Java Performance/Python etc

[Steve Lamb]

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Tuesday, September 19, 2000, 9:13:12 AM, Simon wrote:
> I deliberately said "standard library" i.e. functions that are
> guaranteed to be present and work in a defined way on all
> implementaions.  Having consulted our python guru (cos I'm not one),
> I still maintain Java has no peers in this area - whether you doubt
> it or not! Agreed, you'll find features missing, but no other
> languages have such a rich standard library!

    Right, and in Python's standard library that is exactly the same.  What
isn't the same is clearly noted and completely understandable.  For example,
how do you change user permissions on a file on Win95?  Java is going to do it
no differently than Python does it.  Not at all because the OS doesn't
implement it.

> Most (OO) languages introduce their own terms for things, certainly
> including C++ (what used to be called a "method", is a "member
> function" in C++)

    Well, what is a method?  It is a function in the class.  Member
/function/.  At least you have links back to the terminology of the past.
Also C++ and other OO languages were jockeying for terminology.

    Java was not.  When you can tell me how a "Bean" somehow references what
came before it I'll concede.

> and Java is no worse than the others for "terminology" IMO. If you know C++,
> what does "static" mean, and how many languages share this definition
> (Answer to the second portion: 0).

    Bean.  Java Bean.  The name was picked because it was cute with the name
of the product as a while.

    "Oh, this is cute, we'll call it Java, as in coffee because everyone loves
coffee and it will run everywhere, all computers will love Java."

    "Yeah, yeah, and the classes will be called beans. Java beans, get it!
Yeah! People can program beans, toss beans around, I bet we could put a lot of
class, er, beans on a CD for people to use and call it a bean bag!"

    "Ahaha, good one, this works."

    *Cut to the programmers and techies getting the document the marketing
people dreamed up.*

    "What the FUCK!?!?  They're calling a class a bean."

    "A what?"

    "A fucking /BEAN/!  We're making beans!"

    "Great, I can see it now.  Next they'll have a commercial with Juan
Valdez, the damned Taco Bell dog and the Sun logo with a voice, 'What do these
three companies have in common?  Excellent beans.'  I'm going to puke."

    *cut back to marketing people*

    "Hey, we could get Juan Valdez and the Taco Bell Dog and..."

    Yeah, do I know what static means in C++?  No.  However I'm sure it
doesn't relate to static electricity, static cling or some other cutesy
marketing crap that make real programmers wonder what the hell crack the
company that produced it was smoking and where they could get some!  Trust me,
I sat in a room with 20+ programmers of Perl and C with the resident Java
person going on about beans and we were /ALL/ shaking our head at the
stupidity of it.  I guarantee you "Member function" and "static" would not
have gotten the same reaction!

    That is the biggest problem, the terminology was dictated by /MARKETING/,
the people who are so far removed from technical aspects of the world that
they should not be allowed to dictate anything about it.  Whenever they do the
product invariably is bloated crap (See anything from Microsoft or programmed
with the Microsoft mindset) or dies (see IBM's marketing dept. treatment of
OS/s) because they just don't get it, EVER.  For applications it is somewhat
forgivable that marketing have some hand in it.  You need to sell to the
knuckleheads who don't know LMB from RMB and constantly have to ask after you
specify one if they need to continue pressing that one for ever after.
However, a computer language doesn't need to be marketed to those
knuckleheads because they can't program.  It is marketed to programmers and it
will stand or fall on its technical merit.

    Oh, no, not Java.  It was marketed to suits who then tell their
programmers they will program in this wonderful, run anywhere language that
they can't themselves used because is sounded cute.  Java beans, they can get
that!  And that is why 20+ programmers were sitting there in numb shock that
they were actually being force to program in that explosive diarrhea discharge
from Sun's marketing department when they /KNEW/ they could get the job done
in 2-3 other languages which are just as fast to develop in, start faster, run
just as fast or adequately fast, that they know /NOW/ and were resorted to
using terms dreamt up by the lead marketer who places his coffee cup in the
CD-Tray.  And if you ever wondered why Java is called Java, that is why!


> BTW: What new terms are you thinking of, possibly "inner class" is
> new, but then I know of no other languages which possess inner classes,
> so fair enough!

    /BEAN/.  I said it.  BEAN, EJB and a slew of others which were produce by
the mental masturbation of some marketing department deep in the nether bowels
of Sun.

> Fair enough. I do understand your concerns and share them but
> to a lesser extent - however I think that Sun has every right to
> behave this way and generate revenue from its impressive "invention".

    Impressive?  When it does something impressive, let me know.  So far the
only impressive thing it has done is make a mockery of programming languages.

> IBM has almost bet it's business on Java, and I'd of thought they'd
> be very vulnerable if your concerns are that "real".

    After their handling of OS/2 (remember when they bet their business on
that?) I don't consider that a stellar endorsement.  I didn't even blink when
they announced "support" for Linux because I know what IBM "support" amounts
to.  Beans.

> BTW: the European Digital TV bodies have standardised on Java for the
> "applications language" for set-top boxes and digital TV precisely because
> there are 2nd sources for JVMs (from HP and other smaller vendors) which are
> not subject to any of Sun's IP rights - these bodies rejected MS's
> submission on the basis that they refused to be at the beck and call of a
> single supplier.

    2nd source of JVMs, all of which derive from the spec set forth by Sun
which can be altered and closed off at any moment.  They are simply
disillusioning themselves as to not being subject to a single source.
Remember, the JVMs don't matter, the spec for the language does and that is
still under a single /CLOSED/ source of control.

> Whatever Steve! It is possible to have implementaions where it wouldn't
> take a minute, as I described!

    It is impossible to have a circumstance where it would take a minute under
the two I've described.

> I have the misfortune to have to produce web apps using PHP (3 not
> 4 which may have improved) and Java, and PHP is not close to being
> "performant", though it's much more sutable for small quick-hack type
> apps, Java is more suitable for large "formal" ones.

    *laugh*  You know what I use for my examples?  The hundreds of sites that
use PHP that run smooth and fast as can be and the comparable LACK of Java
"servlets" (WTF is that?  SERVER, not LET, ER.  SERVER!  APPLICATION, SERVER!)
both in number and in performance.  I can tell when I am on a Java "servlet".
It runs like a dead dog whipped 20 times over.  Sure, the whipping moves it a
few millimeters but you can't call that running.

>>Hopefully that hell will never happen in my lifetime.
> If it happens, it won't be a hell! If it remains a hell Java
> won't happen (on the desktop)!

    Heh, speak for yourself Bealzabub.  We've had two decades of eating crap
from Microsoft because of its monopoly position.  Sun is the underdog which is
why they are willing to be as open as they are with Java.  If it ever gains
dominance we're right back where we started, a for profit, single source that
can control everything.  You think it is going to remain open then?  Doubtful.
You have to remember what Sun wants Java to be there for.  Do some digging in
ASP and the DCMA.  Those are two abortions that need to be flushed pronto.

> Wow! Ok Steve, whatever you say - can I borrow your time machine
> sometime? (Java was *nearly* opened up in the past, and it may
> well be opened in the future - though possibly only "portions"
> of it)!

    Pardon me for not trusting a for profit company for being altruistic in
any sense until it happens.  You said nearly and portions.  That isn't open
and not all.  As I said, won't happen.  /IF/ it does it will only be under
extreme circumstances that I don't even want to ponder lest I want to rip my
eyes out in horror.

- --
         Steve C. Lamb         | I'm your priest, I'm your shrink, I'm your
         ICQ: 5107343          | main connection to the switchboard of souls.
- -------------------------------+---------------------------------------------

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