Better, faster, stupider Java

(with apologies to Bruce Tate for the subject)

Lately there has been a lot of talk about "improving" the Java language. In response
to C#, JSE 5 introduced generics, foreach, autoboxing, and varargs among other
things to make it "easier" to program in Java. Annotations are supposedly much
"cleaner" and more "powerful" than doclet comments. Now in response to C#3 there
are proposals for even more changes. Will today's Java programmer even be able to
read tomorrow's code?

This has got to stop . I like the next new thing as much as anybody (probably
more than most), but look, Java is not C#. Java comes from a variety of vendors, and
C# comes from one. If C# changes, that vendor will create a new version of the .Net
framework and push it out to everybody's machine. Java doesn't have that luxury.
We still have customers running 1.4.1 and will have for at least another year because
it takes a while for the JVM vendors and open source implementations to catch up.

And why should they? Is Java great because of cool language features? Would it be
more popular if you could skip a couple curly braces here or an extra cast or function
call there? No, just the opposite.

New language features make Java less great . And to a lesser extent, so do
new features in the core java.* and javax.* libraries. Like new methods on commonly
used classes such Integer and String. Is this heresy? Probably, but I'm sure it's right.

Take the example of Mylar. Mylar is a plug-in for Eclipse and, being written from
scratch, the developers decided to use all the newest features of JSE 5. One little
problem, not everybody could use JSE 5. For example there is no JSE 5 support on
RedHat Linux with GCJ. Oh, there probably will be someday, and maybe there are
workarounds with retroweaver or something but that's not the point.

Java is great because of the huge amount of 3rd party software available for it. The
majority of open source software in the world today is written in Java. It's nearly
ubiquitous. But Java has to stabilize or we'll lose that advantage . It's 10 years
old and it should be mature. Not dead, just mature.

Right now there's kind of a backlash against new versions of Java. For example many
Eclipse plug-ins are being recoded to work in what they call a Foundation
environment. This is a subset of Java which works on older versions, smaller VMs,
constrained environments. While it's not as sexy as taking advantage of every new
thing coming down the pike it makes the software usable in a whole lot more places
than it would otherwise be.

Language guys love to tweak. I know, because I'm a language guy myself. I used to
work on compilers, code generators, libraries, and debuggers. We were always adding
new stuff, new commands, special keywords, etc. Did our users thank us for it?
Maybe the one or two that wanted the new things, but the vast majority would just
groan when a new release came out. What will this break now? Will I have to
upgrade? Will I have to use somebody else's code that requires this new thing before
I'm ready? Has it been ported to all the machines I need to run on? Boring, I know,
but very practical and important issues.

My suggestion? Hold the line at the JSE 1.4 level or earlier . Set your IDE to not
allow JSE 5 and over language or library dependencies creep in unintentionally. You
still get the advantage of the run-time improvements of up-level JVMs, such as better
memory allocation algorithms and better JIT code generation without changing one
iota of code. If you look at all the changes in JSE 5 and beyond, ask yourself
honestly, Do I really need this? Am I gaining more than I'm giving up by locking myself
into that? Almost always the answer will be "no".

So when do I think it's safe to use JSE 5 level features? At the earliest, not until JSE
5 runtime support has become ubiquitous. By that I mean when it is production and
supported on all platforms including the pure free/open source ones, and everbody
has had a chance to deploy it and shake the bugs out and get comfortable with it.
This is especially true the lower you sit on the software stack. The more people use
your code, the later you should convert. It may be, you should never convert, or
even go back to Foundation levels to achieve wider adoption. That's up to you.

In summary, innovate outside the language and the core libraries, in those places
where the power of Java really lies. And innovate in new languages that have no
existing base. Just quit making Java a moving target! Minor tweaks, I've got no
problem with, but wholesale changes that try to morph Java into something quite
different, I do. Accept its maturity as a good thing, as a strength that can be built
upon, not as a weakness that needs to be corrected . Share your thoughts on
Java 5 and new language features over at EclipseZone .

Until next time,
Ed Burnette
ed.burnette...eclipsezone.com




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Я прошу помощи

funikovyuri А.Грасоff™
Это ты как шутку выложил?
...
ЗЫ Bruce Tate - врах!
каждое мнение имеет право на жизнь.
а причем тут брюс тэйт?

funikovyuri А.Грасоff™ А тут одни лозунги с эмоциями!
ну видишь... в этом топике - только твои эмоции :)

funikovyuriИ у него была статья Better, faster, lighter Java
или книга?

PS
Better, Faster, Lighter Java
Beyond Java
Bitter Java
может, еще чего :)