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[LittleBigLui]

I want a date in my program, oh no i cant just use an array of ints

Why can't you? What's preventing you?

int[] date = new int[] {2006, 8, 16};

That's not particularly OO, but even then, what's preventing you from writing your own Date class?
Of course, that would be pretty stupid unless org.slashdot.lucratius.Date does something that java.util.Date and java.util.Calendar don't do.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[Lucractius]

in my case, this was way back when i was first learning, and to top it off was trying to be used with a database connecting JSP, so i couldnt use an Array, writing my own was and remains pointless, and overly difficult. But you remind me of the other thing i despise.

unnoficial.third.party.library.collections.in_java .are.Obnoxious

the use of strong typing and name enforcement is a major hurdle to easy use of the language.

that and think logicaly.

You perform an action/method/operation ON an object in the normal world

fill $object with data

not $object.fill(data)

its just counter intuitive, especialy when a student is pushed through it.

and im pretty sure yould aggree learning a language improperly, is probably more detrimental than trying to code while drunk.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[LittleBigLui]

You perform an action/method/operation ON an object in the normal world

fill $object with data

not $object.fill(data)

Well, strictly talking OO, you send the object a message:
object, fill [yourself with] data

That's because of encapsulation and polymorphism. The object consists of its internal state and a bunch of operations that may change said internal state. You don't fill the object, because you don't know how to fill it. A doubly-linked list is filled differently from a hash set. The knowledge how to fill is part of the object. That way you can swap a doubly-linked list for a hash set and keep your client code the same.

Of course, encapsulation and polymorphism don't require the syntax to be the way it is, but they explain it.

Also, I want to mentione something from your original post:

C is a quintisentialy orthogonal language, you dont need X billion extra libs to use C.

1. C uses the dot operator to access parts of structs in a similar way that java uses it. So your criticism of object.fill(data) should also apply to struct.field = value which according to your logic should be written as set the field of struct to value (which looks a bit like the verbose syntax of ActionScript, IIRC)
2. I'd claim that you need more extra libs for C than for Java, assuming that by "extra" you mean "not part of the standard". GUIs, database access, threading - you need extra libraries for all that in C. Of course, you could use no libraries at all and write everything you need yourself, but I hope you agree that that would be pointless.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[Lucractius]

Oh i agree completely that writting several million extra lines of code to do all the stuff in your own program is totaly pointless.

But conversly, Its Utterly Obtuse to be force fed a million libraries, as part of the language STANDARD. the JVM does not need to have so much extra Bloat, the smallest ive ever seen a java program on windows was a 25MB memory footprint, and that was less than a meg of compiled java code. and about a 5mb program (including pics etc) all up, the JVM should be a bytecode enviroment, and something else should be left responsible for all this library of spaghetti code. Nothing stops them defining and releasing a standard set of libraries, but why does every bloody program have to load so much more than it needs, its a perfectly decent language for what it does, but the standard libraries have got to be separated, segmented, and organised, if i need just 3 libraries for a program, i dont want to load the entire standard java package for them, i want the three libraries and the absolute minimum of core libraries, and thats something java seems pretty poor at doing.

i was taught in university to load entire segments of the standard java libraries, i need some math stuff, oh just import java.math.* etc... not the java.math.stat.normal_distribution or whatever.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[LittleBigLui]

i was taught in university to load entire segments of the standard java libraries, i need some math stuff, oh just import java.math.* etc... not the java.math.stat.normal_distribution or whatever.

The import statement is just syntactical sugar. Only the classes you actually use will be loaded. AFAIK, IANJG[1] .

[1] I am not James Gosling.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[k8to]

Not really. Win32 is fairly well abstracted away. Even Microsoft know win32 is dangerous and must die.

Let's start with

• Dirwatcher class uses win32 glob expressions which aren't defined anywhere.
  
• You can't have daemons, but rather 'services'?
  
• File handle semantics are straight out of win32 to the point where there's a hair-brained handler-daemon in Mono which breaks unix PID semantics (which makes the services junk more annoying), which also defeats cross-version mono interaction.
  

All of these are caused by win32 semantics bleed. I could dig up a lot more if i had to.

Re:Closed Java is worse then closed C#

[ultranova]

But conversly, Its Utterly Obtuse to be force fed a million libraries, as part of the language STANDARD. the JVM does not need to have so much extra Bloat, the smallest ive ever seen a java program on windows was a 25MB memory footprint, and that was less than a meg of compiled java code.

I don't think that the programs code size has much to do with its memory footprint. A simple image manipulation program, for example, is almost certainly going to allocate many times its code size just when it first loads any moderate size image.

Nothing stops them defining and releasing a standard set of libraries, but why does every bloody program have to load so much more than it needs, its a perfectly decent language for what it does, but the standard libraries have got to be separated, segmented, and organised, if i need just 3 libraries for a program, i dont want to load the entire standard java package for them, i want the three libraries and the absolute minimum of core libraries, and thats something java seems pretty poor at doing.

First, you may wish to separate, segment and organize your text into separate sentences before requiring anyone else to do so for their libraries ;).

Second, since part of the Java specification is that classes are only loaded when they are first referenced, if your program only uses 3 classes from the Java API then only those 3 get loaded, at least in theory.

Good

[Espectr0]

They better do it fast. Sadly for Java, .NET took almost everything good about Java and fixed lots of its quirks and gotchas. And with Mono, OSS people are giving it a chance too. With dynamic language support being heavily invested in both platforms, having outside contributors is critical.

Now that Java can be redistributed legally (tell that to the slackware guy, he has always included it by default), and will be open sourced soon, it can fight back.

Re:Good

[cryfreedomlove]

Do you have any data that shows that Mono deployment in the enterprise is increasing, relative to java deployment? Because, in my experience of 8 years of enterprise java, Mono is not making any strides. It's a backwater that a few people are toiling in.

Re:Good

[forgotten_my_nick]

Do you have any like actual proof to back that up?

Re:Good

[jalefkowit]

Do you have any data that shows that Mono deployment in the enterprise is increasing, relative to java deployment?

Well, it's not particularly scientific and it speaks more to .NET in general than to Mono specifically, but if you believe Tim O'Reilly's book sales data C#/.NET passed Java in popularity/interest over the last year, and is still growing strong (C# sales up 68%, general .NET book sales up 125%; Java book sales are down 6% over the same period).

Of course one could always argue that more .NET books sell because .NET is harder to learn... but having dipped my toe in the Java waters a few times, I find that hard to believe :-)

Re:Good

[mrchaotica]

Oh, Mono deployment is big, that's for sure. The only trouble is that it's all on Windows, and they call it ".NET" instead.

Re:Good

[hclyff]

Yes, because book sales are perfect signs to base claims about language popularity on.

C#/.NET book sales are high, that means something, sure. It means that .NET is on rise, but not necessary that it has overcome Java. You see, Java developers won't buy books they already own. The same goes for job demand. You can have higher demand for .NET developers, but that only means unequality between skills and actual job demands. Once that settles down, I predict Java will still be the more popular of the two.

Re:Good

[bytesex]

Unfortunately, .net is also pretty much married to M$ software on intel hardware. That setup won't be obsolete quite soon (on workstations), but clever people that run big hardware setups usually won't go for it. Which leaves java in a very interesting position; it will run both on the client and the server no matter what configuration. The difficulty for M$ will be to get .net onto the server, and I have a hard time believing that they can pull that off. Especially when java goes open source, so that everything that M$ stole, can easily be stolen back again. Then again, java would also have to completely revise their J2EE APIs, but that's a different rant...

Re:Good

[JohnnyCannuk]

Uhm, buddy, is that when you graduated school or something, because Java has been huge on the server side and in the web for about 6 to 8 years.

Many of those applications are being updated to new version of the JVM and extended because the work quite well.

"oday, I think it's generally agreed upon at all levels of the enterprise that .NET/Mono is superior to Java in most areas."

No, actually it is not. I don;t know who this "everyone" is you are speaking to is, but you should really get out more. I work for a large consutling firm and the vast majority of our work is on Java-based systems.

"It's also apparent that .NET offers a significantly more pleasant experience to the end-user."

Where, on Windows based systems? Well that's actually a pretty small percentage of software. Most end-user experience is web-based, and considering MS great sucess in the webserver market and security, I doubt there is a whole lot of .Net stuff on the internet right now.

Mono is a backwater that is not used in the real world at all. Zip, zilch, nada. If it wasn't a required install for my Suse 10.1 Gnome install, it wouldn't be on anything I run.

Re:Good

[THEbwana]

Mmm.. thats my take as well.
My background is 9 years in Finance/IT in various technical (mostly programming / systems engineering) roles in three European countries, working in financial institutions of the size 30K-130K employees.
The only .Net stuff I've seen is on the client side of some internally developed trading systems. The serverside, however, is usually run as J2EE apps running in one of the many servlet/ejb containers you see in the marketplace nowadays... J2EE simply rules the serverside and SWING apps are seen quite frequently. My guess is that banks will be happier extending eclipse when writing their client apps than going the .Net route...
Maybe the .Net route is more popular within other market segments ? Anyone working in another industry care to comment ?

