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* CYBERSPACE *
* A biweekly column on net culture appearing *
* in the Toronto Sunday Sun *
* *
* Copyright 1999 Karl Mamer *
* Free for online distribution *
* All Rights Reserved *
* Direct comments and questions to: *
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* *
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Java scared me at first. The web has been so successful because
HTML, the mark-up language that lets a web browser make your
text look real pretty, is reasonably easy to learn.
HTML began life as a quick-and-dirty hack -- something busy
scientists could master in a few hours and the average computer
user could stumble through in a few days.
Java's not something the average computer user can learn in a
few days. Java is an object-oriented computer language. It's a
nudge less complicated than C++, arguably the preferred
language of Real Programmers, but it's still a major step up
from HTML.
Java was invented by high-end computer manufacturer Sun
Microsystems. Java was intended to be a universal computer
language. A "write once, run anywhere" computer language had
long been the dream of pretty much anyone who couldn't decided
between buying Mac or IBM. The Internet and Netscape's
inclusion of Java support in its browser helped give Java
instant critical mass.
My initial fear was Java would dominate the web, locking the
average Joe out of this equalizing medium. People would be so
transfixed by web pages with dancing babies and Java versions
of Mine Sweeper, no one would care anymore to read home-brewed
pages about the Avro Arrow or body piercing techniques.
A great loss, surely.
Fortunately for the vox populi, the Java dream has turned into
something of a nightmare. The reality of Java today is not
"write once, run anywhere" but "write once, port for
everything." A truly universal Java program has to be ported
about 17 different times because Java interpreters written for
various web browsers, operating systems, and development
environments all go about solving certain problems in "novel"
ways.
Like most computer nightmares, blame is laid at Microsoft's
feet. Sure, why not?
Java, being backed by Sun and Netscape (two major players in
the early days of the net), took on the aura of a Microsoft
Killer. Novell and Corel have previously picked up the sling
shot and laced on the bronze greaves of the Microsoft Killer
and came away bleeding money.
You would have to be very creative to think up a dumber move
than to take on a company with enough cash in the bank that it
can go a year without revenue.
Oh well, maybe Java would be different this time. Novel and
Corel went after the arms and legs, the application side. Java
aimed for the heart, Microsoft's Windows operating system. With
Java, software development is no longer tied to a specific
operating system like Windows.
Microsoft does not react well when it senses its eventual
demise. It fights back, using every trick and dollar at its
disposal. In the early days of Java, many people in the
industry assumed Microsoft would throw 300 of the worlds
smartest developers on a project to create its own portable
language.
When it announced that it would license Java from Sun and then
mentioned less-than-specific plans for "extending" the
language, a few realized the battle for Java as a Microsoft
Killer was over before it had even begun.
The man who invented Java for Sun, James Gosling, recently
accused Microsoft of creating a "divergent" version of Java.
Programs written on Microsoft Java either won't run or won't
run well on any other platform. Since it is Java's theoretical
universality that makes people put up with the generally crappy
performance, it becomes pointless to write Windows applications
in Java. You may as well write in native C code.
While it's fashionable to blame Microsoft for all of Java's
problems, developers themselves have a laundry list of
complaints. The Java Skeptics page at
ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Stuart_L_Hodgins/jskeptic.htm
gives one a good overview of many of the non-Microsoft inspired
problems. In summary, developers view Java programs as slower,
prone to crashing more, and the language limits one to fewer
features.
The Java apologist side can be viewed at
www.disordered.org/Java-QA.html. Many of the answers to the
criticisms amount to "this problem will be solved in the not-
too-distant future when everyone agrees on something." The
problem is, as developers have come off the Java high and are
waking up to its bitter realities, Java's future now depends
developers actually believing the language has one.
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