2009/11/15 Casper Bang <[email protected]> > > I hear you, and might I add, WebStart is no rosy story either in a > customer scenario. Personally I have always felt that the client Java > approach is a case of "doing all platforms, but none of them > particular well". I suppose there's direct evidence to that, in how > NetBeans for Windows is delivered through a wrapper exe file written > in C. > > Btw. the Mono guys are quite far down this path of a mini-runtime > statically compiled into one executable. This is what allows them to > run on the iPhone and create Moonlight. See the Bundles section here: > http://www.mono-project.com/Guide:Running_Mono_Applications > > Size of the executable is such a non-issue today anyway and you can't > really trust 100% backwards compatibility of an existing JRE either, > it's a nice idea in theory but it doesn't pan out in practice. >
FWIW you've been able to compile a Java app into a native binary for a while: http://gcc.gnu.org/java/ they even did a native compilation of Eclipse back in late 2002 / early 2003: http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/4860 but when it comes down to it, even with a native app running on an OS you'll have deal with different installations - just look at the different Linux layouts or the changes between Windows releases, you're still using a runtime and depending on a library (especially GUI components) - just at a different level I worked on native apps before (and after) moving to Java and wouldn't like to go back - too many memories of insanely #ifdef'd files! With Java I get a lot of portability for free. It may not be 100%, but it's enough for my purposes PS. the new modular JVM should make it easier to bundle a minimal runtime -- Cheers, Stuart /Casper > > On Nov 15, 7:56 am, RogerV <[email protected]> wrote: > > I'm at this weird point in life where I have runtime installer > > fatigue. > > > > For several years now I've been doing Java, some .NET for Windows > > clients (talking to Java middle-tier), and these days Adobe Flex for > > Flash Player and AIR on the client. > > > > The flagship languages for these runtimes are Java, C#, and > > ActionScript3/MXML respectively. > > > > I do enterprise software solutions. I'm responsible for multiple > > products and oversee teams per each. A lot of the concern that > > consumes my life is deployment, configuration, and application > > stability/consistency (with respect to distributed applications where > > various components have to be well versioned to be compatible to one > > another). > > > > As such, I don't like to leave things to chance when it comes to JRE > > or .NET or Flash Player or AIR runtime versions that our apps have > > been well tested and verified against. Consequently we have installers > > that put specific JRE and AIR runtime into place to be used privately > > by our apps and turn off automatic updating. We control and manage all > > that rigorously to make sure the customer client machine doesn't > > destabilize our software. > > > > I guess this is a round about way of saying that what appeals to me > > about Go is the notion of once again building an executable binary > > that is standalone. (Just to make sure things stay stable, I'm > > resorting to making the runtimes private to the apps anyway.) > > > > When it comes to middle-ware server software, dealing with JRE is not > > biggie. And it is nice to build middle-ware software deployments > > as .war or .ear files that can easily be plopped onto AIX, Linux, or > > Windows and be able to just run the same under the respective JRE for > > those platforms. > > > > The client-side stuff is a different matter, though. I'm rather fed up > > with runtimes and would just as well install a conventional native app > > that doesn't depend on a separate runtime facility being present to do > > its thing. (Perl, python, et al, have the same problem of how to > > create distributable apps - it's the crazy runtime problem.) > > > > Go will take me back to those good old days - but with some of the > > niceties as found in the more modern languages. It has enough of the > > spirit of C to make me feel quite at home (C is my first language to > > use professionally and I wrote several shrink-wrapped software titles > > with it). > > > > Was going to spend more time learning Scala, but now Go has stolen the > > center of attention. Too bad there's no Windows support yet. > > > > My one other reservation about Go is lack of intrinsic exception > > handling features. > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