Re:Good

[Furry Ice]

I like to use Google trends for this sort of thing. It's at least as valid as book sales, probably more so, but still far from a perfect correlation with actual usage of a language. Anyway, based on this comparison, http://google.com/trends?q=java%2C+C%23%2C+.net%2C +ruby%2C+php&ctab=0&geo=US&date=all it appears that Java still has a very strong lead over the competition, but it is in decline. Hard to say how much farther down it will go, and how the others might change. PHP seems to be going down slowly, Ruby is going up slowly, and C# and .Net are holding steady.

Re:Good

[killjoe]

To me both java and c# suck (well they are almost the same after all). They are both entirely too wordy and impossible to use without a really heavy duty IDE. Can you imagine trying to code a java app without netbeans or eclipse or IDEA? Can you even imagine trying to code a c# app without VS? These IDEs provide workarounds for the cumbersome way these languages go about doing things. I guess I just prefer more elegant approaches like those provided by other languages.

To me the biggest shame in this industry is the unwillingness by corporations to adopt superior technology. Proven superior technology like erlang or haskell or something. The herd mentality of CIOs and the really the programmers themselves holds the industry back. The wide adoption of silly bondage languages like java and c# when functional languages have been shown over and over again to be more robust, more stable and more productive is stupid.

As a side note. When some kid writes a perl6 interpreter in haskell in six weeks shouldn't the perl6 people have thrown up their hands and said "OK we give up, please use haskell instead"?.

Re:Good

[dubonbacon]

Writing an interpreter with a functional language is not a convincing example of productivity for general purposes.

Re:Good

[killjoe]

Why not?

Re:Good

[Mithrandir]

Can you imagine trying to code a java app without netbeans or eclipse or IDEA?

Yes. In the large groups of libraries and apps that I hang around in, vi/emacs or similar text editor use far outweights the IDE crowd. In my own case, I have several multi-hundred thousand line libraries that I develop, all using a combination of text editors and make. Conservative estimate of the main projects totals about 2 million LoC that I actively maintain on a daily basis.

The converse to your statement is true - try managing those huge projects in an IDE. Things like context highlights and suggestions grind the entire IDE to a halt. Netbeans is particularly bad for this and Eclipse isn't that much better. Pulling the largest of my projects into Eclipse can grind my dual core machine with a couple of gigs of ram to a screaming halt. I can easily outtype Eclipse's abilty to respond. It's far more frustrating to use an IDE than it is to use simple text editors that do nothing more than syntax highlighting.

Re:Good

[aCapitalist]

Can you imagine trying to code a java app without netbeans or eclipse or IDEA? Can you even imagine trying to code a c# app without VS? These IDEs provide workarounds for the cumbersome way these languages go about doing things. I guess I just prefer more elegant approaches like those provided by other languages.

We're past that stupidity. What do you think all those plugin for Vim and Emacs are for? Just goto vim.org and see what the most popular plugins are. But I'm sure you'll be laughed at for programming your superior languages in Notepad.

To me the biggest shame in this industry is the unwillingness by corporations to adopt superior technology. Proven superior technology like erlang or haskell or something. The herd mentality of CIOs and the really the programmers themselves holds the industry back. The wide adoption of silly bondage languages like java and c# when functional languages have been shown over and over again to be more robust, more stable and more productive is stupid.

I know. Everybody is stupid except you. If we all just used Erland and Haskell, it would be ITopia. Of course we can also hand wave about functional languages "having shown over and over again to be more robust, more stable, and more productive". The great thing is that we never actually have to show any evidence. We can just claim it, and make ourselves feel better because it's everybody else that is stupid.

Once you get out of college or get a little bit more experience, you'll realize that there's a lot more to IT then just a programming language. And one of those other things is actually having productive tools like Eclipse, Netbeans, IDEA, and VS.

Re:Good

[Espectr0]

I didn't say Mono was being deployed in the enterprise, i only said OSS people has been getting exposed to .NET, at least C# because of Mono.

Java had a big start, no wonder it dominates in servers. But it cannot rest on its laurels because Microsoft is pushing .NET everywhere. People didn't think Windows Mobile had a chance against Palm, but Microsoft outsmarted Palm. Sure, Palm let themselves behind too.

Now if only Flash was open sourced... I think the top 2 propietary programs installed in linux (if you don't have an nvidia card) are flash and java.

Re:Good

[dubonbacon]

Sigh, did you even take one func. prog. class? Functional programming is very good at : recursive algorithms, concurrent, compilers, interpreters, evaluators, syntax and type checkers, theorem provers. Programming one of these does not prove anything about its efficiency for business applications. BUT, for scientific or engineering work (like ... i don't know, speech recongnition or network simulation), it is indeed very suited.

Re:Good

[owlstead]

JHC!

Ever heard of splitting things up in modules? The JDK is pretty large as well, but it's not a problem at all to link it to your project. Syntax highlighting is pretty much local to Java files. I've downloaded and compiled the entire Eclipse project on my 1 GB machine without too many problems as well. That should be quite a number of lines.

Something is terribly wrong there. Reminds me about someone complaining that you needed to put classes in folders that reflect the classes package declarations. Yeah, well, duh! How would you use automatic code generation and refactoring without all that?

The only problem I've seen is that large projects tend to take some time to rebuild when settings are changed. Splitting the projects up into seperate projects does the trick in this case. If you cannot, your design is probably pretty broken, at least you could split most packages into projects.

Re:Good

[killjoe]

So let me get this straight.

FUnctional programming languages are incabable of writing "efficient business applications". One presumes by "business applications" you mean database interaction and some gui component.

What is it about functional languages that prevent them being efficient for database access and gui applications?

Re:Good

[bnenning]

I know. Everybody is stupid except you. If we all just used Erland and Haskell, it would be ITopia.

Of course not, that's just silly. We should all use Python :)

Seriously, you're right that functional programming is not a magic bullet. In my experience it makes many hard things easy but many easy things hard (Exhibit A: LISP loops). That's why I like Python and to a lesser extent Ruby (syntax is too Perlish). You get a lot of the power of functional languages but in a format that's more approachable and familiar.

Re:Good

[cheesybagel]

Only things missing for CPython to be perfect would be: brackets {} and instead of WhiteSpaceMatters, oh making it faster would also be nice (JIT would be ok).

Re:Good

[hritcu]

Then again, java would also have to completely revise their J2EE APIs, but that's a different rant...

You mean ... like this?

The purpose of Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) 3.0 is to improve the EJB architecture by reducing its complexity from the developer's point of view.

Re:Good

[WilliamSChips]

My first guess would be the lack of (good?) libaries for database access and gui applications.

Re:Good

[killjoe]

Why guess? You can just look that up can't you?

Re:Should we begin `digging graves?'

[3770]

Don't use the "d"-word here. ;)

In time for 1.6?

[mccalli]

October is the current projected release timeframe for JDK 1.6. I'm pretty sure that's not a co-incidence.

Cheers,
Ian

So all the juicy bits are to be left for later

[mjrauhal]

Sure, HotSpot may be a bit faster than free JVMs, but the free ones do function well enough. Also, free Java compilers are already readily available. For a long time, the main issue has been the maturity of free class libraries (particularly their Swing/AWT implementations), and now Sun says they'll be getting around to releasing that around the end of 2007. Almost smells like timing the release to a date when they think Classpath will have most of it nailed anyway.

And then there's the license bit, but I shan't speculate on that uninformedly.

Re:So all the juicy bits are to be left for later

[Jason Earl]

Exactly. Free Software has plenty of JVMs and compilers. Heck, the Free Software world has too many JVMs and compilers. What's needed are Java compatible class libraries under a license that is both amenable to proprietary and Free Software developers.

At this point Sun is simply trying to draw support away from the various Free Java implementations. Sun knows that if the Free Software implementations ever become popular that its chances of controling Java long term are essentially flushed down the toilet. Sun reacted too late with Solaris, and it is desperate to keep Java from suffering a similar fate. So it is doing everything in its power to keep people away from Free Software Java-alike systems.

If Sun were serious it would A) concentrate on releasing the Java class libraries, and B) it would have given Java developers some guidance on the license that it will be using. Everything else is just fluff.

Re:So all the juicy bits are to be left for later

[owlstead]

"Exactly. Free Software has plenty of JVMs and compilers. Heck, the Free Software world has too many JVMs and compilers. What's needed are Java compatible class libraries under a license that is both amenable to proprietary and Free Software developers."

Try the 1.6 release with the new verifier and better register usage, and I think you will agree that, although there are many VM implementations, there are very few that will outperform this specific version. I do agree that the libraries are the main thing to free though. As long as Sun and the JCP are still the ones making the official version. I would also like more components to use factories and factory methods, so that people can easily drop in their implementations.

Does it still matter?

[DoofusOfDeath]

I don't mean this as a troll at all. It's just the main thing that enamored me with Java 8 or 9 years ago was that I found myself getting projects done much faster in Java than in C++. Since then, however, I've found Python, which I'm even more productive in. For big projects, where strongly defined interfaces help control complexity, C# is now an option.

