I’ve never been a huge Philip Greenspun fanboy, but anybody who disses Java and SUV’s in one fell swoop deserves a link. Yeah, the quotes is as old as the hills (2003), but it’s new to me. And now I’m subjecting you to it, probably again.

A project done in Java will cost 5 times as much, take twice as long, and be harder to maintain than a project done in a scripting language such as PHP or Perl. People who are serious about getting the job done on time and under budget will use tools such as Visual Basic (controlled all the machines that decoded the human genome). But the programmers and managers using Java will feel good about themselves because they are using a tool that, in theory, has a lot of power for handling problems of tremendous complexity. Just like the suburbanite who drives his SUV to the 7-11 on a paved road but feels good because in theory he could climb a 45-degree dirt slope. If a programmer is attacking a truly difficult problem he or she will generally have to use a language with systems programming and dynamic type extension capability, such as Lisp. This corresponds to the situation in which my friend, the proud owner of an original-style Hummer, got stuck in the sand on his first off-road excursion; an SUV can’t handle a true off-road adventure for which a tracked vehicle is required.

I experience this first hand every day. All the Java code I work with could be done just as well if not better in maybe 1/10^th as much code in any of the much-maligned “scripting” languages. Plus it would be easier to test and maintain. What does the “strength” of Java buy? Nothing.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 26th, 2007 at 10:25 am and is filed under Programming. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.