[Gllug] OT(ish): Advice

[chris.wareham at btopenworld.com]

Mike Brodbelt <mike at coruscant.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> 
> I must admit that this has always confused me. I see the point of Java
> in client-side applications, where the cross-platform nature of the
> software is very useful, but Java on the server is another matter.
> 

Java is a great language for getting stuff written quickly - lots of
nice utility classes like Vectors, HashMaps, etc. Unlike Perl, it's easy
to write readable Java code, and unlike C/C   you don't have to worry
about memory management. Plus with Perl you're stuck with firing up a
huge interpreter for each request, or forced into using mod_perl. With
C/C   you can write for the webservers module API (most likely Apache),
but I've managed to crash Apache too often to like that method.

> 
> Is there any actual reason why I should choose to run server side
> software on my web server, where I control the platform, in an emulated
> environment guaranteed to slow everything to a crawl? Is there any sane
> reason to choose Java over, well, *anything* else that's not running in
> a JVM? I'm genuinely curious as to why so many people seem to have
> bought into servlets, and I can only currently rationalize by assuming
> that Intel are brainwashing people......
> 

The most popular server side CGI/webserver module language during the 
Internet boom was Perl, which is effectively an "emulated" environment.
It has the additional overhead of compiling to byetcode on top of
actually running it. mod_perl may help here, but I've seen so much badly
written Perl code (usually stop-gap stuff that never gets rewritten)
that I struck it off of my CV.

By the way, what would Intel want to "brainwash" people into using Java,
a language created and effectively controlled by Sun - a company who
make most of their income from selling Sparc based machines?

Chris

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