So given that we have Python (for fast code) and C# (for big systems), do people really prefer Java for new projects anymore?

Re:Does it still matter?

[John Courtland]

Apache seems to be banking pretty hard on it.

Re:Does it still matter?

[Anonymous Coward]

good joke. You mean a big project, or a big system. A big project doesn't mean a big system with hardcore availability and concurrency requirements. A big project could just mean a big GUI, which would make sense to use C# instead of Swing. C# doesn't work on Unix or Mainframes, so the only choice is to get a big SMP windows box, which by most accounts is rare. Of course HP, NEC and IBM all offer large SMP windows servers, but I'm not aware of people buying them in quantities. I do know several banks that have several large mainframes. Most windows servers don't use more than 4 CPU, which doesn't count as big SMP. try 12 or more CPU's. Though 12 isn't considered big either by people who actually build big systems. 18+ CPU's with 20GB of RAM with hundreds of concurrent transactions is what I consider big. Your definition may not.

Re:Does it still matter?

[ahmetaa]

well.. yes, java is still the most used platform in business and it is getting bigger. who is "we" you are talking about anyway? "we" here use java in all big applications and very happy about it.

Re:Does it still matter?

[zlogic]

Mobile phones and custom, in-house developed apps that must work no matter what OS the company is using *still* need Java. Show me a popular Python app that works on Windows, Mac, Linux (and doesn't look alien in either system) and I promise I'll throw away all my Netbeans CDs.

Re:Does it still matter?

[UtucXul]

Show me a popular Python app that works on Windows, Mac, Linux (and doesn't look alien in either system) and I promise I'll throw away all my Netbeans CDs.

PySol maybe.

Re:Does it still matter?

[stuntpope]

C# may be an option, but you don't explain what it is about C# that makes you prefer it over Java (or why others would, either). After all, you say your productivity went up with Java vs. C++, why wouldn't you continue using Java for "big projects" unless C# gives you clear gains over it?

Re:Does it still matter?

[JohnnyCannuk]

You may want to reassess your definition of "popular"...

Re:Does it still matter?

[owlstead]

Java has a pretty well defined, small and functional syntax. This makes it very easy to create good tools for it. The number of (good) IDE's and language tools is simply staggering. This is certainly not the case for python the last time I looked. C# obviously does have a nice IDE available for it. IMHO, it does not compare well to Eclipse, but that's just my opinion.

C# is a very nice language, but it does not seem that Microsoft is showing any constraint in adding features, almost making it some kind of "D" language (look it up). There are many, many more side effects in C# that you need to consider when reading someones code. It also does not really try to be really object oriented or to force people to code correctly (virtual keyword, delegates, etc). For enterprise apps, this *should* kill most support for it, although PHB's may decide otherwise.

Re:Does it still matter?

[Doug Neal]

Do you mean you can code faster in Python or that Python programs run faster? I've always found Python to be a bit of a dog, definitely slower than Java anyway. Haven't tried C#.

Re:Missing question mark?

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Congratulations! That has to be the most redundant post I've ever read!

You asked me if I read the summary, then bolded the part of the summary I'd quoted (and/i? I prefaced it with ftfs [from the fine summary])

What of IBM

[diablovision]

And the masses calling for open sourcing IBM's production desktop and embedded VM?

*crickets*

Exactly. This has always been and will always about looting Sun microsystems or [insert OSS bogeyman in possession of valuable technology here].

Re:What of IBM

[Wesley Felter]

No, the masses have been calling for an open-source, certified JRE. Nobody cares whether IBM or Sun or Harmony or GCJ or Kaffe got there first. A while ago there was speculation that the Harmony project was set up specifically to "launder" IBM's J9 source code into the "community", but that didn't happen. Now that Sun has committed to open-source HotSpot and their class libraries, there's little need for a second open-source VM.

Also keep in mind that most of IBM's class libraries are still owned by Sun, so probably only Sun can open-source them anyway.

Re:What of IBM

[diablovision]

No, IBM has a completely clean implementation of the class libraries unpolluted by Sun code. In fact, IBM is cleaning house to have a completely independent Java implementation free from licensing issues....of anything relating to Java, it's probably the most complete, best candidate for an open source Java implementation...but somehow the community just wants to keep bashing Sun.

Hey the language specification and Java APIs are there. No one is preventing the community (or any other agent) from developing their own completely independent Java implementations....but it's just so much easier to cry, bitch, and moan about how evil Sun is.

Five Year Everybody Dies Plan?

[Anonymous Coward]

It depends, will Gosling announce a "Five Year Everybody Dies Plan"?

This is what I don't understand about Sun...

[Anonymous Coward]

If they had done this right 5 years ago, .NET would have been stillborn and Sun would be the worlds leading application platform vendor. That's a desirable and advantageous position for a hardware vendor to be in. Instead we're 2 months before a release and we still don't have enough details to consider java for future projects. With the benefit of hindsight, the best business decision Sun could have made back in 2001 would have been to relicense the java source code like they were being asked to.

Re:This is what I don't understand about Sun...

[jeswin]

If they had done this right 5 years ago, .NET would have been stillborn and Sun would be the worlds leading application platform vendor.

There is a truth in what you are saying. The real problem with Java is the lack of pace, and the locked Java Community process, which locks the platform and language. Also, since Sun was keen to hold on to the Enterprise space, the platform became too focused on Enterprise applications, while the language was stagnating. It took C#, Python and Ruby to finally get some new language additions.

Had it been Open Source, a lot more (free)wisdom would have gone into the core language.

Re:This is what I don't understand about Sun...

[owlstead]

On the other hand, I do think that C# is growing *way* to fast. There does not seem to be any constraint. This will not be good for the language. It will be very difficult to create good tools, and understanding the language will get more and more difficult. This will make it much harder to create systems that are managable in the long run. The big Java expansion has been in the API, not in the language. The core API now offers mindboggling amount of - rather well documented and readable - functionality.

By the way, Java is also quite big on Smart Cards and mobile phones. It's starting to get bigger and bigger on embedded and entertainment systems, and realtime Java is picking up speed as well. Hopefully, with the Eclipse environment, we will also see more desktop applications appear. I am certainly working on one...

Better and smaller class libraries

[kherr]

It's definitely the class libraries that make Java "java". The language is straightforward and there are decent JVM workalikes, but developers write their code around the class libraries. The problem I've always found with Java is the bloat of the class libraries, so I'd like to see open source distributions make lean and mean Java variants.

A perfect Java distro would maybe drop all the deprecated methods (will Sun ever do that? Java 1.6 is a good opportunity...) and unbundle some of the least-used stuff like the CORBA and RMI stuff. Heck, even Swing and AWT should be optional packages. Why couldn't Java be structured sort of like a Java Web Start install, pulling in libraries only if needed. Almost everything is connected to the internet these days and good caching of libraries from trusted sources would be a decent way to get full functionality with a smaller initial footprint.

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[Paco103]

Of course dropping all the deprecated methods entirely would break backwards compatibility with older software that uses it. Write once, run anywhere (as long as you have the same old version it was written in). I personally don't want 10 versions of the same software and having to deal with which version it was written in and what to run it in.

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[TypeC]

A perfect Java distro would maybe drop all the deprecated methods (will Sun ever do that? Java 1.6 is a good opportunity...)

This question was asked again a JavaOne last summer and Gosling himself said they'll never remove deprecated items because of backward compatiblity.

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[Kunta Kinte]

A perfect Java distro would maybe drop all the deprecated methods (will Sun ever do that? Java 1.6 is a good opportunity...) and unbundle some of the least-used stuff like the CORBA and RMI stuff. Heck, even Swing and AWT should be optional packages.

And the fragmentation begins...

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[zlogic]

Lean and mean Java implementations is all we need. "Works on Sun's, IBM's and XYZ's Java but not on gjc and others. And Kaffe needs some hacks and updates in order to make this app work". We are already seeing this kind of problems with .NET and Mono: you can either write simple apps that work in both, or advanced apps that work in Mono (and need GTK# in .NET Framework), or advanced apps in .NET Framework (and hope that it will work in Mono, although will look ugly on Linux and won't support Windows Native calls).
As for deprecated stuff, it should be avaliable as an easy-to-install packages that aren't installed by default. It's a real shame that some of Sun's own demos in Java Tutorial designed for an old VM don't work on 1.5 (maybe they've fixed this now, I don't know). One of the strong points in Java is that it's abstracted so that if you write an app you're sure it will work pretty much the same after ~5-10 years. If an OS's API changes, Java's classes can be rewritten so that older apps still work. That's why many educational stuff is written in Java (or Flash) - because if you buy an encyclopedia or dictionary (things that don't change over time and don't need to do any platform-specific stuff), you won't be buying upgrades every year just because some library is "deprecated"; after all, these things are pretty much like music and videos, platform-independent and not changed every year.

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[Anonymous Coward]

...and that is precicely why Sun fears open-sourcing Java. Java has so far been immune to the dependency hell of other OSes--all you have to be concerned about is the version of one thing: the JVM. It's manageable that way. I'd like to see more effort put into fast unloading of the pack200 format instead.

