JavaOne Keynote
JavaOne traditionally opens with a keynote hosted by John Gage. In contrast to previous years, John Gage just gave the introduction and pretty soon handed over to Rich Green, the head of Sun’s software division. For a JavaOne newbie the keynote might be quite impressive, but as a 10th year alumni I am used to all the marketing glitz and it’s easier to focus on the real content. In addition, I have seen so many announcements at JavaOne which turned out irrelevant. Therefore, the announcements have to be taken with a grain of salt.
Nevertheless, the keynote gives you a feeling about the general direction Java is taking. From my point of view, there were two remarkable announcements:
- Sun is really serious about opensourcing Java. It’s a daunting task, though. They are still not able to completely put the JDK into the open, but most of it can now be downloaded from http://openjdk.java.net/. What’s even more important is the fact that the TCK (technology compatibility kit) will be available as well. Open source implementations are now able to check compatibility without throwing up quite some money.
- Java on the desktop is a big topic again. Sun finally realized that being just on the backend is not good enough. They want to get Java into the hands of end users and consumers. Therefore, they really focus on the desktop and on mobile devices. The most important issue here is to make Java easily available, i.e. easy download, install, and start-up. I will write more about this in an upcoming blog entry. To complement this, it should be easier for developers to create Rich Internet Applications. Today, you can achieve almost everything using Java and Swing, but it just takes too long. JavaFX will fill in the gaps. It allows for creating content and user interfaces descriptively. Whether Sun can compete against Adobe’s Flash and Microsoft’s Silverlight remains to be seen, though. Consistent with Sun’s history there aren’t any tools available yet. They are promised for later this year. Hey guys, tools are as important as the technology. That’s why Microsoft is so successful with Joe developer – they get the tools early on. Sun also salvaged the intellectual property of SavaJe, which was prominently announced at last year’s keynote, and will release it as JavaFX Mobile. They promise to make this freely available to mobile devices manufacturers which again spells good news for RIAs, since this makes Swing a reality on mobile devices.
Surprisingly, Java EE did not get mentioned at all. I think there are two reasons for this. First of all, Java is well entrenched in the enterprise backend, it’s the desktop where Sun has to catch up. And secondly, Sun does not have to announce anything in this area, the next version of Java EE is still quite far away.
Last year Sun promised to make this year’s conference carbon neutral. Apparently, they heavily underestimated the effort to measure the impact of JavaOne on carbon dioxide emission. Now they are asking the attendants to come up with ideas how to measure that. At least Sun is thinking about these issues and keeps trying. Being a Mac guy, it was good to see that the only demo machines at the keynote were two Apple laptops, apart from the handheld devices. A few years ago Apple had to try hard to get some attention at JavaOne. Nowadays, you see lots of MacBooks and even Sun cares more about this platform. On a last note, Jonathan Schwartz, the CEO of Sun, should come to the conclusion whether he is a developer or an executive. From the waist down his Jeans speak “I am a developer like you guys”, but his formal jacket has written executive all over it. Why did he leave out the tie? At least, Rich Green did some kind of Steve Jobs impersonation with a black short-sleeve T-shirt and Jeans (yes, I know the real Steve Jobs always wears a black turtleneck).
