(March 9, 2006) - "There have been a number of language coming up lately," noted James Gosling today at Sun's World Wide Education & Research Conference in New York City when asked if Java was in any kind of danger from the newcomers. "PHP and Ruby are perfectly fine systems," he continued, "but they are scripting languages and get their power through specialization: they just generate web pages. But none of them attempt any serious breadth in the application domain and they both have really serious scaling and performance problems."
The Father of Java then dismissed Microsoft's C# as having had potential, but no longer: "We were afraid they were going to do something really creative - but they're hopelessly focused on one platform."
PHP (for example) is able to make things simpler because it's 100% aimed at web pages, Gosling explained. Whereas with Java, he said, "We have a balancing act: we need the simplicity but we also need power."
He called Simplicity and Power "evil twin brothers" - "Building systems that have a lot of power just attracts complexity. Because of the way that the world has become so interconnected it helps to have systems where it carries over from one domain to another. You can do web presentation stuff really well in PHP but you couldn't write a library that does, say, interplanetary navigation."
On the other hand, any discussion about Java "versus" PHP or Ruby or any other language is in many ways moot, Gosling also stressed:
"We also tried to work with all these languages ,so that Java works with PHP and works with Python, so you can do the web presentation layer in PHP and the analytics in Java. Lots of people do that."
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John wrote: Programming
language comparison is
not always meaningless.
For example, for most
programmers Java is a
better language than
VBScript. Here is our
migration path in the
past few years:
- ASP + COM objects (the
dark age)
- Java (abandoned in
favor of C#)
- C# (purely a enterprise
decision)
- Ruby
As a language, Ruby in
general can produce
better products with less
code, and is easier to
maintain. It is also
easier to achieve good OO
design with Ruby.
Another way of looking at
this is: C++ is a failed
attempt to tag OO onto C
language, and Java
improves upon C++ by
cleaning up the mess.
From this perspective,
you can see why there are
other languages out there
that are better than
Java.
nobody wrote: "Many, many
developers are moving to
.Net and C#...."
"...Especially since C#
has severely erroded
Java's control of the
enterprise..."
"...The basic facts of
Java are:
good points
1. Easy to use
2. Useful in RTC
3. Loved by Corporate
people who like the idea
of cross platform idea,
but this itself is just
like anyother language.
4. Good set of library
functions.
Bad points
1. Memory hog
2. Slow Slow Slow
3. Overkill for most
functions and
applications
4. Over
rated
..."
A lot of FUD against Java
is everywhere. But I
can't believe all your
anti-Java arguments until
you give facts, studies,
or proof.
Leigh wrote: I use Ruby
all the time and am not
working on web pages.
The main difference
between Ruby and Java, is
that I can't do lots of
things in Java without
taking on 10 different
frameworks. Also Java
has this, if its easy its
bad attitude - it was
only when c# came along
they even started adding
the most basic Syntactic
sugar - but it still has
a long way to go to get
near Ruby or Python.
The Cherbin wrote: Joe
Average ???
"They don't do
computational 3D, they
don't do complex
numerics, they don't do
Gui design..."
Computational 3D ?
whatever? PHP does too.
GUI design shouldnt be
done with Java for sure.
Its a complete memory
hog, just look at the
java GUI builders.
they're written in java
and they drag a machine
to a halt.
Even Xforms will blow the
hell out of some Java
GUI.
This is about the worst
written article and
viewpoint I've ever read.
Give me one reason that
PHP is just good for Web
Programs.. Just shows
these peoples ignorance,
no wonder they're using
java for all these
applications.
One thing is I cant
believe Colleges are
given credit for taken a
Java class, thats like
given credit for Basic.
Even Pascal and Kylix are
much more valuable than
Java.
Java's Thread Manager -
if you can ...
Brandon Tyler wrote: Be
careful thought. Many,
many developers are
moving to .Net and C#. I
love it. The development
environment is excellent.
Although Eclipse is very
nice too. ASP.NET 2.0
totally kicks PHP in the
booty though.
Joe Average wrote: I
think Gosling is right on
the money...
The simple fact of the
matter is that php and
ruby are very weak
compared to other
languages in terms of
platforms (embedded and
non), libraries, and
functionality... In the
regard of patterns: PHP
and Ruby are perfect MVC
pattern implementors...
Which only can fit well
in one place... The Web.
They don't do
computational 3D, they
don't do complex
numerics, they don't do
Gui design...
They plain suck for
ANYthing outside of "web"
junk....
The Cherbin wrote: JAMES
GROSLING GET WITH IT !
Java is basically only
useful for RTC
applications. It has been
just dragged on and on as
an acceptable language to
use for any application
you want becuase a CSI
major can pick up easily.
Its not any more portable
than C, PHP, Basic, Perl,
COBOL.
Once again, you can read
my comments below, but
after thinking about what
this guy said in the
article, just goes to
show how computer science
is taken lightly, and how
the Mean population of
Computer Programmers can
consider such an article
even worthy of print.
Ruby and C# ? who in
their right mind would
even use such a language,
thats like using asp for
webpages.
