Java was meant to be the foundation of a universal platform for all operating systems that would flatten applications and the Internet. It was meant to be great for all. But what Java accomplished was:
- It was a platform of incompatibility. How many of us have dealt with users requiring 3-4 versions of Java and teaching “Hopeless John/Joan in Finance” how to switch between those versions, and getting at least 1 helpdesk call from him/her per day.
- Becoming one of the most attacked products on the planet, thanks to it’s gaping holes and slow updates from Sun/Oracle.
So it was kind of funny that almost every Bank and every tax collection agency on the planet adopted Java as their required application runtime. Customers/tax payers around the world are running the ancient and vulnerable Java 4.x because the code requires it.
And this is why IT staffs hate, no … HATE Java.
Start partying … Oracle announced:
Oracle plans to deprecate the Java browser plugin in JDK 9. This technology will be removed from the Oracle JDK and JRE in a future Java SE release.
In other words: JAVA IS DEAD!
Woooooooooohooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
Two groups will be delighted:
- Web developers are anticipating Y2K fees from Banks and government finance departments who are now in a race against end of support.
- IT pros who are anticipating the removal of Java hack-ware and helpdesk-ticket-ware.
To say “JAVA IS DEAD” is deliberately inflammatory, and I say this as a Microsoft .Net stack developer. Oracle is removing the Java browser plugin, which as a target for client-side ’embedded-in-a-web-page’ software delivery has been in decline for years just like Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight. The decline of these runtimes has coincided with the improvement of performance and feature support in web browser JavaScript engines.
The Java Runtime Environment (just like the .Net Common Language Runtime) will continue on as a platform for delivering server-side software, or even desktop software in some limited cases.