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[955301]

Drop RMI? You realize that communication to EJB's is RMI right?

And for the love of gods, why bother trimming the libraries? If you don't use the classes, they don't get loaded into the VM. Everything else is inflating including the OSes and you want to trim the programmers libraries?

The more I look at your post, the more I realize you are straddling two fences. You say drop Swing and AWT implying that you are on the server in which case, your not downloading the JVM & libraries to the client anyway. Then you say Java needs to be like a Java Web Start install, meaning you are on the client side and therefore need the libraries you just said to toss! Oh and btw, Java Web Start is part of the jre download - if you have to download and install something to the client, why not download it all at once? Besides, the libraries *are* broken up - j2se and j2ee, correct?

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[PantsWearer]

I'm not sure how this "perfect" distro would be any different than a current distro other than disk space and lack of backward compatibility. Let's say you toss all of libraries you mentioned, it'll take up less disk space, but the runtime footprint itself probably won't actually change in any significant way.

Much of java is loaded dynamically at runtime, so if you don't use something, it's not just sitting there, taking up memory. With modern memory management systems, any unused portion of memory is just going to be swapped to disk in any case, so it almost doesn't matter if, say, Swing is memory resident or not.

Personally, I agree that there are a ton of libraries that I'll never use, but that doesn't mean that they're hurting me because they exist. I've never used CORBA, I haven't used RMI in over five years, the only parts of AWT that I use are those subclassed in the Swing libraries. Lately, I work with Servlets, so I barely touch user interface libraries at all. Not to mention that sometimes I need one of those libraries that I generally don't use and at that point I'm glad that it's already there and resident.

As for disk space, Java is pretty insignificant compared to what features it provides. My 1.5 JRE is about 70 megs, but can run just about anything writting in java that's been written since the first release. It's basically the equivalent of a fully internationalized operating system by itself.

If you really need to save size, look into some of the other releases of java, J2ME or whatever it's called now.

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[kurtdg]

A perfect Java distro would maybe drop all the deprecated methods (will Sun ever do that? Java 1.6 is a good opportunity...)

Are you nuts? Do you know how many Java SLOC have been written since JDK 1.0? That code is in production now. Do you want to break it all? Do you think the corporations running these classes, depending on these jars, will be delighted to solve another Y2K problem?

Hint: The prime reason that Windows Vista will undoubtedly sell really well, is that it runs the vast majority of binaries made for Windows XP, 2000, ME, 98 and 95 (and may even 3.x) unmodified, really well, and no other OS on the market does that.

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[aCapitalist]

A perfect Java distro ...

Hehe, Sun just cringes when they hear "Java distro".

Re:Better and smaller class libraries

[bladesjester]

I've been thinking the same thing while reading this part of the thread. Production code is expensive to replace, so language makers leave the deprecated methods in there.

The C/C++ fanboys are going to hate hearing this, but if they want the deprecated methods removed from Java, they should push to remove the deprecated functions/methods/whathaveyou from C and C++ first. I'd love to see how far they get before they realize that there are still very important production systems in use that were written back when C was very young and use parts of the language that have since been deprecated...

It just seems to me that most of the people screaming for the removal of deprecated portions of a language are either hobbists or students who have never had to look at something that has to be maintained over the long term.

who cares?

[MobyDisk]

Why are people clamoring for open java? As an application developer, I don't use Java, and it has nothing to do with it being open-sourced. It has to do with a bloated framework that I'm not supposed to distribute with my application, an inconsistent UI, and speed issues. If I could compile a native executable that Just Worked(tm) then I would love it.

Java is still only good for simple embedded web applications, or server-side applications. From an application developer's stand point, Java grew out but never grew up. Open sourcing doesn't fix any of this.

Mono is still a better option.

Re:who cares?

[0xABADC0DA]

What is this "native executable" you speak of? To quote morpheus, "Do you think those are instructions you are running?" Pretty much every so-called native program you run is passed through the ld.so interpreter that relocates the binary and loads shared libraries. Grep the kernel sources for "ld.so".

The only reason you have to ship a JVM with your app is because a) Microsoft intentionally sabotages compatibility (by strong-arming Dell, etc not to ship Java) and b) because Linux distros can't legally ship it because of license restrictions. Java apps work fine on a Mac without shipping their own JVM.

With a JVM installed as a standard system component you run your Java programs just like any other program. You just double-click or ./ it.

Mono has convenient language syntax with C#, but that's it. The CLR bytecode cannot be interpreted well, so hotspot like optimizations are far harder to do. It's a VM trying to be everything to everybody, so it's not really great at anything. It's startup time is far slower than a gcj'd Java program and it's throughput is much less than a hotspot'd one. The only real benefit is that it is oss.

Re:who cares?

[MobyDisk]

because Linux distros can't legally ship it because of license restrictions. Java apps work fine on a Mac without shipping their own JVM.

Thank you. That was the missing link for me. Why can't you ship Java with Linux? Is this a GPL thing? Or something Sun is doing? I don't think it matters if Sun open sources Java. But modifying their license so that people can actually get it on their systems might be a big improvement.

Re:who cares?

[nasch]

Java is still only good for simple embedded web applications, or server-side applications.

ONLY server-side applications? That's huge! I don't have any numbers, but it should be extremely clear that "server-side" is a significant percentage of all the software that gets written in the world in any given year. Therefore, the fact that Java is good for this means that Java is good.

Re:who cares?

[k8to]

Hello Moby Disk,

I have not talked with you since 1997 or so. Mini-Impulse hoo-boy!

On topic, however, it seems you've missed the last 8 years or so of Java on Linux. The reason Java was generally not distributed as part of the various Linux distributions for so many years, is that Sun did not make it legally permissable for them to do so.

There are some additional issues like Linux folks wanting to be able to provide security and bug fixes as appropriate for such a core component. The failure of Sun to make Java truly Open Source prevents these issues from being able to be addressed. These and other problems with closed software, both ideological and practical mean that many distributions will not ship Java directly with their core distribution until it is Open Source.

So, it is a big improvement, if you care about using Java on Linux, or if you care about Java getting adopted. If you don't care about these things, then I suppose it doesn't matter.

Re:who cares?

[hritcu]

If I could compile a native executable that Just Worked(tm) then I would love it.

You can compile Java to native code.

Mono is still a better option.

Where? On windows? No thanks.

Re:who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

For 6 years, I wrote high-performance CAD algorithms in Java. My company wrote efficient software that solved large NP-hard hardware place and route problems in 100% native Java. I have also spent years writing the same sort of software in C++ at industry leading companies.

When it comes to raw memory, with tens of millions of small objects, C++ is better. When it comes to raw speed, C++ is also better, but not as much as many people think. When it comes to development speed, debugging, readability, refactoring, and general software agility, I find Java to be much better.

And that ends up indirectly translating back into run-time and memory performance.

Java allowed us to debug our code faster, find the performance problems, and optimize the critical loops and data structures while reimplementing better high-level algorithms.

Meanwhile, C++ code tends to be bigger, less readable (IMHO), and more fragile. The language is saddled with vestiges of its past such as the preprocessor, separate header files (rather than interfaces), non-standard integer type sizes, and the inability to introduce incompatibilities with C, even at the cost of useful features. There are major components of C++-based CAD systems that people hesitate to re-write from scratch in C++, because of the amount of time they'd spend worrying about memory management (often reinventing a subset of a good garbage collector), dealing with efficient but unreadable STL adaptors, and debugging tricky pointer problems. I've written many of these components in Java and found them to be fairly reasonable projects.

In general, I'd say it's harder to write C++ code than the functionally equivalent Java code, and that the extra effort only pays off in the critical 5% of your code. I will be the first to admit that STL code can be amazingly efficient. I just don't want to spend my life reading it. If you know what you're doing in Java, and have a good background in software architecture, engineering, and algorithms, you can usually find good ways to solve performance problems within the language, and sometimes end up with better code in the process.

I admit to being biased toward Java (as well as python and other more modern languages). If you have your own preference, you're welcome to it. My real point is that as someone who has written high-performance software in Java for one of the most performance-demanding desktop applications anywhere, I believe that the language and development tools are certainly up to the task. It's hard to hear yet another person repeat the mantra that the language is too slow without showing me the critical code fragment that can't be made fast enough for their application.

Now you can do just that with Java

[Uukrul]

"you can see and compile all the code, but no way are you going to be redistributing this as any kind of commercial project"

From Sun:

Sun also makes the JDK source code available for researchers and others interested in exploring the details of the JDK. Over the past several years, Sun has made the source code available via the Sun Community Source License (SCSL) terms. Sun continues to use SCSL for JDK 5.0. In addition, Sun is also releasing JDK 5.0 under the new Java Research License (JRL) which simplifies access to JDK 5.0 source code. Researchers and universities should find the JRL much easier to understand and work with compared to SCSL.

For Research Use only you can access the source code of the implementation of Java from Sun. If they are going to open source Java, I think that they think on more than that.

So if they are going to open source java, but you can't use it for commercial use, then they are only to change the name of the lincense.

