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Oracle May Have Stopped Funding and Developing Java EE (arstechnica.com)

While anticipating new features in Java 9, developers also have other concerns, according to an anonymous Slashdot reader: ArsTechnica is reporting that Oracle has quietly pulled funding and development efforts away from Java EE, the server-side Java technology that is part of hundreds of thousands of Internet and business applications. Java EE even plays an integral role for many apps that aren't otherwise based on Java, and customers and partners have invested time and code. It wouldn't be the first time this has happened, but the implications are huge for Java as a platform.
"It's a dangerous game they're playing..." says one member of the Java Community Process Executive Committee. "It's amazing -- there's a company here that's making us miss Sun." Oracle's former Java evangelist even left the company in March and became a spokesman for the "Java EE Guardians," who have now created an online petition asking Oracle to "clarify" its intent and resume development or "transfer ownership of Java EE 8".

115 comments

  1. No, not transferred by fustakrakich · · Score: 1, Funny

    It should taken and placed in the public domain. Problem solved...

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
    1. Re: No, not transferred by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Offtopic

      Says the guy who doesn't know the difference between your and you're. Oracle are corporate assholes and they're pushing people away from Java with their lawsuits.

    2. Re: No, not transferred by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I see what you did there. Trolling is a art after all!

    3. Re: No, not transferred by fustakrakich · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but I have to sell it. Gimme an offer...

      --
      “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
    4. Re: No, not transferred by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nope. Poor execution on his part.

      The proper troll is "your a moran."

    5. Re: No, not transferred by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      None of you saw what *I* did there apparently. But I agree, we can't forget the morans.

    6. Re: No, not transferred by hackwrench · · Score: 1

      I did. In insinuating his post was a good troll you got responses.

    7. Re:No, not transferred by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It should taken and placed in the public domain. Problem solved...

      Java should be terminated immediately and buried after cremation.

  2. Re: Trollinf by Lonewolf666 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    No, that wasn't good trolling by GP at all.
    A skilled troll can get people riled up and provoke a bunch of heated answers.
    A really skilled troll does it in a controversial way that draws some supporters as well, creating a major flame war.

    Just calling someone an idiot does not qualify.

    --
    C - the footgun of programming languages
  3. Re:Yep by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Fuck Oracle. Also fuck the people who buy Oracle products.

    Google should fork Java (and rename it) before Oracle tries to fuck over anyone else with such an important technology stack.

    Dalvik should have been based on Python perhaps with a JIT based on Cython. Then Oracle becomes increasingly irrelevant.

  4. Um.. what are they suppose to do? by rsilvergun · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Sun couldn't make any money off Java. Sun wasn't incompetent, they were stuck in a business model that became irrelevant (selling high end hardware). It's all well and good to say you should pivot to SaaS but that means selling access to software. If Oracle tries that with Java the community will just fork the damn thing. Where is the business model with Java that makes Oracle enough money to cover the expense of buying Sun? It wasn't in enforcing copyrights on Google, they lost that fight. What they're left with is really nice tech that can't make anyone a dime...

    --
    Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
    1. Re:Um.. what are they suppose to do? by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 4, Informative

      I think companies like Redhat (JBoss) and IBM and SAP disagree, they make plenty of money with Java.

      Also I see plenty of JDeveloper commercial licenses in Enterprises.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    2. Re:Um.. what are they suppose to do? by Z00L00K · · Score: 2

      JBoss and the peer implementations will probably be the future of Java EE. The fact that Oracle drops it just means that they drop their control over the solution and the worst that can happen is that the various implementations will diverge unless the companies developing the solution put in a joint venture to coordinate the APIs.

      --
      If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
    3. Re:Um.. what are they suppose to do? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      The do not make money because the "own" Java, they make money because they "use" Java...

      Big difference there. The owner of Java would probably love to get a portion of the money that these users of Java are making. This would be realized through a licensing stream... which may be the end game of scaring customers into thinking that the current public product is going to get shit-canned

    4. Re:Um.. what are they suppose to do? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oracle got a tonne of stuff when they bought Sun, not just Java... The most significant was probably the Sparc line of servers, of which they recently released a new line, and this enabled them to get a share of the market back from HP. Oracle moved towards cluster deployments for their database years ago, and acquiring such a hardware platform was important to them.

    5. Re:Um.. what are they suppose to do? by Blaskowicz · · Score: 1

      Selling high end hardware and a high end OS, to run hardware-independent and OS-independent Java?

    6. Re: Um.. what are they suppose to do? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sun died because x86/Linux surpassed Sparc/x86/Solaris. Java was one of the reasons Oracle bought Sun.

      However Oracle proved to be more clueless than Sun when it comes to Java. To nobody's surprise.

      Oracle doesn't know any business models other than ones where huge companies give them tend if thousands of dollars for next to nothing. Java only proliferated due to the fact that you can develop on it for free with great community support on lots of projects.

    7. Re:Um.. what are they suppose to do? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You do realize how many oracle app server licenses are sold to run java apps? Oracle is making tons of money off it indirectly, much like Microsoft makes money off people using .Net since they need the rest of their stack, which isn't free. ( at least until recently.. which i still question that move, they have an angle )

      Consider it an investment in your companies infrastructure. It may not make you money as an 'entity', but without it you dont have anything.