The Cherbin
Infernoz wrote: I think
that James Gosling is
talking out of his
backside, C# maybe only
on Windows, but he
forgets that most
laptops, desktops,
servers run Windows!
Sun need to get very
serious about Java, force
those JCP lagards to make
product, so that this,
very late, critical stuff
and important recent
stuff can be put into
Mustang and not leave for
a very late Dolphin. I'm
quite annoyed at how much
stuff got left out of 1.3
and 1.4 because people
sat on their hands way
too much! Companies can
have very long
development cycles and
developers like me can
get quite frustrated at
the lack of facilities
because to facilites got
massively delayed to
'risky' new java
versions! I've even
stated to backport some
stuff, which should have
been available as
optional extra jars!
Paul Barry's Technology
Blog wrote: Trackback
Added: Ruby is just for
generating web pages; In
a recent Java talk, James
Gosling said: “PHP
and Ruby are perfectly
fine systems,” he
continued, “but
they are scripting
languages and get their
power through
specialization: they just
generate web
pages.”
I find this
to be a...
Zé colméia wrote: Aff
Maria, esse tio tá
ficando senil.
O povo está percebendo
que existem coisas
melhores que o Java e o
desespero começa a bater
no pai da criança.
Paul wrote: I have huge
respect for James
Gosling, but I think in
this particular article
the most important quote
is this one:
"Any discussion about
Java versus PHP or Ruby
or any other language is
in many ways moot anyway,
Gosling also stressed."
Developers will write in
whatever language they
write in. It'll either
work well for them or it
won't. What's the point
of "my language is bigger
than your language"
debates?
jman wrote: Even as a
Java programmer, I must
say that this sounds like
a rather arrogant story.
Especially since C# has
severely erroded Java's
control of the enterprise
and Ruby, Perl, Python,
and PHP dominate small to
mid-size projects.
Gosling also failed to
mention the Mono project,
which ports C# to
non-Windows platforms.
I'm not a C# fan, but
thought it was only fair
to mention that.
But, who knows. Maybe
the companies and
developers switching from
Java will agree with
Gosling and return Java
to its former glory. I'm
not going to count on it
though.
The Cherbin wrote: Java
has been way over rated
for the last couple of
years. Even Java threads
are a pitiful attempt to
make it seem like a real
working language.
Other points involving
PHP/Perl
1. PHP is not
just a WEB language as
most people just love to
use it just for WEB
programs.
2. PHP is much
faster than JAVA and can
replace C or any shell
scripting language on a
command line interface.
3. PHP has a bad weakness
which is NO threads
C# is a 40/40 programming
language, meaning that 40
books are sold covering
the same topic in 40
languages for a money
profit.
The basic facts of Java
are
good points
1. Easy to use
2. Useful in RTC
3. Loved by Corporate
people who like the idea
of cross platform idea,
but this itself is just
like anyother language.
4. Good set of library
functions.
Bad points
1. Memory hog
2. Slow Slow Sl...
news desk wrote: 'There
have been a number of
language coming up
lately,' noted James
Gosling today at Sun's
World Wide Education &
Research Conference in
New York City. 'PHP and
Ruby are perfectly fine
systems but they are
scripting languages and
get their power through
specialization: they just
generate web pages. But
none of them attempt any
serious breadth in the
application domain and
they both have really
serious scaling and
performance problems.' He
then dismissed C# as
having had potential, but
no longer: 'We were
afraid [Microsoft] were
going to do something
really creative - but
they're hopelessly
focused on one platform.'
NameGame wrote: Is it
true that the reason Java
was originally called the
"Oak Project" was because
of the oak trees outside
James Gosling's office at
Sun? Can anyone
confirm/deny?
From Application
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topics being discussed in
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faculty at the 3rd
International
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& Expo being held by
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Many topics were
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things have changed a lot
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again, here are my
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order, bear in mind that
they do not represent the
opinion of my c
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One of the things I
really enjoy at the
moment is the recognition
and adoption of agile
programming as a fully
fledged powerful way to
deliver quality software
projects. As its
figurehead is a group of
very talented individuals
who have created the
agile manifesto
(http://agilema
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From Application
Virtualization to Xen, a
round-up of the
virtualization themes &
topics being discussed in
NYC June 23-24, 2008 by
the world-class speaker
faculty at the 3rd
International
Virtualization Conference
& Expo being held by
SYS-CON Events in The
Roosevelt Hotel, in mi
SOA is mostly associated
with technologies such as
BPEL, SCA and Web
Services. But does SOA
really imply these
technologies? In this
session we will show how
you can use the service
oriented approach while
staying inside the Java
world. jBPM is a powerful
lightweight framework th
This is the story of a
Mac application developer
(okay - it's about two of
them) who set out on a
quest to find an
application development
tool based on Java so his
boss would let him
develop on the Mac
platform, which he loved.
There was only one catch
- he had to find a tool
th 
One of the things I
really enjoy at the
moment is the recognition
and adoption of agile
programming as a fully
fledged powerful way to
deliver quality software
projects. As its
figurehead is a group of
very talented individuals
who have created the
agile manifesto
(http://agilema 
