From: frantz@netcom.com (Bill Frantz)
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 1996 13:56:25 +0800
To: perry@piermont.com
Subject: Re: Java
Message-ID: <199606042119.OAA07878@netcom7.netcom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At  9:06 AM 6/4/96 -0400, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
>Bill Frantz writes:
>> I'll say.  You have also ignored some of Java's other features.  Machine
>> independence is probably the most important.
>
>Many languages are machine independent. Thats hardly a new feature.
>...
>However, your point is taken. Java is a neat little language in many
>ways. However, that isn't cause enough for literally fifty books on
>the subject to be on display, including breathless ones proclaiming
>"Tips from experienced Java programmers!" as if there are any in the
>world at this point. There are dozens of cute little languages in the
>world -- scheme, smalltalk, etc, etc.

I guess I tend to react to the Java hype with bemusement rather than
horror.  I enjoy joking with the clerks at Computer Literacy Bookstore
about the "Java book of the day".  However, unlike so much of the
industry's over hyped marketing, with Java there is actually something
worth while hidden under the massive hype.

Java appears to have a chance of being adopted widely in the industry.  We
can discuss until the cows come home why Smalltalk, Scheme etc. have not
achieved wide usage.  I suspect it may be a combination of unfamiliar
syntax, licensing issues, version compatibility issues, and the inability
to do low level programming.  These issues may also hit Java, but for now
it is the nicest language around with a bandwagon behind it.  If it
replaces Basic, that will be a significant step forward.
 

>I mean, with all the "Teach yourself Java in 21 days" and company
>books coming out, you would think you were dealing witht he major
>application programming language for the world instead of something
>that at the moment is used for almost nothing more interesting than
>fake scrolling LED sign applets.

I agree that all the hype has been about applets.  However there is one
common non-applet Java application that shows that significant applications
can be written in Java.  That application is the Java compiler itself.  If
you are running on a Sun system, you can do real applications today.  (On
the Mac you are still in the "applet jail", but I haven't opened the latest
Java environment that arrived on my desk last month, so I may be obsolete.)


>> If you want defense in depth, run your Java interpreter in an OS
>> environment which limits the interpreter's access to only those resources
>> you wish it to access.
>
>Since that doesn't exist, it isn't an option for my users. It is not,
>in any case, my obligation to make Java secure. I'm not the one hyping
>it.

I thought this was the effect the Unix people get when they run
applications such as firewall code in a "chroot jail".  Perhaps Netscape
could make you happy by having its Unix based browsers run Java applet
interpreters in such a jail.  (I don't know, Unix is an imperfectly spoken
foreign language to me.)


>You could hand any websurfer a Netscape PGP plugin without much work
>at all, and you could easily build it on lots of platforms. After all,
>look at how many platforms that lowly C code like PGP runs on.

Why don't we have one of these now?  (N.B. not a rhetorical question)


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