    8. Re:Um.. what are they suppose to do? by tomhath · · Score: 1

      Sun's main driver behind Java was to provide a language that could compete with Microsoft's Visual suite (Visual Basic and Visual C++). They had to keep tight control of the language to prevent Microsoft from usurping it (remember the J++ lawsuit?).

      Sun succeeded to some extent, but it bled them to death. Their hardware couldn't compete with Intel and they weren't making any money on Java. Now Oracle is looking over their shoulder at Postgresql and not making any money on Java.

  5. IBM & RedHat will form "O2EE" and life will go by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is Oracle playing it's usual games and it's introducing a hiccup in the J2EE lifecycle, it's ultimately not going to matter. If Oracle does take it's toys and go home because of the Google decision, IBM, RedHat and others will happily step in to create the O2EE alliance with other major players and life will go on. The J2EE server market is dominated by Tomcat and JBoss/WildFly, Weblogic has roughly 10%. Oracle can certainly cause trouble but they are in no position to kill J2EE.

  6. Consequences in Banking/Finance? by mpapet · · Score: 1

    Lots of java in the banking finance world. I wonder how much of it runs on the EE platform.

    http://docs.oracle.com/javaee/...

    --
    http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
    1. Re:Consequences in Banking/Finance? by gweihir · · Score: 1

      Indeed. They should have bought Sun and have it continue doing Java. Would have been cheaper than what is now happening.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    2. Re:Consequences in Banking/Finance? by mSparks43 · · Score: 2

      For those not familiar with java EE, who, like me when I first saw this popping up on the tinterwebs thoght this was remotely a java..
      "Java EE" IS NOT what anyone familiar with Java would ever really use.

      Its more like a mish mash of highly specialized and mostly irrelevant java projects for corporate customers that I very much doubt anyone but the original client is using.

      This is not remotely equivalent to the java JDK we are all familiar with.

      At least, as far as I can tell. If someone can point me to something in the Java EE suite that "will be missed", I may change my mind that this is anything other than a few big clients kicking up a fuss that they may have to pay developers to work for them.

      Also, while I've seen lots of "pulled developers onto other things", there is no mention of what these "other things" are.

      We would all benefit from them de prioritizing java EE and instead devoting those resources to javaFX. imho.

      ready to be corrected if I misunderstood.

    3. Re:Consequences in Banking/Finance? by SlashdotOgre · · Score: 2

      I work for a very large bank heavily invested in Java and while we are largely a Java shop for the Web tiers, most of what's done is no longer J2EE but rather Java in a servlet container with frameworks like Spring or Hibernate. In fact, we're largely shifting off of full fledged Java app servers (WebLogic, WebSphere, etc.) to simpler containers (e.g. Tomcat) as the needs are no longer there. Talking to my peers at the other big bank, it sounds like this is an industry trend.

      --
      Sadly, PS/2 was yet another victim of USB, which doesn't care what you plug into it, the electrical slut.
    4. Re: Consequences in Banking/Finance? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      More precisely, Java EE is a collection of APIs.What most people are accustomed to is the Java SE API, which is part of the JDK. EE is implemented, partly or in full, by application servers.

      Although not all APIs in EE are widespread, some are pretty much the basis of Java application servers such as Tomcat, Jboss/Wildfly, Jetty, Glassfish and co.

      For example, Servlet and JSP are part of Java EE. While they are old specs and haven't changed dramatically through recent releases, I am pretty sure any Web developer using Java knows what servlets are or interacted with them indirectly.

      Now whether any of this will be missed is a matter of taste, but Java EE, at least part of it, is hardly something used only by high-ends customers.

    5. Re:Consequences in Banking/Finance? by Miamicanes · · Score: 1

      The big, huge problem with Tomcat is that it doesn't scale well beyond a single instance running on a single server (unless something MAJOR has changed within the past year or two). Mostly, because it takes an eternity to start up after redeploying a new webapp, and starts responding to http requests with 502 errors (instead of just silently ignoring the connection requests) a minute or more before it's REALLY ready to handle them. And frameworks like Spring just make matters even worse.

    6. Re: Consequences in Banking/Finance? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It turns out that tomcat, glassfish, etc aren't really so convenient for deploying apps. Like jetty much better.

    7. Re: Consequences in Banking/Finance? by mSparks43 · · Score: 2

      Im pretty sure that isnt true.

      For example. Tomcat (by apache foundation) is he implimentatiom for some of the more widely used java ee specifications. And is based on vanilla java.
      And gives jsp and servlets.

      There is a version combined with other java ee components (java tomEE). But Looking to see if it was true that tomcat is java ee is the first time Ive heard of it.

    8. Re: Consequences in Banking/Finance? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't think I said that Tomcat was a full EE implementation. Sorry if it looked like so. What I meant to say is that Servlet and JSP, which are parts of Java EE, form the basis of pretty much all Java application servers such as Tomcat. Apache TomEE is an implementation of the Java EE Web profile (which contains a bit more than servlets, but not all of the EE APIs).

