Always reading bits...


Its the shadows and reflections cast from the future that interest me.

Who : Charles Ditzel

Email: cld9731@yahoo.com



Go get NetBeans
««Feb 2010»»
SMTWTFS
  123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28

Search Blog

 


Go to Swing Pointers site

Mailing List

Library Thing

Restaurant Reviews

Flickr - Latest Photos

Use OpenOffice.org
Wikio - Top Blogs - Technology
cld
       cld.blog-city.com

Help Spread The Java Platform To Visual Basic and C# Developers

« H E email
posted Thursday, 27 April 2006
Java versus .NET
A simplified view of the battle in enterprises.
 Java and Microsoft.NET are the two central players in the enterprise space.  IT Departments are constantly struggling over which to pick and when to pick one over the other, especially when IT departments already have a large body of Microsoft-based code.  Some IT departments make their choice and then may realize that rather than C# or VB.NET they should have simply written a Java  application that is not bound by operating
system and hardware boundaries.  Write Once, Run Anywhere continues to have a deep meaning to IT.  There is little question in my mind that prior to .NET - Win32 developers migrated in substantial numbers to the Java Platform.  Recent surveys
of developers within major companies strongly suggest that Java  and .NET constitute the two  frameworks battling it out in the enterprise  today. Today some .NET developers continue to move to Java.  How do we create a tipping point where C# and VB.NET developers consider moving to Java in much larger numbers ? Clearly, one of the best ways is the personal touch.  I recently started a poll (or vote) on this topic to see how many Java developers are building bridges with C# and VB.NET developers.  You can find the (visitor) poll on the left sidebar of this page and I encourage you to vote.   Moving .NET Developers
How can we move C# and VB.NET developers over to Java ? Hard work. Java developers need to show the power of the platform and IDEs.  Some already have.
I notice from  some of the responses on the poll that there are ex- VB/VB.NET developers that have moved over to Java and  are also mentoring other VB/VB.NET developers and showing them what Java offers.  That's pretty  cool.  Clearly,  one stumbling block is that developers in large companies with mixed environments often are in different areas and there may not be a lot of communications between the groups.
In addition,  some of the cultural differences serve to undermine one-on-one developer communication.  One of the nice things about Java developers spending a little quality-time  with  VB/VB.NET and C# developers is that many .NET developers are genuinely interested and curious about the Java community - it is less of a daunting challenge if we help them cross the bridge.   It is worth discussing what Java in 2006 is about with them :  
> Java performance is now fast (break the mythology). Even commercial games are now being written in Java.
> Java development environments offer better enterprise and mobile features.
> Java on the desktop is gaining strong momentum.
> Java offers a wealth of diverse development options and features that transcend products from one company.
> Java offers write once, run anywhere. This transcends operating systems and computing hardware.
> Java offers lower cost entry points and enterprise software.
> Java scales.  It also scales beyond one operating system and hardware platform.
> Java offers an open community and open development process.

Maybe this call to action is appropriate with JavaOne 2006 just around the corner - if you know a VB/VB.NET developer show them the IDEs, the tools or at the very least show them some of the content from JavaOne 2005 and soon from JavaOne 2006.  Danny Coward has written a nice blog on this topic and I will write about some good Java Platform starting points for VB/VB.NET and C# developers in my next few blogs.

links: digg this    del.icio.us    technorati