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XML Conference #9 - Ted Neward

Ted Neward's turn.

Talking to a room of (mostly) .NETters must be kind of tough for a guy with such a strong Java side.

It's strange, because it seems like Ted just won't choose one or the other (which, in my opinion, is a good thing - more toys == more fun). It reminds me of Shakespeare's song from Much Ado About Nothing:

Sigh not so, but let them go
Men were deceivers ever
One foot in sea, and one on shore
To the one thing constant never...

Anyway, he got going. There were a couple of dissenters in the audience who scoffed when Ted asked if there were any Java developers in the room, but he quickly whipped those two guys to death with his ponytail, so the rest of the talk went on without such interruptions.

Now we've all been scared into loving Java, and are hoping that we get out of here alive.

At another point in the talk, Ted forced the entire room to stand up and perform calisthenics, which made me feel like I was on lunch break at a large Japanese corporation. Nobody dared resist his command to rise and wiggle after seeing his handiwork in the area of hair wielding.

This man is smart and dangerous.

Oh, and the talk was on the subject of Java and web services.

You know, I have a soft spot for Java. It's a nice language.

However, some things are just a major pain in the ass to implement with the platform. .NET makes remoting via web services so freaking simple that it's hard to believe.

Java, on the other hand... Well. Let's just say Java web services still doesn't look like my kind of thing.

There's the whole issue of requiring a Java app server. If this whole Java web services thing starts with code (which I like) and ends with something like Websphere (which I hate), then I would rather coat my eyeballs in honey and dip my face in a box full of hungry rats.

I hate Java application servers. That just about kills my interest in Java web services.

Ted was entertaining anyway, though.

Published Thursday, July 10, 2003 10:54 PM by Rory

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Comments

 

Joshua Hoover said:

You're right Rory. I'd much rather have only one application server that is tightly integrated into only one OS that only runs on one hardware platform (X86). Screw options. We'd rather have things easy than to be given the little hassle that comes with technology choice. We love monopolies. :-) My comments (with hrefs intact) to your article can also be found on my weblog: http://jhoover.weblogdog.com/
July 11, 2003 5:45 PM
 

Rory said:

It isn't a question of loving monopolies. It's a question of hating crap. My experience with Websphere has been that it's a bloated bit of irritation. Saying that I don't like shitty software != saying that I like monopolies.
July 11, 2003 5:57 PM
 

Joshua Hoover said:

Since when is Websphere your only Java application server choice? How about lean and mean ones like Resin, Jetty and Tomcat? Or more full blown J2EE ones like Oracle 9i App Server, JRun, etc. You make it sound like Websphere is your only choice and that just isn't true.
July 11, 2003 6:47 PM
 

Rory said:

I never said it was - It's just that Websphere is one of the most irritating pieces of software I've ever encountered. Tomcat, on the other hand, I like. I ran my personal site off of it for a couple years, actually, and loved almost every minute of it. But, I still have my preferences, and have found that it's significantly easier for me to get off the ground when I'm coding with .NET against IIS. I may be guilty of having been unclear, but you're guilty of taking the paranoid position of "doesn't like java app servers" == "obviously likes monopolies." Anyway, it doesn't matter. You're going to do what you do, and I'm going to do what I do. That's that, eh?
July 11, 2003 6:56 PM
 

Joshua Hoover said:

Agreed. Websphere does suck and everyone has their technology preferences. But, I will always argue that technology lock-in is a real issue. Companies want to dominate. The company I work for does in its market and I'm sure the one you work for wants to as well. The problem with total domination in the software market is that you can soon find yourself pinned in a corner when the king of the hill makes decisions that negatively impact your work. It's a very real situation. Just ask those who got nailed with Software Assurance contracts that raised their costs by 30% or more. That isn't being paranoid, that's being aware of reality. Java and .NET are both more than capable. But, Java is much more open than .NET and that means something to those who have platforms other than Microsoft, which is most medium-large sized businesses. For instance, we have Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and AS/400 for a company with about 1,500 people. Java will run on all those platforms, .NET will not. That's something we consider when evaluating technologies.
July 11, 2003 7:07 PM
 

chrootstrap said:

BUT, .NET (BUT.NET?) doesn't just run on one platform. Mono works perfectly well for web-services and dot.gnu is coming along nicely as well. Also I have the Rotor shared source on CD right here in front of me. I got it for free at the Open Source Conference this week. .NET will run on (x86, ppc, sparc) Linux, Mac OS X, and AS/400 (running Linux). My advice: if you want to avoid lock-in in enterprise computers, focus on OPEN INTEGRATION TECHNOLOGIES rather than components per se. XML, SOAP (cf. RMI), ODBC, etc. This also improves future compatibility.
July 12, 2003 6:20 AM
 

TrackBack said:

TechEd Hidden Gem Sessions
June 3, 2005 5:23 PM
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