      Examples of full EE implementations are Apache Geronimo, Jboss AS / WildFly and Oracle Glassfish (which happens to be the EE reference implementation).

      I don't think that Java EE should be regarded as one single unit that is or isn't used by developers - you have to look at the APIs which are part of Java EE. Again taking the example of servlets : anyone saying that they don't rely on Java EE but use, directly or indirectly, servlets, would be wrong. They may not use all of EE, but at least part of it.

    9. Re: Consequences in Banking/Finance? by mSparks43 · · Score: 1

      But still. I don't see anything that any normal dev would miss being de prioritised and oracle devs being put on "other things".

      So why is oracle getting such "bad press" for doing exactly that?

    10. Re: Consequences in Banking/Finance? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Because, at least from what I gathered in the article, Oracle has not communicated their official stance on the matter. This seems to put the community in limbo regarding the future of Java EE development.

      You are right about not missing Java EE specs being de-prioritized (some of them are quite mature), but that's not the problem. Is Oracle temporarily reallocating efforts elsewhere, or are they planning to abandon the whole thing altogether?

      Personnally, I am not that much concerned about the situation - since the specs are open, the community can just fork the whole thing if needed and wanted. We have seen it with Solaris, OpenOffice.org and MySQL.

      However, as long as Oracle makes no official statement, the community more or less "waits", blocking at least in part the evolution of the platform. I think this is why Oracle is getting bad press at the moment - not so much for de-prioritizing the development of Java EE, but for being unclear in their intentions towards the community.

  7. Re:Yep by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What if Google bought Oracle?

  8. Re:Yep by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's most likely already forked.
    They will keep it under the covers until it's ready to deploy and at the opportune moment so Oracle buckles it's knees.

  9. In related news, Microsoft does open source .NET by Lonewolf666 · · Score: 1

    See https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2016/06/28/the-week-in-net-6282016/

    In short, more cross-platform libraries for .NET while Java EE may be stagnating.

    As some people have commented on ArsTechnica, if this goes on Oracle risks that more corporate users switch to the .NET ecosystem. Which will not make Java obsolete overnight, but such trends tend to be self-perpetuating.

    --
    C - the footgun of programming languages
  10. Re: People still use it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If Java is COBOL 2.0, .NET is PL/I 2.0.

  11. Is this a problem? by Tailhook · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I see no less than 5 independent, certified implementations of latest Java 7 EE spec, including one LGPL application server; Wildfly by Red Hat. I'm pretty sure the "community" can handle evolving the standards going forward, and it's blatently obvious that Java EE doesn't actually need Oracle's implementation for anything. Is anything of value being lost here?

    --
    Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
    1. Re:Is this a problem? by Tailhook · · Score: 1

      4 actually, two of those are Oracle; WebLogic was acquired when Oracle bought BEA.

      --
      Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
  12. Re:In related news, Microsoft does open source .NE by Z00L00K · · Score: 1

    Be aware that Java EE is more than Oracle these days. Just because Oracle drops it doesn't mean that those that have developed various platforms compatible with the API will drop it.

    --
    If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
  13. Re: Trollinf by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Thank you for helping us all to understand those brave souls of the internet... trolls

    Without their self sacrifice we would find ourselves living in a stagnant mental puddle of accepted facts and prejudiced ideals

    We are all beholden to the trolls for their incitement of thought and generation of heated discourse

    From the simplest provocation to the highest of motives, trolls, one and all, are the Heroes of our era

  14. Oracle voting for Jexit? by nerdyalien · · Score: 0

    Not trolling... but I think it is time and right thing to do.

    Don't misinterpret me... I worked in a Java house for 4 years. For the life of me, I can't understand why anyone should go for Java solutions at this day and age. Perhaps, it solved some problems around the time it was introduced. Fast forward to today, I find it overly complex, largely irrelevant and struggling to keep up.

    I guess Java will haunt all of us for another few decades, similar to Cobol, simply because of Android platform and many other critical software written around it, and the large pool of (barely talented) developers. Good luck!

    1. Re:Oracle voting for Jexit? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is true for any technology. It is good for some and bad for others. Has good times and bad. By the way - Cobol is still being used.

  15. They'll just move to Rust. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    I think what we'll start seeing within the banking and finance fields is an industry-wide movement to Rust. Rust is perfect for these kinds of applications: it's super safe and it is super reliable and it is super fast. It's everything that the banking and finance fields need, plus it's futuristic. That's exactly why Rust is the future, in fact: because it defines what the future is, today. The beauty of Rust is that with one language it makes so many other languages irrelevant. If you're using Rust you don't need C++, you don't need Java, you don't need Perl, you don't need Ruby, and you don't need JavaScript. Rust is a full-stack language that you can use to write the OS as well as the libraries as well as the applications as well as the middleware! There is no need for different languages when Rust can do it all.

    1. Re:They'll just move to Rust. by zarr · · Score: 2

      It's not about the language. It's the APIs that matter. Rust couldn't be less relevant.

      And frankly J2EE doesn't matter that much either. I haven't seen a purebred J2EE application inn ages. There may exist EJB2 monstrosities deep in the server catacombs of large banks, but nowadays when people say enterprise java, they really just mean java code serving http-requests and running batch-jobs, with a gazillion of 3rd party libraries throw in.

