Java sluggish not slow
Posted on August 26, 2007
Filed Under Programming
Last week Jonathan Schwartz made a now infamous announcement that SUN would change its ticker symbol from SUNW to JAVA. The condemnation was near unanimous and immediate. A common complaint with Johnathan’s equating SUN to Java was that Java is a relic of the past. Here are some excerpts from the replies to his post
In the minds of many people, Java == slow . . .
Java means slow. Painfully slow. And badly written . . .
Synonyms for Java are ‘Big’, ‘Fat’, ‘Bloated’, and ‘Slow’ . .
Java is a slow bloated ancient system . . .
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The postings go on but you get the point. I disagree with the characterization of Java as “slow”. Most objective language comparisons and benchmarks show Java to be among the faster languages around. Certainly not a fast as C but much much fast than the currently popular Web 2.0 languages (ruby, python, php, perl,….). It seems the word “slow” is being incorrectly substituted for another word, “sluggish”. In other words it has a lot of inertia, slow to start, but once it gets going it cooks (thanks to the JIT).
With that technicality out of the way, I agree with the general sentiment that Java does have to change to compete in today’s world. It must become more agile, even at the cost of total speed.
The technical hurdles to make Java more nimble pail in comparison to the cultural ones. Can the Java community embrace a new way of programming and updated language specifications required to enter the new age? Some don’t think so. Time will tell.
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