We're going to do it.. NEXT YEAR!

[sudog]

Sweet! Next year! Damn.. that's close.

Re:We're going to do it.. NEXT YEAR!

[VGPowerlord]

To the time machine!

Re:Maybe now...

[ahmetaa]

you are a fool if you think it is easy to find the exact amout of empty disc space in a netwroked-clustered environment in a platform independant matter..

Re:Obligatory Gorbachev quote

[Paco103]

and he who comes too early is punished by wife.

Re:Should we begin `digging graves?'

[squiggleslash]

By the way, we shuld not be suprised if we hear OSS zealots saying that this action should have come earlier. Some will even say it is too little too late.

Not sure how stating either of those makes someone a zealot, but, whatever.

It should have been earlier, and it may well be too late. I respect Sun's problems with making the system open, and they've certainly experimented a great deal with different levels of openness, but I think they ended up making the wrong decisions. Not making Java Free Software earlier helped proponents of alternatives such as Mono, and this in turn gave .NET more traction.

GCJ isn't going to go away. It's more than just a JVM, after all, and people are only beginning to see its power. But I can see GNU Classpath disappearing if the official Java libraries are available under a GPL-compatible license.

Alpha Port?

[LinuxFreakus]

Maybe now someone will be able to do a full fledged port to Alpha. I've used Alpha (Linux mostly) systems for many years and I'm never going to give them up until I can't make them run anymore. Yes, I know there are other 64 bit options these days, but I just like Alpha.

The only thing I've really found that is lacking on the Alpha is Java support. There are a few little projects out there which offer limited support, but not since compaq stopped its implementation at JRE 1.3 has there been a real Java environment for Alpha.

Since Java is one of my all time favorite languages to work with, I really hope this could lead to a complete, up to date, stable JRE for Alpha/Linux.

Open source changes...

[ClockworkSparrow]

How long until some enterprising hacker adds all the features to Java that people miss, such as operator overloading? I personally would use Java far more if I could avoid code such as this:

result = x.add(y.multiply(BigInteger.valueOf(7))).pow(3).ab s().setBit(27);

(Example stolen frome Jamie Zawinski's "Java Sucks" rant.)
Add operator overloading (and I mean PROPER operator overloading, not some find-and-replace garbage) to the JDK v6, and you've got a language that (despite being slower than C++ in some cases) towers over C++ in so many ways - garbage collection, easy exception handling, a huge standard library...

Re:Open source changes...

[RetroGeek]

result = x.add(y.multiply(BigInteger.valueOf(7))).pow(3).ab s().setBit(27);

My goodness, what a perfect example of why NOT to use operator overloading.

What would you use for an operator? The +, *, /, or what?

How would operator overloading make the code more readable?

And you could always wrap the whole thing inside one of x's methods, and give it a reasonable name.

Re:Open source changes...

[ahmetaa]

i hope open sourcing Java does not make trigger happy idiot computer language junkies fill Java with crap like this.

Re:Open source changes...

[everphilski]

Uh, "+" instead of ".add(" and "*" instead of ".multiply("

result = (x + y * BigInteger.valueOf(7)).pow(3).abs().setBit(27) is arguably a lot cleaner: less to read, order of operation is implied by type (multiplication before addition).

As someone who spends his day writing code in C++ that mostly multiplies matricies and vectors (occasionally transposing or inverting them) I still can't fathom why Java doesn't have operator overloading. It put C# a notch above Java for a second laguage to learn, for that very reason.

Re:Open source changes...

[VGPowerlord]

Of course, that only really applies if you're using integers larger than 9223372036854775808 or smaller than -9223372036854775807, because you don't need BigInteger for anything in between those.

Re:Open source changes...

[RetroGeek]

So x and y are therefore a type of BigInteger?

Does order of operation (* before +) apply to overloaded operators?

If I remember from the C++ course I took, I can make an overloaded operator do anything I want. I am not limited by what they NORMALLY do (yes, I know, this is bad practice). Does the compiler still honour the traditional meaning, and thus follow order of operation?

I am not convinced. There is NO ambiguity in the original example. There is ambiguity in the C++ example. I prefer a little wordiness to ambiguity. And with a good IDE with intelligent code assist, you do not even need to type all that much.

Using method names means that you do not need to be intimately familiar with the class to know what a plus sign really does.

For instance:

MyObject x = new MyObject();
MyObject o = x;

What did I just get? A reference to x? A (shallow/deep) clone of x? A brand new MyObject with no relationship to x? How do I find out? And when I do, what does this mean:

AnotherObject x = new AnotherObject();
AnotherObject o = x;

New object, possibly new rules.

Re:Open source changes...

[Mitchell Mebane]

"So x and y are therefore a type of BigInteger?"

C++ would try to find a contructor for BigInteger which took an int, and would upconvert them.

"Does the compiler still honour the traditional meaning, and thus follow order of operation?"

Overloaded operators keep their original precedence, even if you completely redefine them (which is why overloading ^ to do exponentiation doesn't quite work).

Well, in C++, neither of those examples will work, because new returns a pointer. But assuming you mean the following...

MyObject *x = new MyObject();
MyObject o = *x;

depends on if/how the copy constructor for MyObject is implemented. If there is no copy constructor, the compiler will perform a shallow copy. Otherwise, whatever code is in the copy constructor is used.

AnotherObject *x = new AnotherObject();
AnotherObject o = *x;

same thing: depends on the copy constuctor.

Re:Open source changes...

[RetroGeek]

depends on if/how the copy constructor for MyObject is implemented. If there is no copy constructor, the compiler will perform a shallow copy. Otherwise, whatever code is in the copy constructor is used.

Which is my point.

In Java the standard usage is:

MyObject y = new MyObject();
MyObject x = new MyObject();

x and y hold a reference to a different instance of MyObject.

MyObject x = y;

x and y both refer to the same object, and the object which x did refer to is eligible for garbage collection.

x = y.clone();

x now holds a new object which is a copy of y

In all of the above it is quite obvious what is happening.

This is starting to sound like a religious agruement :-)

Re:Open source changes...

[VGPowerlord]

"So x and y are therefore a type of BigInteger?"

C++ would try to find a contructor for BigInteger which took an int, and would upconvert them.

Java, on the other hand, would most likely autobox x and y as Integers, then complain because Integer doesn't have things like .add and .multiply.

Re:Open source changes...

[Mitchell Mebane]

"This is starting to sound like a religious agruement :-)" Heh. :) "In all of the above it is quite obvious what is happening." I would argue not, but, then, I'm used to working with pointers, and like having syntactical reminders of when I'm working with references. I'm also not such a big fan of garbage collection. Having to debug memleaks where pointers get passed everywhere can be nasty, but it forces you to think carefully about your design.

Re:Open source changes...

[RetroGeek]

Well, I started with C. Lots of strut and pointer arithmetic. Heck I even used union. And when I learned Objects, I found that I was using object oriented programming without the objects. Each strut was accompanied by its own set of getXX and cleanupXX functions, plus all the functions to manipulate the strut were contained in one file. This was in self-defense when the apps became somewhat large.

Right now I am in the middle of developing a Java Web app which currently has over 2.5M bytes of code. I figure I will be done by July next year. Not having to worry about the mechanical details of memory management makes things a lot simpler and lets me sleep better :-))

Re:Open source changes...

[ClockworkSparrow]

Sorry if I left some ambiguity in the original example. Yes, x and y are BigIntegers. Personally, I believe that this:

result = x.add(y.multiply(BigInteger.valueOf(7)));

is far less readable then this:

result = x + (y * 7);

You do raise some good points about order of operations w/ regards to operator overloading - that's why I parenthesize to bejeezus and back. I find it to be a pain to memorize the Java order-of-operations list when I can just parenthesize; additionally, even if I do remember those, there's no guarantee later programmers will. Parentheses, while verbose, are little missionaries prosletyzing the Principle of Least Astonishment.

While we're talking about order-of-operations, let's all set aside our differences and take a look at the Perl Periodic Table of the Operators: (apologies for the PDF - but check it out, you might get a kick out of it)

http://www.ozonehouse.com/mark/blog/code/PeriodicT able.pdf

Please accept my deepest sympathies for the pain you must suffer for 2.5 megs of Java code. I'll always have a place for Java in my heart - it was the first language that I took a class on, and I've written some pretty complicated GUI apps - but I wince at what you must be going through. *shudder*

Re:Open source changes...

[RetroGeek]

Perl Periodic Table of the Operators

LOL

I gave up on Perl after a few months. You can produce the most un-readable code I have ever seen. And this includes samples from the original Basic (line numbers and GOTO and GOSUB).

Please accept my deepest sympathies for the pain you must suffer for 2.5 megs of Java code. I'll always have a place for Java in my heart - it was the first language that I took a class on, and I've written some pretty complicated GUI apps - but I wince at what you must be going through. *shudder*

Oh, it is not that bad :-)

My manager trusts me, and I have complete control over the entire project. Everything is abstracted through objects. So to get a re-direct page I use:
Page.HOME.getServlet() where HOME is a static object holding everything there is to know about a page. This referencing applies to every important function in the system including Tables, Columns, Indexes, Page form names, and so on. I let the IDE do most of the work for me.