    2. Re:They'll just move to Rust. by gweihir · · Score: 1

      Rust is a full-on irrelevant language for the purpose of this discussion. Nobody is going to rewrite all that software.
      (Rust has other severe problems, among them the blindness and fanaticism of its followers.)

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    3. Re:They'll just move to Rust. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You're delusional. Nobody is going to move to Rust anytime soon you huge retard.

    4. Re:They'll just move to Rust. by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      J2EE doesn't have a code of conduct.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    5. Re: They'll just move to Rust. by nitehawk214 · · Score: 1

      There is still lots of cobol and PowerBuilder out there. Do you think anyone will ever rewrite all that Java?

      Also rust is a non starter as it's trying to be everything to everyone and thus is nothing to most.

      --
      I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
  16. Java and Java EE: two different things by Guillermito · · Score: 4, Informative

    This affects less people and it is way less dramatic than what the summary implies. Java EE it's just a bunch of "enterprise" frameworks which run on top of the Java virtual machine. Many people using the Java platform don't even bother with Java EE and use other set of frameworks instead (like Spring or Hibernate), and even for those using some of the Java EE technologies, they are most likely using some third party (IBM Websphere) or open source (lJBoss, Tomcat) implementations, since the "official" Java EE implementation by Sun (and later Oracle) never gained much traction.

    1. Re:Java and Java EE: two different things by ahabswhale · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Agreed. Java EE is for dinosaurs. I don't know anyone who uses that crap anymore.

      --
      Are agnostics skeptical of unicorns too?
    2. Re:Java and Java EE: two different things by Jahta · · Score: 1

      This affects less people and it is way less dramatic than what the summary implies. Java EE it's just a bunch of "enterprise" frameworks which run on top of the Java virtual machine. Many people using the Java platform don't even bother with Java EE and use other set of frameworks instead (like Spring or Hibernate), and even for those using some of the Java EE technologies, they are most likely using some third party (IBM Websphere) or open source (lJBoss, Tomcat) implementations, since the "official" Java EE implementation by Sun (and later Oracle) never gained much traction.

      This is absolutely right. Sun were so slow evolving the Java EE spec, the user community took the lead and developed less high maintenance approaches like Spring. This won't affect most Java developers, even those developing "enterprise" applications.

    3. Re:Java and Java EE: two different things by Bite+The+Pillow · · Score: 2

      And that is why java is terrible. There's no real common target, it is terribly fragmented. You have the language, which is standard curly brace plus a lot of nonsense convention.

      I get the academic rigor of some ways of doing things, but then you can choose any old framework, and various extensions because the core is missing features or functionality.

      You can't just be a java programmer. I would never hang my hat on just one aspect, but I don't see anyone being successful at java in general, as day one comes along and they use this framework and those extensions, and if that cane up in the interview you lie or don't get the job.

      With oracle signaling a lack of interest, who would choose to make a career of chasing the current top 3 fads?

    4. Re:Java and Java EE: two different things by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Agreed. Java EE is for dinosaurs. I don't know anyone who uses that crap anymore

      If you have health insurance, a bank account or shopped at any major retailer in the US in the past year you've used it even if you didn't realize it.

    5. Re: Java and Java EE: two different things by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I am successful Java programmer. Sure I know many languages but it is Java I prefer.

    6. Re:Java and Java EE: two different things by GuB-42 · · Score: 1

      Well, according to the HR department of my company, "dinosaurs" are in high demand right now.

    7. Re:Java and Java EE: two different things by ahabswhale · · Score: 1

      I don't doubt it. It's a sad situation.

      --
      Are agnostics skeptical of unicorns too?
    8. Re:Java and Java EE: two different things by Guillermito · · Score: 1

      It is the other way around. The Java community has been signaling for years a lack of interest in what Java EE has to offer, and this decision by Oracle is just a response to that. It seems Java developers just prefer "chasing the fads". This is true for other development platforms too, like Node.js, Python, Ruby, where the main language is accompanied by a myriad of frameworks and libraries that you have to learn in order to become productive. This is a trend that you might not like but it is here to stay.

  17. Synergy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Synergy is the creation of a whole that is greater than the simple sum of its parts. Do we really want that?

    Oracle = evil
    Google = evil

    Google + Oracle = more than twice as evil

    1. Re:Synergy by Sax+Russell+5449D29A · · Score: 1

      Two negatives give a positive.

      --
      -SR
    2. Re:Synergy by bn-7bc · · Score: 1

      unly if multiplrd or devided :)

    3. Re:Synergy by Sax+Russell+5449D29A · · Score: 1

      I totally missed the equation there. :S

      --
      -SR
  18. Java 9? meh... by zarr · · Score: 3, Informative

    I make a decent living off writing Java code, and after Java 8 came out I started liking it, not just tolerating it. Lambdas and method references, which I thought would be a nice-to-have, has turned it into a completely new language, streams are great, the multi-threading support is not too shabby and the new time API was loooong overdue.

    When reading the linked list (no pun) of new features though, all I can say is "meh"...

