Java One, Phobos, JavaFX

I have been watching with interest what has been happening at Java One this year via the web. To be honest, I have never really paid attention to it at all except to see a random news story here or there. Since I have begun using Phobos and looking for ways to move business applications to the Java platform, I have been following Java much more closely. My main area of interest was to see what the Phobos team was presenting and how Phobos fits into the big Java picture. The next thing which jumped out and I found exciting was the JavaFX announcement. I saw F3/JavaFX several months ago, but really have not paid attention to it, but was pleasantly surprised by how far it has come and how it is being developed. It is exciting to see Sun putting effort into making simple, easy to use tools. In my book, this is finally an effort in the right direction to draw new, non-Java programmers into the Java platform. This is what needs to happen in order for Java to dominate and neutralize the operating system monopoly.

It was sad to see the reaction Java developers and Java bloggers being critical of Sun's efforts and JavaFX. With Phobos and JavaFX built on top of Java, Java is not going to go away. Java programmers will still be able to code in Java. What is the problem with building a simple declarative language with easy binding? What is wrong with designing an interpreted language running on the Java stack? What is wrong with bringing the level of complexity to write on top of the Java stack to a very simple proposition? It seems many Java programmers are their own enemy. It is time for Java developers to have some enthusiasm about the Java platform striving to encompass and invite, in whatever ways necessary, those developers who are using other languages. That does not mean forcing them to learn Java. That means creating a migration path that is feasible and comfortable, and giving them the tools to do so. Sun is finally doing it, and it is about time that Java developers and Java bloggers get in the game and support Sun's effort. It is in every Java developers best interest to do so.