If I was to create a logical diagram of the whole system it would look like those cartoon factories. A big building with several floors and lots and lots of smokestacks. The building is my framework and the smokestacks are my Use Cases. Each nicely separated from the rest.

Keeps me sane....

Besides, of the 10+ languages which I haves used in the past, I actually prefer Java.

Applying open-sourcing to the real world

[sjonke]

If Colonel Sanders would open-source those eleven herbs and spices, we could finally know with certainty how many of them are salt.

opensolaris

[asv108]

Is this "open source" as in Sun's Solaris "open sourcing", where it's open source in all technical senses, but it's under an unbelievably elaborate license which exists for no reason except to engender GPL incompatibility and keep Linux from benefiting from the source release, which effectively scares everyone away from the project?

Its only been year since the release of OpenSolaris, and there are already many distributions in development. So I don't think the CDDL is everyone away.

While I don't care for the CDDL, Sun's rationale is well documented.

It's easy to do now

[Reverend528]

Process child = Runtime.getRuntime().exec("df")

But Sire, the train has left the station

[jeswin]

I doubt if this will change anything:

1. In the application space, there are much more productive languages and tools. Think Ruby, Python. And extreme performance has never been a Java forte either.

2. Core language capabilities are obsolete now. Bruce Eckel's famous piece The departure of the hyper-enthusiasts captures this nicely. And looking at the C# 3.0 spec, with lambdas, automatic type inference, monadic comprehensions and lots of functional programming goodness, Java is left way behind. MS is also way ahead in adding dynamic languages support to the platform (Microsoft supported IronPython v1 for .Net Fx due out this month.)

3. I think Gosling needs to move on. After he said Ruby/PHP are just scripting languages, and they just generate web pages, and lack the "power" of Java. [Which "power"?]

4. With Vista MS would have finally killed Java's Run Anywhere promise. It will still run, but it will look totally out of place. The new eye candy, and the good communication foundation (WCF) is better and easier accessed through .Net.

The only reason to have Java is for compatibility in a "Legacy" Java environment. Kind of the same reason why we still have mainframes. These days I cannot think of a single reason why someone would go with Java, other than interop.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[sirdisc]

LOL monkey. You must be an academic or hobbyist. Java is alive and well in the enterprise. Any real programmer in an enterprise environment knows that dynamic langauges like perl, python, ruby, etc etc are not used for shared enterprise level code and never will be in their current form. It is foolish (and therefore why 99% of enterprise software) to use a dynamic lagunage unless you're willing to create endless amounts of documentation of what each function actually does. Static type languages like Java, C#, C++, C etc are still used for enterprise level shared code because it is far easier to understand what each function does, maintain and share. What is far more likely to happen is that staic typed languages like Java will adopt more dynamic behavior in limited cases where it makes sense, and at the same time increase static type-checking in other areas (eg Genereic in Java).

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[JohnnyCannuk]

"1. In the application space, there are much more productive languages and tools. Think Ruby, Python. And extreme performance has never been a Java forte either."

Uhm, yeah. Let me guess, never programmed in Java, huh? Java on the server runs as fast, and occasionaly faster than native code. About 8 years ago, Swing was dirt slow, but even it has picked up since about 1.4.2 release. Don't even ge me going on the security superiority of VMs and compiled coded vs scripting languages like Ruby and Python. Clearly you do not have a clue.

"2. Core language capabilities are obsolete now. Bruce Eckel's famous piece The departure of the hyper-enthusiasts captures this nicely. And looking at the C# 3.0 spec, with lambdas, automatic type inference, monadic comprehensions and lots of functional programming goodness, Java is left way behind. MS is also way ahead in adding dynamic languages support to the platform (Microsoft supported IronPython v1 for .Net Fx due out this month.)"

"3. I think Gosling needs to move on. After he said Ruby/PHP are just scripting languages, and they just generate web pages, and lack the "power" of Java. [Which "power"?]"

Go to Jini.org, jxta.org, or any one of the number of Java based projects out there and show me how Ruby, PHP, Python or even C# can do some of that stuff. BTW, Ruby and PHP are just scripting languages. Get over it.

You could also admit that there are times when Java is the right tool and times when Ruby or PHP is the right answer.

"4. With Vista MS would have finally killed Java's Run Anywhere promise. It will still run, but it will look totally out of place. The new eye candy, and the good communication foundation (WCF) is better and easier accessed through .Net."

Huh? Sun and MS have signed a partnership agreement. If you don't think there are Sun engineers busy coding a Swing PLAF that matches Vista, you are an idiot. Actually, considering the other stuff you wrote, you are an idiot. Besides, Vista doesn't look like it will see the light of day anytime soon so I shouldn't worry. Oh and guess what, if Java is OSS, then a whole buhc of new engineers can pitch in to port it to the new platform. That sort of the point.

Man you kids are really getting sloppy with your trolls these days...

C# 3.0...your comparing curent Java 1.5 with an unimplemented spec, basically vaporware. Right. How about you compare Mustang(1.6) or Dolphin (1.7) with C# 3.0. Only and MS fan-boy would even write this crap.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[sirdisc]

By the way, I'm only talking about enterprise level software that has shared libraries. There are certainly one-off cases where perl, ruby, python etc. are very useful. I use them a lot depending on the task. It's foolish to not use a static type-safe language for shared code at an enteprise level. You would be hard pressed to find example where it isn't used, but there are always exceptions.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[pthisis]

Don't even ge me going on the security superiority of VMs and compiled coded vs scripting languages like Ruby and Python. Clearly you do not have a clue...BTW, Ruby and PHP are just scripting languages. Get over it.

Please define "scripting language". If you have the time, please categorize the following as "scripting languages" or "not scripting languages":
1. Java
2. Python
3. Ruby
4. C#
5. Smalltalk
6. Lisp
7. Scheme

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[fm6]

Do your own homework!

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[pthisis]

I have. I ask you the question because you refer to Python, for instance, as a scripting language but seem to indicate that Java is not.

Python is byte-compiled and then run on a virtual machine (and I can, for instance, byte-compile to .pyc files, delete the source code or move only the .pyc files to another machine, and execute the .pyc files). The level of optimization depends on the particular Python implementation (CPython, Stackless, PyPy, and psyco all do it differently, with CPython doing only minor peephole optimizations, constant folding, etc while psyco and pypy do much more sophisticated specializing native code generation), but the basic scheme is similar to what Java does except that instead of having seperate javac and java commands both functions are included in one binary.

Usually "scripting language" is used to refer to a system admin-level interpreted language (like bash, windows scripting, old Rexx implementations, etc), and often it's used to mean embedded extension languages (like elisp, QuakeC, VBA, etc) but you're clearly using a non-standard definition.

I'm wondering if you are using "scripting language" to mean "any dynamically typed language". Perhaps you're using it to refer to the implementation detail of having the VM and the compiler in the same binary. Perhaps there's some particular type of optimization that you feel seperates a scripting language from a non-scripting language.

From what you've said I can't figure out exactly how you're defining it, and I know of no way to "do my own homework" to find out what's going on inside your head.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[pthisis]

Sorry, didn't notice that you weren't the poster I was originally responding to. The "you"s in the parent refer to JohnnyCannuk.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[fm6]

Inasmuch as I can parse your argument at all, you seem to be saying "Most scripting languages compile to bytecodes that are executed by a VM; therefore any language that executes bytecodes on a VM is a scripting language." If you would learn to express yourself more concisely, you could avoid fallacies like this.

Perhaps it would help if you stopped taking the word "scripting" too literally. As you point out, languages like Perl no longer much resemble the scripting languages from whence they sprang. Nowadays, the more accurate term for languages like python and perl is "agile". But people continue to say "scripting" out of habit. Sloppy, but that's carbon-based units for you.

Your homework assignment is to google "agile programming languages" and explain why they describe Perl and Python, but not Java or C#.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[k8to]

Java on the server runs as fast, and occasionaly faster than native code.

I would like to hear some justification as to how java can run faster than native code, where native code is specified (as here) in a general sense. That is, do not tell me how some java code can run faster than some native code, since it's obvious you could create pathological native code to run arbitrarily slow.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[pthisis]

Inasmuch as I can parse your argument at all, you seem to be saying "Most scripting languages compile to bytecodes that are executed by a VM; therefore any language that executes bytecodes on a VM is a scripting language."

Where the hell did you get that from?

I put forth the most common definition of scripting language (interpreted system administration level language) and pointed out that Python does not fit that definition. I put another common definition (embedded application extension language) and pointed out that Python doesn't fit that language.

Then I asked what he meant by scripting language, since neither of the most common definitions would include Python but he called it a scripting language. I offered some guesses at what he might mean. Perhaps he defines scripting language as any dynamically typed language? Perhaps he defines scripting language as anything that doesn't meet some (unspecified) level of optimization? Perhaps he defines scripting language as anything that includes the compiler and VM in the same binary?

Until he actually defines what he means by scripting language, there is no argument. I'm just trying to figure out what he meant, as he isn't using mainstream definitions.