    Stuff like HTTP/2, TIFF and JSON support should be external, upgradable, libraries. Its a common theme that the standard java libraries fall into disuse after a while, because external library writers do a much better job of implementing the same concepts. JDBC, Date/Calendar, XML processing, HTTP are just a few examples.

    My key takeaway from this is that I'm a bit tempted to start using _ as an identifier name, just to fuck over any future maintainers of my code.

    1. Re:Java 9? meh... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Please reference a third party library that is well written with no regard for Java 7 compatibility. I'd like to look at some modern, non-trivial Java.

    2. Re:Java 9? meh... by zarr · · Score: 2

      I think you'll still find that most libraries retain java 7 compatibility. Luckily that does not generally prevent you from utilizing java 8 features in application code, even when interfacing with those libraries. E.g. libraries accepting references to single-method interfaces for callbacks will happily accept a lambda expression instead. To the JVM they're indistinguishable after all.

      One example that comes to mind is Spark framework (http://sparkjava.com/) which I like for its almost naive simplicity. Great for throwing together a microservice on short notice.

    3. Re:Java 9? meh... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I think you'll still find that most libraries retain java 7 compatibility.

      Yeah. I know. That's why I specified "no regard for Java 7." And yes, Spark's examples do appear to be significantly less hateful than "traditional" Java web stuff. Interesting. And thanks.

    4. Re:Java 9? meh... by zarr · · Score: 1

      "traditional" Java web stuff.

      I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.

    5. Re:Java 9? meh... by mlookaba · · Score: 2

      Lambdas and method references, which I thought would be a nice-to-have, has turned it into a completely new language, streams are great, the multi-threading support is not too shabby and the new time API was loooong overdue.

      This

      There is a reason that scripting languages aren't normally used for large applications. After the initial "wow that was super simple to write", you get to the phase where debugging takes forever, and maintenance is a pain in the ass. Maintenance is always the major share of software cost, and the amount of time it takes to write the initial code should be a secondary consideration (IMHO). Anyone who thinks a strongly typed language is just a pain in the ass probably hasn't done much long-term maintenance on a large system.

      Streams are awesome. Everyone who codes Java needs to spend more time using them. The time API is greak (but everyone with a clue was already using joda time anyway).

    6. Re:Java 9? meh... by Lisias · · Score: 2

      There is a reason that scripting languages aren't normally used for large applications. After the initial "wow that was super simple to write", you get to the phase where debugging takes forever, and maintenance is a pain in the ass. Maintenance is always the major share of software cost, and the amount of time it takes to write the initial code should be a secondary consideration (IMHO). Anyone who thinks a strongly typed language is just a pain in the ass probably hasn't done much long-term maintenance on a large system.

      And this is precisely the reason there're so much effort on "dynamic languages".

      The ideal programmer nowadays are cheap and disposable as the code he writes. There's no money on fixing production code, everybody wants to throw everythig away and rewrite from scratch every couple of years.

      Long term maintenance demands competent and experienced professionals - that costs more. Throw away code, written by throw-away programmers are cheaper on the short-run, leaving more money to be pocketed by the low and middle management.

      --
      Lisias@Earth.SolarSystem.OrionArm.MilkyWay.Local.Virgo.Universe.org
    7. Re:Java 9? meh... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.

      Thank you for sharing that valuable piece of information. Not entirely sure what you wanted to convey. Actual disgust? An attempt at appearing "cool" somehow? Something else? Oh, well. Doesn't matter, at all, does it?

    8. Re: Java 9? meh... by nitehawk214 · · Score: 1

      Exactly. This is why I think the only thing that will supplant Java as the defacto language of business is a JS one like Node or its successors.

      Especially with web frameworks taking over all ui, now we can turn or crappy front end "web programmers" into server system programmers.

      --
      I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
    9. Re: Java 9? meh... by nitehawk214 · · Score: 1

      And don't think I hate node. My job is a JS front-end with Java back end. It predates node, someone may have picked that if they were to build it today. (But not me. I am ok with node, but I prefer Java 8.)

      --
      I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
    10. Re:Java 9? meh... by erapert · · Score: 1

      Lambdas and method references, which I thought would be a nice-to-have, has turned it into a completely new language, streams are great, the multi-threading support is not too shabby and the new time API was loooong overdue.

      So Java finally caught up to where literally every other programming language including C++ had been for years???

      Need real performance? Use Fortran, C, or C++ PERIOD. Want "relatively good" performance? Use C#, Go, Rust, or, hell, even Nodejs these days-- why bother with that crufty awkward dinosaur called Java?

      Want something "easy to learn"? Use Python, Ruby, Javascript-- ANYTHING but pedantic and verbose Java.

      Want something that "runs everywhere"? Dude, literally every programming language does that. If you're going to now complain that you can't use platform specific stuff with C++ then tell me how exactly you can do that with Java on every platform? Look, if you're using libs provided by your OS or platform then you're no longer "run everywhere" and that's the same for every language. If you stick to standard language features then ALL code written in EVERY language runs on all platforms and so Java loses its big selling point-- which it only really ever had for a couple of years in the nineties.

