Bruce Eckel on using Java for RIA
I stumbled across this posting at Indicthreads.com, discussing a recent article by Bruce Eckel:
Bruce Eckel looks at “How And Why AJAX, Not Java, Became the Favored Technology for RIAs”. He begins with what’s wrong with Java and the web at large. He then looks at the RIA space, the alternatives, the challenges and why Java hasn’t managed to capture the market for client-side RIAs.
He says “In fact, why do we like Ajax? It’s clearly not because JavaScript is so easy to work with—JavaScript cross-platform problems are the reason people have avoided it in the past. Ajax is popular because we know that the necessary software for the client side is already installed. Someone had to figure out how to deal with the cross-platform issues for JavaScript first, but if JRE installation was trivial, everyone might have just created Java applets. But they didn’t, applets are not ubiquitous, and everyone got excited about Ajax instead. So Ajax became the favored technology for RIAs.”
“It’s not impossible to build GUI applications with Java, but it’s been 10 years and there are still installation hiccups with applets, Java WebStart, and regular applications. After 10 years, people don’t trust it anymore.”
He then looks at how Flash and Flex could be possible solutions for creating powerful cross-platform UIs. Read the entire article on JDJ.
For a contrary opinion have a look at why Marc Domenig feels that despite the hype around Ajax, Java Swing can be a much better option.
As Indicthreads points out, Canoo has taken a different stance on this, shown by its continued investment into its thin Swing library. And reflected by various happy customers. See also Canoo’s list of advantages compared to Swing and Java Web Start.
The JDJ article includes some valid criticism of Java. Clunky, boring and grey user interfaces is, in my humble opinion, one of them.
Marc Domenig points out in a Javalobby article on AJAX and RIA, that there are many different evaluation criteria to consider on a per-project basis. Currently there is no one technology that fits all. This jungle of RIA possibilities has led Canoo to offer consulting services for customers that are grappling with this question.