Obviously these categorizations are not "bright line". For instance, perl started as a sysadmin language that was strictly interpreted; it's grown up into a full-fledged byte-compiled language used in a wide array of application domains. So if you're using the most common definition of scripting language, Perl historically fits it. On the other hand, _modern_ Perl is certainly not limited to the implementation and domain that the traditional definition of scripting language implies.

The O'Reilly definition of "agile programming language" at http://www.oreillynet.com/onlamp/blog/2003/04/pyth on_is_an_agile_programming.html is fairly content free. Certainly you can go down all the bullet points and argue that Java and C# qualify just as much as Python and Ruby.

Personally I prefer to use actual CS terms instead of marketing buzzwords--is a language strongly typed (Java, Python, ML) or weakly typed (C, tcl, bash)? Is it statically typed (C, Java, ML) or dynamically typed (Python, Java)? Does it have strong support for functional programming (Lisp, ML)? Does it have support for object orientation? Are functions and classes first-class objects? Does it have closures? Continuations? Hygeniec macros? A security model for untrusted code?

And then you can talk about implementations, though obviously for mature languages there can be many (e.g. gcc compiles C to machine code, while eic interprets C; gcj compiles Java, while the Sun JDK runs bytecode on a VM with some on-the-fly native code generation).

Obviously the guy I was responding to has some subset of language features and/or some subset of implementation details in mind when he calls something a scripting language, but he hasn't specified what they are.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[pthisis]

Obviously listing java under both dynamically typed and statically typed is a typo. Replace it under dynamically typed with tcl, scheme, or whatever.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[metallic]

The simplest explanation is that the JIT compiler will actually compile your Java application to native code, profiling the running of your application in order to figure out what kind of optimizations to make. That's why you can sometimes get better performance than well optimized C++ code.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[k8to]

However, in practice all hotspot does is compiles the most-used regions to native code, minimizing the cost of the compilation and maximizing the benefit.

Yes, I understand there are theoretical advantages to native code. However, I don't believe any such optimizations are actually available for use.

The faster-than-C++ cases I've seen have nearly always been compile time optimizations that had to do with numerical programming, where the limitation for C++ is the pointers. This is a limitation for C++, but not for native code. The equivalent fortran, for example, will run faster.

Re:But Sire, the train has left the station

[k8to]

I meant "Yes, I understand there are theoretical advantages to dynamic execution."

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[VGR]

I know, I shouldn't feed a troll....

You are the reason they were reluctant to make it (fully) open source.

You obviously are confident you know more about what makes a good language than the designers of Java do. Have you read even one paper at jcp.org? Have you looked at the people who make up the JCP? IBM, Apple, Cisco, Intel, HP, ATI, NVidia, Creative Labs, Google (!), Apache, Apogee, Namco ... you really think you're smarter than their combined intellect and months of discussion? Trust me, you're not.

I'm sure you and a lot of others are already giddy with excitement over the idea of making a "better Java" with const and operator overloading.

When you understand the "less is more" principle, you'll begin to understand why all your pet features don't belong in the language.

Java vs. Mono now

[Qwavel]

This makes things more complicated for me.

I'm a C++ Windows developer and I'm interested in starting to do some C# or Java. It is my belief that both are quite good and both can run on Windows and Linux (this is a requirement) so it doesn't matter which I choose technically. I feel equal hostility to MS and Sun so that doesn't matter. If the open source community decides on one or the other as being more 'free' and really gets behind it then I'll probably go with that.

With Sun still playing games on opening Java, to the point where the JVM couldn't be bundled, and with the Mono project sounding pretty good (so long as I stick to the right API's) I was definately leaning towards Mono. But if Sun really does open Java then that will probably sway me the other way. Of course, I won't base my decision on the info we have today - I'll wait and see if they really do it.

Re:Java vs. Mono now

[aCapitalist]

If the open source community decides on one or the other as being more 'free' and really gets behind it then I'll probably go with that.

Who are you going to let decide for you what tools you're going to use, and who is defining free for you?

Re:Java vs. Mono now

[andersbergh]

Check out http://digitalmars.com/d, it's a C#/Java/C++ like language that is compiled to native code. The official compiler runs on Windows and Linux, but it's not open source. The frontend is, however. There is also the GNU D Compiler, which runs on a few more platforms and is 100% Free. It's a really nice language, you'll like it.

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[bladesjester]

Hey, at least I'm not the one making that speach anymore =]

I just do not understand why the people who hate java want to add all sorts of things to it that would either make it a total pain to use or to undermine the security of the platform.

Java isn't C. It was made for different reasons. People need to learn to live with it. Don't get me wrong, I use C as well, but I just don't know why the heck it is that some people want everything to look like C.

Does it matter?

[crhylove]

I'm still not installing JRE to slow down my computer. It can be as open source as it wants. Why do people still bother with java? It's a poorly designed, poorly implemented language. I'm not going to bog down my machines with any program that slows it down un-necessarily, which means: I'm not using anything written in java. Now if it being open sourced means that I can get applications written in java as precompiled binaries not needing JRE, well, then maybe.

rhY

Re:Does it matter?

[ltbarcly]

ARG. Are you on some kind of medicine that makes you slow? Java is just as fast as any other language once you consider the quality of programming. A perfect C program is faster than a perfect Java program at the same task. Of course, a real world C program is never perfect, so you are VERY likely to see Java software which has better performance than natively compiled software.

Of course, how would you know? You're somehow morally opposed to software that runs 30% slower than some hypothetical ideal.

<sarcasm> I never run software that was written in C. I only run software written in Fortran, because the lack of pointers lets the compiler squeeze 2% better performance out of the code. I always decide on which software to run based on some esoteric implementation detail which doesn't effect me at all rather than how well the software solves the problem it is designed to solve. Where I work, getting things done is job 2! (Job 1: Making sure my computer isn't bogged down.) </sarcasm>

Re:Does it matter?

[crhylove]

LOL You caught me arguing about completely the wrong thing. I don't like java because I have to have a JRE installed on my machine, and so far, every JRE has slowed my PC unnecessarily. I'm not THAT picky about well written code, or which language a program is in. I just want a binary that runs without an extra layer of software. Actually, more than that I want a binary that doesn't even mess with the registry.

rhY

Re:Does it matter?

[hritcu]

Your windows is slow because of viruses not because of Java. In order to prove this to you we'll install it one day on your computer and you will see.

Re:Does it matter?

[gaj]

You moronic contrivance.

The JRE only loads up when/if you run a Java application or Applet. I am a developer, and I have several JDKs and JREs installed on each of my machines -- not one of them has any process having to do with Java running unless I am running a Java app or applet.

n00b.

Re:Does it matter?

[ltbarcly]

The JRE doesn't effect the performance of your PC. It does run a background process which checks for updated versions of the JRE, but you can disable that, and it shouldn't effect performance.

Frankly, I beleive you are a 'ricer'. You should run gentoo.

Re:Does it matter?

[crhylove]

I wasn't TRYING to be flame bait, though obviously that's what I succeeded at (and for that I apologize). I just want native binaries that don't need any kind of runtime environment. I don't install .net, JRE, or almost anything else I don't have to. My computer runs faster and I don't have tons of random crap in the task bar that I don't need for 99% of the tasks I routinely use my computer for in a work or pleasure related fashion.

You java fanboys need to cool down and just start giving us native compiled binaries. I'm looking at YOU, azureus and freenet! I don't want JRE, GTK, .NET, or any other stupid layer like that. I understand the convenience for you coders, but it sucks for the end user, whether you're open source or any other type of coding project.

rhY

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[Reverend528]

Have you looked at the people who make up the JCP? IBM, Apple, Cisco, Intel, HP, ATI, NVidia, Creative Labs, Google (!), Apache, Apogee, Namco ... you really think you're smarter than their combined intellect and months of discussion?

Yeah. The individual usually is smarter than the group.

drop dead, Sun

[m874t232]

10 years ago, Sun promised ANSI and ISO standards for Java plus open source implementations. What did we get? No standards, a lot of FUD (yes, FUD from Sun) about how they can't because of MSFT, proprietary and closed implementations, costly compatibility tests, bloated APIs and implementations, and threats of lawsuits.

Now that FOSS implementations are mature and nearly complete, Sun is trying to undermine them by finally open sourcing Java (at least in name--in practice, the license will probably be a sham).

The sooner Sun goes out of business, the better for everybody. Microsoft at least makes no secret about where they stand on FOSS, but Sun pretends to be a friend to FOSS but keeps spreading FUD about FOSS and keeps stabbing FOSS efforts in the back.

Re:drop dead, Sun

[WilliamSChips]

Solaris is a proprietary BSD derivative

No it's not. BunOS was, but they changed the name to Solaris when they changed from BSD to SysV.

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[Just Some Guy]

you really think you're smarter than their combined intellect and months of discussion? Trust me, you're not.

Unless you're posting that from an AT&T Unix console, you're benefitting from people who had the hubris to think you're wrong.