      As long as I've been alive I've only ever seen hideous and laughably slow programs written in Java. Writing Java is every bit as painful, pedantic, and verbose as old C++ '98. Now that Oracle controls it things are even more unattractive: why on earth would I want to jump in bed with Oracle?!

      It's not faster than anything, it's not more portable than anything, it's not free-er than anything, it's not easier to learn or use than most other languages... will someone please tell me what Java itself is actually good for? Why don't we just let this language die? Why not just stop talking about it and silently pity those poor devils who have to maintain ancient old code bases written in this horrible language? Don't start new projects with it. Advise newbies to steer clear of it. It's already doomed, why prolong the suffering?

  19. Re: Trollinf by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    *a idiot

  20. Re: Yep by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Oracle would still be evil.

  21. Re:People still use it? by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

    Sorry,
    You make no sense at all.
    Why would one remove AWT and what would be the point?
    Old code relies on it.
    Same for Swing.
    If you don't like Swing, use JavaFX. But there is no need whatsoever to 'remove' anything. That would break backward compatibility.
    Java has Generics, no idea what you want to update there. Perhpas giving it a true templates would be a point. Linq would be a thing, but Java went for the new Streams API.

    Regarding native code: there are plenty of runtime environments and compilers for Java that compile to native code. E.g. https://github.com/ReadyTalk/a...

    Regarding your favourism of C#/.Net ... it does not run on most platforms I'm using. And they made some mistakes regarding class and method names ;)

    --
    Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  22. Re:In related news, Microsoft does open source .NE by Sax+Russell+5449D29A · · Score: 1

    I used to dislike .NET a lot, but as of late I've started coding more and more to it. It's easy to be productive with it and prototype stuff, but I still favor other platforms and technologies for long-term projects that require more robustness. Java, on the other hand, has always been a pain in the ass for me personally. Might be because it's just been misused so widely and after Sun, Oracle has also been a pretty damn good reason to hate it.

    --
    -SR
  23. Re:People still use it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    You seem to not know what you're talking about. Java and Python aren't even in the same class of programming languages. Other than C#, please name another language that's good for large businesses? C++ is incorrect. The strict typing and ability to auto-complete are must haves language features for companies with wildly ranging skill levels and churn rates. C++ doesn't have that nor does Python, Ruby, or JavaScript. Sure some editors will generate fake auto-complete lists, but its not possible for the editor to list with 100% certainty all the functions and methods and their types in Python and similar (to be fair Java isn't 100% either if you use reflection, but very few projects use those features and novices don't even know they exist).

    Remove a well established GUI toolkit? Why? Nothing forces you to use it and many like not having to find and manage more 3rd party libraries. Java comes with all the bells and whistles that you need. Mature and cross platform threading, GUI, networking, file I/O, graphics, images, algorithms, database interfaces, etc... C++ didn't even understand threads until recently. Java is one of the, if not the best, general programming language. Easier and safer to program than C related languages and safer than Python and other 'scripting' languages. There are always trade offs, it isn't the fastest language to program. Though Java is easier to debug than dynamic ones, so initial development speed is a misleading metric.

    There are native compilers for Java. You have to know enough to use them when warranted which you clearly don't.

  24. Re: Trollinf by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 2

    A really skilled troll does it in a controversial way that draws some supporters as well, creating a major flame war.

    Just calling someone an idiot does not qualify.

    That's a good point. And someone that clever could probably just write an Emacs macro to do the trolling for him.

  25. Re:In related news, Microsoft does open source .NE by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 1

    I hesitate to call any piece of software open source unless its maintainers affirmatively resign all rights to software patents that are even remotely relevant.

  26. Re:Yep by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

    Google should fork Java (and rename it)

    Microsoft already did that. They named it C#.

  27. Re:Yep by zarr · · Score: 1

    The sum of Google and Oracle wold disappear in a puff of smoke.

  28. Re:Yep by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    C# only has some vague similarity in syntax with Java, they are miles apart nowadays. C# is actually more closer to (or perhaps less distant to) Scala than Java.

  29. Re: Trollinf by ColdWetDog · · Score: 3, Funny

    Vi

    --
    Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  30. Re:Microsoft Java by hackwrench · · Score: 2

    No, it's actually J# then Microsoft got sued by Sun and had to drop it because Microsoft was intentionally adding in incompatibilities because Microsoft could expect to be the biggest player.

  31. Re:In related news, Microsoft does open source .NE by Lonewolf666 · · Score: 1

    That would of course be nice, and IIRC the GPL V3 has some clauses to give the user protection against patent misuse.

    But in general, I'm fairly content if you get the source code, the right to redistribute it and no overly onerous license clauses to limit how you use it.

    --
    C - the footgun of programming languages
  32. Re:IBM & RedHat will form "O2EE" and life will by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You left out WebSphere

  33. Some people might say, Ding dong the witch is dead by EmperorOfCanada · · Score: 1

    I am certainly not a fan of Java, but people who like java like it for the exact reasons I don't like it. Without going into those, I don't want the Java people flooding into languages I do like such as C++ and Python and trying to turn them into Java. The typical Python program, for instance doesn't need a PVM, it doesn't need 80000000 classes, and it doesn't need certification to get a job.

