J1 – Final Remarks
This conference was different in several respects. First of all, Oracle’s takeover of Sun is certainly a watershed and it remains to be seen how Oracle will drive the Java ecosystem. Larry Ellison’s appearance at the keynote was a strong and desperately needed signal for the Java community. At next year’s JavaOne it should be clearer how serious Oracle is about Java.
Another difference was the comparatively small number of attendants. I cannot remember a JavaOne with plenty of space in the session halls (they even had tables in some of them which was convenient for laptop users) and short lines at the entrance, at lunch or at the restrooms. And for the first time ever at JavaOne the wireless network was kind of usable and mostly reliable. The quality of the talks was pretty good, though. This impression was also corroborated by other people I spoke to. Only two talks did not meet my expectations in terms of presentation and content.
The two main topics were certainly JavaFX and mobility. JavaFX is Sun’s last bet to seize the desktop and RIA realm. Right now, they are trying to impress the designers but they have to address the needs of hard-core Java developers as well. It is still too early to tell but it will be a tough uphill battle for sure. Mobility has been a main topic for the last few years. However, the iPhone has definitely changed the landscape, especially in terms of usability and JavaFX Mobile is not yet there.
Who were the prominent absentees? Android was almost never mentioned. Sun is obviously still not sure whether to ignore or fight it. Ignorance may be bliss but I think it is not the right approach here. I also never heard anything about portals (with the notable exception of iGoogle, which has nothing to do with JSR168). Looks like this technology did not catch on and will remain in its niche.
One final remark: if Sun is really serious about Rich Internet Applications and JavaFX then they should come up with a vastly better JavaOne schedule builder. The current Web application is lightyears away from being usable and only serves as a bad example.