The road of progress was paved by people who thought the current way of doing things was dumb, and who set out to find a better alternative. This is generally regarded as a good thing (except by people with a vested interest in the old ways).

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[nuzak]

Yes, but of course once Sun comes out with operator overloading, it will be the font of all wisdom and goodness and all that is right and proper.

Hell, they can't even add local type inference. You know what? I am smarter than these people if they can't figure that much out. What a joke all you fawning apologists are. And here's a shocker -- operator overloading is a purely syntactic construct. If it was added to the language, it would STILL be bytecode compatible.

TCK and calling it "Java"

[kmahan]

To me the real question is "When will Sun be releasing the various TCKs?" The conformance suites are what is needed to validate any of the java implementations and call them "Java" in the eyes of Sun (and their lawyers).

As James Gosling has said -- the source to the JVMs and libraries has been available for 10 years. But the TCKs aren't available in source or binary form.

Open sourced

[dodongo]

It's interesting to note that "open source" is now a verb. And we can be sure of that because the poster has inflected it for tense.

The part of the compound that seems most verbal to me is "open" -- yet they don't refer to it as "opened source" -- which ostensibly refers to source (code) which has undergone an event of opening. Instead, the whole kit and kaboodle has been verbalized. Or, alternatively, "source" is being inflected as a verb on its own, becoming past tense "sourced", leaving "open" as ... ? An adverbial? Must be, because the opposite of "open sourced" would be "closed sourced", right? So the preceding modifier controls the manner of sourcing, either in the opening or closing direction. Hm. What a conundrum :)

And the implication for phones?

[phonewebcam]

This is way cool, and coming right on the heels of the open linux phone
http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/0 8/15/141244

Dare we hope for a perfect marriage?

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[ahmetaa]

well said.

Fix the bugs instead

[kherr]

I was thinking of the install footprint, not the runtime. I guess I'm showing my (java) age. A huge barrier to adopting Java software in the client world is getting Java on the client. Really, Windows it the biggest pain in the ass because it doesn't come with Java. I don't care how big Java is on Mac OS X because it's just there. I guess follow-up comments lead me to realize that splitting up the libraries is pretty pointless in this broadband (tubes? dump trucks?) age.

So I'll stand by my call to actually remove deprecated methods. Otherwise, what's the point in deprecation? Five years should be more than enough time to stop using something. But thinking about it, there are some serious bugs that could stand fixing, particularly in the big, complex parts like Swing. Or how about revisiting existing code and optimizing the performance? Some of Java's code is gnarly. Open source eyeballs could really tackle those without burdening Sun developers, who are busy pushing out the next unnecessary release for the sake of marketing...

Community Summary

[znx]

Let me be the one to show a summary of Java coders in the community. WOOOHOO finally! I can only see this as a good thing in general. We can only hope that it will grow in popularity now.

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[kaffiene]

Oh for christ's sake, everyone KNOWS that operator overloading is just syntactic sugar. Who the fuck do you think you're enlightening with that gem of insight?

The objection to operator overloading is made on the grounds of code simplicity and readibility, not because of any issues with byte code.

Re:Okay, but what does "open source" mean? Answer

[owlstead]

This is said at Mark Reinhold's blog:

"We don't know which license we're going to use yet. We do know that it will be an OSI-approved license. We also know that any particular license choice is going to disappoint some people, but we don't see any way around that."

Let's turn Java into TMMLPTEALPAITAFNFAL!

[Jesus_666]

But Java would be so much better if it was more like $MY_FAVOURITE_LANGUAGE! For example, it's lacking some features found in PHP like being mixable with HTML code and not using namespaces! And it should have the syntactic goodness of both Ruby and Haskell! Speaking of Haskell, why doesn't Java use type inference everywhere? Forcing the user to give a type only makes things complicated. Also, function declarations should not look like String foobar(int blah, int fhqwhgads) - foobar::Integer -> Integer -> String is much better for a completely nonspecific reason that everyone with two brain cells to rub together could see (just as he could see that such declarations should be optional since they could be inferred by the compiler). Also, Java should run on Dotnet and use FLTK as the main GUI toolkit.

And Javadoc should translate all source code comments into Esperanto.

And ARM Jazelle bytecode specs ... ?

[Big Jojo]

There are a lot of embedded CPUs that have "Java Acceleration" built in. I'm specifically concerned with ARM's Jazelle -- as found in ARM926ejs CPUs like the one in the Nokia 770, for example, and all ARM v6 CPUs -- but there is also Atmel's new AVR32 (Linux port is in the MM tree) and there are a few other processors that do the same thing.

But you can't get specs on how to use that stuff ... and if you ask the chip vendors, the answer is that it's Sun's fault. To get specs, you must sign agreements with Sun. That's for basic stuff like how to preserve the relevant processor context, and how to enter or exit the "execute Java bytecodes" CPU mode, and of course exactly what bytecodes exist. (They just accelerate the bytecodes ... some things need to punt to runtime code.)

What that means is that for example GCC can't use that CPU acceleration by having its Java runtime (GCJ/GIJ) build on it ... one assumes that this means a performance penalty for at least the bytecode interpretation parts of almost every Java runtime environment, though of course it would be interesting seeing how things like HotSpot affect the performance numbers. (The CPUs that have Java bytecode acceleration are by the way not ones that normally have big CPU caches, high clock rates, or very much memory to waste on the stuff HotSpot does.)

So my question: Is this "Open Sourced Java" going to cover ARM's Jazelle? And the AVR32 Java acceleration? And other chips?

Or is it going to be the same-old, same-old? Folk working with embedded systems want to know... the big system bloatware that that Sun ships is not especially useful. Finally loosening the reins on the bytecode acceleration hardware would be a much more useful step.

Forget the compiler and VM...

[jonwil]

Unless SUN releases the source code to the class libraries, java will never be Open Source.

Re:Forget the compiler and VM...

[Script_God]

I'm looking at C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.5.0_07\src.zip. Sure looks like the sources to the class libraries to me!

don't let facts get in the way of your astroturf

[m874t232]

I have about 1600 packages installed on my Debian system. Of those, 84 mention Sun in some form, but mostly, it's just bug fixes or ports to Solaris that Sun contributed to other people's projects. Only two groups of packages can be said to be Sun contributions: Tcl (obsolete and abandoned by Sun) and OpenOffice.

Claims that Sun is a great supporter of open source just don't stand up to real-world facts. Sun usually only open sources things when they are afraid of becoming irrelevant in some market, or as an add-on to a necessary proprietary offering, and even then only under some carefully picked nuisance license.

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[nuzak]

> Who the fuck do you think you're enlightening with that gem of insight?

So where are the compatibility arguments now? That's always the first canard people pull out whenever the horrifying specter of open-sourcing poor little vulnerable Java comes up. My code that uses operator overloading will be perfectly compatible with the code that does not. Hey, we're back on topic.

Nope, it's arrogance. Our poor mushy little brains can't handle mildly complex features, so Sun protects us from such things. And now we're back off topic.

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[runderwo]

You are aware that the Java trademark prevents third party distributions from being referred to as Java, are you not? If someone hacks features into the language, they can't legally call it Java. Simple as that.

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[Breakfast Pants]

Here's another shocker -- changing every keyword in the language to be UPPERCASE is a purely syntactic construct. If it was added to the language, it would STILL be stupid (oh, and bytecode compatible).

The answer is NO.

[hritcu]

You chose the worst programming language somebody would like to see mixed with anything. C++ is already bloated and obscure just by itself ... no need to cross it with Java. Think of the children.

Re:Big deal for OSS QWZX

[kaffiene]

Compatibility has got absolutely nothing to do with it you great newbie muppet. If you don't understand Keep It Simple, then I pity people who have to work with you.

OK: Does "Apache" mean "open source"?

[mdm42]

Sun do get it (though it took a while) - Jini http://jini.org/ has been opensource under ASLv2 for a while now.

Control of variation is essential

[presidenteloco]

Open sourcing java might be ok, but we should realize that a significant part of its predominance
and popularity in fact comes from its rigidity and lack of variation between implementations,
platforms etc.

Basic tenets: Simplicity and uniform, predictable extensibility at the core levels of something
are essential to manageability of complex systems built on top of that core.

Java has held to this better than any other computing platform to date. And it is a very
important part of its success. Once you know Java, and its core libraries, you're set, and
you're skills are portable to all kinds of uses of Java, and you don't have to keep re-learning
or debugging variants of the basic core.

So it is essential that compliance tests (and a BDFL) are allowed to put a stamp on what is
to be called "Java" going forward. Variants can be called "java-like" or java-lite" or something
but the simplicity and control of variation is THE ESSENTIAL CHARACTERISTIC of the Java
brand, in programming.

Re:Control of variation is essential

[presidenteloco]

Basic tenets: Simplicity and uniform, predictable extensibility at the core levels of something are essential to manageability of complex systems built on top of that core. Java has held to this better than any other computing platform to date. OOPS! EXCEPT LISP OF COURSE - MY BAD

JCP?

[SuperKendall]

Ever hear of the JCP (Java Community Process?)

I guess not. I post this so that future metamoderators will realize you were modded up by the ignorant.