    So, I am begging someone very corporate and very stodgy to take over Java if Oracle abandons it. SAP, IBM, the US government, Fourth Reich NAZIs, The North Koreans, anyone. Just don't unleash a flood of unthinking anti-creative, anti progressive pseudo programmers onto the world. The banks and other crusty organizations don't want this to change either.

    Oh, Java programmers; you should check out .Net if you get stuck, there are a craptonne of government jobs just waiting for you.

  34. Good time to divest from Oracle by exabrial · · Score: 1

    Obviously executive management has no clue how to grow their business.

  35. Re:People still use it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Anyone that recommends a language with dynamic typing in 2016 is objectively retarded.

  36. Java != Java EE by grumpy-cowboy · · Score: 1

    Java ecosystem will continue to live pretty well without Java EE specs.

    --
    Will $CURRENT_YEAR be the year of the Linux Desktop?
  37. Re:Some people might say, Ding dong the witch is d by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's funny to see people that "like Python" act like elitists. The Dunning-Kruger effect amped up to 11.

  38. How is CPython or PyPy not a PVM? by tepples · · Score: 1

    The typical Python program, for instance doesn't need a PVM

    What do you think CPython or PyPy is, if not a Python virtual machine? Good luck running a program written in Python on a PC running the Windows operating system without one of those installed.

  39. Re:Microsoft Java by Miamicanes · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Actually, Sun's OFFICIAL beef with J# was the fact that it made it easy to directly use things like DirectX and MSIE. They were afraid that if Microsoft got its way, Java would rapidly cease to be platform-independent... or at least, writing Java apps that could only build & run under Windows would have been enormously easier than writing platform-agnostic apps.

    The catch is, most of the things Sun was pissed at Microsoft for allowing J# developers to do were things that "pure Java" couldn't do AT ALL, because Sun couldn't be arsed to even TRY to give developers a comparable -- let alone superior -- alternative to platform-dependent features (though apparently, Apple deserves a hefty chunk of the blame, too).

    Three specific examples:

    * Embedding a browser in a Window. J# made it absurdly easy. The last time I checked, it's STILL a royal pain to do this with Java (and AFAIK, the only way is with Firefox and JNI).

    * Using DirectX. OpenGL ultimately won the battle for the hearts & minds of developers (mostly because Microsoft tried to use DirectX as a tool to bully Windows 7 gamers into instaling Windows 8, and it backfired when users revolted and developers were forced to switch to OpenGL to remain competitive), but back in the J# era, DirectX was ENORMOUSLY nicer to develop with compared to OpenGL.

    * Using Microsoft-specific APIs to do things like monitor directories for changed files, interact with the system tray & taskbar, etc... things that Java didn't really have any good way to do natively until sometime around JDK6 or JDK7 (taskbar might have been JDK5, but I'm pretty sure monitoring filesystem paths for changes didn't exist until JDK7's NIO2)

  40. Re:People still use it? by Miamicanes · · Score: 1

    You're right, but the proliferation of things like Spring have SERIOUSLY blurred the lines between compiled languages and interpreted languages. When you're using a framework that builds objects dynamically at runtime from definitions in config files via introspection and custom classloaders instead of compiling them from Java sourcecode, you're giving up most of the safeguards a compiler has traditionally furnished for you.

  41. Thank god for that! by radish · · Score: 1

    And I say this as someone who's been in the Java/JVM space for almost 20 years. J2EE was a bad idea at the time, and has long been consigned to the scrap heap by anyone who knows what they're doing. I'm honestly amazed they were still investing in it up until this point. Just say "container managed persistence" to a Java dev and listen to them laugh :)

    All the major enterprises using Java that I have knowledge of dumped EE years ago (if they ever even adopted it), they're all in the Spring/Hibernate camp (which is looking pretty old itself by now). The smaller, newer shops skipped over even that and are doing microservices with stuff like Akka.

    The core Java language is doing OK, 8 brought in some much needed modern language features, although 9 looks much more incremental. Honestly the JVM as a platform (Scala et al) is more exciting to me than Java as a language, but it does the job.

    --

    ---- Den ene knappen er powerknapp, den andre er Bender voice knapp "Bite My Shiny Metal Ass"

  42. Re: People still use it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Perl

  43. Re:In related news, Microsoft does open source .NE by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    but I still favor other platforms and technologies for long-term projects that require more robustness.

    .NET is not robust? Can you name a language feature or class library that doesn't already exist and do what you need in the standard framework install? Now throw in all of the ALT.NET open source work, all of the projects on CodePlex and the vast universe of StackOverflow, CodeProject and many other blogs, community forms and other gatherings of .NET developers and you would be hard pressed to find a richer and more pervasive development platform or ecosystem anywhere else. The .NET world is the 800 lb Gorilla of business software development. Oracle is the nearest competitor with Java, but since the death of Sun and the acquisition by Oracle, Java has languished. Meanwhile, .NET is charging ahead under the leadership of a new generation CEO in Satya Nadella of Microsoft with Azure cloud services second only to Amazon AWS. I don't know about you, but it looks to me like .NET is the rising star in the corporate software development world, not Java.

  44. COBOL of the future? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Java has become toxic, with Oracle's bizarre attempts to assert copyright on APIs in America. This makes further commercial development using it seem at best risky if you are shipping products in the country with the dysfunctional legal system. If copyright maximalism has a chance of prevailing, then you end up with a product that is coupled to APIs that are controlled by a clearly vindictive company, with management who appear to be unhinged.
    If you don't care about shipping to America, maybe this is less important. I can't imagine any other country allowing this kind of madness to proliferate, but many of us do have to trade with the land of corrupt and mercantile capitalism.
    I have serious doubts about future plans for java, and Oracle's commitment to further development. Killing further development of EE might not be such a good idea, even though it has become quite the overcomplicated and unwieldy beast. For java, this is its core area of commercial usage. Java on the desktop never really happened, largely due to the long startup times, laggy interactive behaviour, high resource consumption, and lack of an acceptable GUI toolkit. EE is entrenched on the server side in big business, and surely will be become the Cobol of the future, albeit with a much nicer syntax/language.

  45. Thank [DietyOfYourChoice]! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Java garbage collector is finally starting to work!

  46. Re: Trollinf by johnsnails · · Score: 1

    Not sure if trolling emacs vs vi or vi vs vim

  47. Re: Some people might say, Ding dong the witch is by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Java is very easy to learn. It takes only 5 years or so. The problem is people who only learn the syntax and think they mastered it. Java is more about tools and libraries than syntax. Think Eclipse and junit. Or maven and jetty. Or minecraft and modpacks.

  48. Re:Microsoft Java by devent · · Score: 2

    I don't get your post. JNI was in Java since day one (or very early on), and via JNI you can access everything that is platform specific. MS or anyone else can just use JNI to bundle a Jar file for Java to allow access to DirectX and platform specific APIs. Java is not some magic, but it's basically a level above C/C++. The architecture is basically, Java>C>OS>Driver>Hardware. So, MS could have just bundled it's own Java+Windows specific modules.

    And to put an browser in Java is also easy. https://www.teamdev.com/jxbrow...
    What difference does it make if it's the Chrome engine or some engine written in Java?

    --
    http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
  49. Re:IBM & RedHat will form "O2EE" and life will by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You left out WebSphere

    I would too.

  50. Re:Yep by binarylarry · · Score: 1

    Its so "vague" you can do a find and replace on most code.

    --
    Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
  51. Re: Microsoft Java by spongman · · Score: 1

    Yeah and JNI is a terrible interface. Microsoft added a different way to do platform-specific stuff that integrated smoothly into existing Windows component interfaces. They didn't remove anything in the non-platform-specific Java stuff. They didn't break any platform-agnostic code.

  52. Re:IBM & RedHat will form "O2EE" and life will by HappyPsycho · · Score: 1

    The problem is Oracle will probably drag out the process, causing untold damage to the Java ecosystem in the process.

  53. Re: Microsoft Java by binarylarry · · Score: 1

    So... if you used Microsoft's native interface, it would work on Mac or Linux? I highly doubt that.

    It's what we call "Knife the Baby" in Microsoft strategic planning terminology.

    --
    Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
  54. Re: Microsoft Java by spongman · · Score: 1

    no, but if you used JNI to call out to a library that made linux syscalls, would that work on windows or the mac?

    seriously, some people...

  55. Re: Microsoft Java by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I thought this is called Extend in MS's terminology.

  56. Re: Microsoft Java by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Were you dropped on your head as a baby? JNI exists on Mac and Windows, so yes, someone could write an implementation on those platforms. With Microsoft's weird proprietary native interface, you're just screwed on other platforms (which is exactly what Microsoft wanted to do.... screw the other platforms over).

  57. Re: Microsoft Java by spongman · · Score: 1

    oh. my. fucking. christ!

    what is the purpose of JNI? it's to call out to native code. what does native code tend to do? it makes calls to the fucking OPERATING SYSTEM! native code is generally NOT CROSS-PLATFORM code. seriously, what's the difference between me using JNI to call into system32.dll, or using J/Direct? none of that is cross-platform.

    i know you have to connect the dots a little here, but claiming that microsoft broke cross-platform compatibility by creating a different (read: significantly better) way of calling code that is by definition not cross-platform is a stretch - you're already distributing a .dll, a .so and/or a MacOS8 shared library.

    and by "weird proprietary", presumably you're referring to J/Direct which used an attribute syntax not dissimilar to what java has now calling out to COM/OLE which at the time was the interface to the largest existing library of 3-rd party commercial software components available for any platform anywhere: VB, access, office and a huge ecosystem of ISVs . microsoft was tasked by sun to write the reference implementation of java on windows. COM/OLE was THE API for writing software components on windows. if java hadn't included COM support it would have been dead on arrival. no windows dev would have touched it - they would have just stuck with VB which nobody (especially the java team inside MS) wanted - java was seen inside MS as the best way to replace the hugely popular (or, in your words, "weird proprietary") VB.

  58. Re: Microsoft Java by spongman · · Score: 1

    right, because improving things is obviously bad.

  59. Re: Microsoft Java by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Thank you for confirming what I just said, in the douchiest Microsoft guy way possible.