JAXenter interviewed Canoo Fellow Dierk König on Groovy++. Read the Interview in German or join the Groovy++ Group dedicated to discussions of experimental statically typed compiler for Groovy programming language!

Update: As from now, the interview is also available in English! By the way: What is “Groovy++”?

Dierk König: Groovy + + is an extension of Groovy, which makes Groovy code pretty much as fast as native Java. In addition, you get static type checking plus type inference, yielding the benefits of compile-time safety but without the noise. To use the language extension, you only need one additional jar file in the classpath. Then you can annotate the required code parts – classes for example – with @Typed. The rest happens automatically. This approach takes advantage of Groovy’s ability to hook into the compilation step with AST Transformations. The name “Groovy + +” indicates that it is still Groovy, and therefore encompasses the entire beauty of the language syntax while exceeding the standard characteristics. Read on!

The well known research firm Gartner just published it’s Top Predictions for IT Organizations ans Users for 2010 and beyond, covering developments which definitely affect the RIA market, too. Their key findings are:

• IT Ownership: ”By 2012, 20% of businesses will own no IT assets”.
• Cloud Computing: “By 2012, India-centric IT services companies will represent 20% of the leading cloud aggregators”.
• Social Networking: “By 2012, Facebook will become the hub for social network integration and Web socialization”.
• Sustainability: ”By 2014, most IT business cases will include carbon remediation costs”.
• Internet Marketing “will be regulated by 2015, controlling more than $250 billion in Internet marketing spending worldwide”.
• Mobile Commerce: “By 2014, over 3 billion of the world’s adult population will be able to transact electronically”.
• Context Aware Computing “will be as influential to mobile consumer services [..] as search engines are to the Web”.
• User Devices: “By 2013, mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common Web access device worldwide”.

Perhaps the most aggressive outlook is the prediction that mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common Web access devices worldwide by 2013 — Morgan Stanley wasn’t quite that courageous. If we look closely, Gartner predicts that mobile phones will drive the higher number of website accesses “due to the sheer weight of device numbers”, but the “the bulk of page views will continue to occur through larger-format devices”. However: The RIA sector has to get ready for the mobile revolution, existing websites and web-based applications should be designed to be device-independent and their information structure has to be redesigned for mobile phone access.

CanooNet Mobile V2 (announced for 2/2010) demonstrates a successful redesign of a content structure for mobile access: No information should be positioned more than 3 clicks away from the user.

Changing Landscape of Software Development Conferences: Colorado Software Summit and SDWest and SD Best Practices terminated their long-running tradition in 2009. There is speculation that JavaOne 2009 may have been the last.

Java IDE Wars: IntelliJ IDEA has been the only one of the four leading Java IDEs that has not been available without charge. In 2009, the availability of an open source community edition of IntelliJ IDEA potentially changed the Java IDE landscape.

Groovy: Groovy claims to be “the most popular and successful dynamic language for the JVM”. According to Marx, this certainly seems to be the case (he mentions the high number of books on Groovy (and Grails) and the existence of a DZone area dedicated to Groovy (Groovy Zone) for evidence.

Java EE 6: Marx defines the December release of Java EE 6 as a significant development in the enterprise space.

Oracle buys Sun: According to Marx, even developers who do not use Sun or Oracle products are likely to be at least indirectly affected by this acquisition because it will almost certainly affect the entire software development competitive landscape.

Also included in the ranking were topics as:

• Programming Environments for Mobile Devices
• Bing Search Engine
• Scala
• Java SE 7 News
• Cloud Computing
• Google Chrome OS

If you are interested in Marx’ full review of 2009, please read his blog entry at JW Blogs. He also cited other annual reviews from JavaLobby and Computerworld. So what are last year’s most significant developments in software development from your point of view?

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Dierk with James Gosling during Jazoon 2009

This are maintenance release for ULCLoad 3.0. Please see the release notes for a list of implemented feature requests and fixed problem reports.

Please note: the ULCLoad 3.0 license key is valid for all software releases labeled ULCLoad 3.0. If you already have a ULCLoad 3.0 license key, a new license key is not required.

This is a maintenance release for UltraLightClient ‘08 that fixes the issue
UBA-7852 introduced by update 4.
In addition we have fixed three other issues

• [UBA-7573] – ULCComponent.add/removeNotify() does not work inside ULCTabbedPane and ULCCardPane
• [UBA-7580] – Missing column selection event for ULCTableTree with expansion listener
• [UBA-7760] – [Mac OS X 10.5.7, JRE 1.5] Installing shortcuts on the dock messed up the dock

Please see the ULC ‘08 update 4 release notes for the complete list of implemented feature requests and fixed problem reports.

Please note: the UltraLightClient ‘08 license key is valid for all software releases labeled UltraLightClient ‘08. If you already have a ULC ‘08 license key, a new license key is not required.

The whole team

So we use our agility to dodge the throng, occasionally struggling to keep track of one another in the mayhem. And the for the first fifteen minutes of what is envisaged to be a thirty minute effort, we remain within sight of each other.

Mike Mannion

Suddenly, however, the terrain changes from asphalt to soil, from cycle-track and side-road to wooded riverside. The track has narrowed allowing just two, maximum three runners to stay abreast of one another. In the presence of this bottleneck, the distance between the ten begins to grow. Surrounded by a dense pack of sweaty strangers, we lose sight of each other. Those ahead are faced with a choice:

• Slow down, potentially impeding other runners
• Retain speed, flow with the masses
• Speed up and overtake whenever possible i.e. when the track widens sufficiently

In any case it is perfectly clear that the rate at which participants complete this course is being determined by this bottleneck, which one might describe as the constraint in the system.

Sibylle Peter and Guenter Losert

Finally, the three up ahead clear the narrow section. We can’t now guess the distance between the team members be we can assume it’s pretty big. Turns out it’s bigger than our assumption because one of the Canooies has been reduced to walking due to some debilitating stomach cramps.

The Canooies in her immediate vicinity take the motto “Leave no Canooy behind” to heart and accompany their colleague until the cramps subside. What a team!

Guenter Losert and Christian Ribeaud

Meanwhile the front runners (three) give it all they’ve got for the final 500m and cross the line more or less simultaneously. It’s a personal best for at least one of them! They waste no time in cheering their colleagues through the final 100m until – in no time at all – every member of the team has crossed the finish line.

Sibylle Peter and Leis Gemperle

Another project completed with all features delivered… Drinks everybody!? More photos on Flickr!

Alas, it was just a dream and the actual 6km Firmenlauf ‘09 was just three weeks away and Mike had no team.

So he used Email to try to put a team together and after approximately forty-eight hours of waiting had volunteer count of one, which was at least six short of the dream’s requirements.

So he went to talk to his colleagues to seek out the reason for the lack of response. And the reasons were wide ranging, from a supposed lack of fitness to Firmenlauf ‘09 taking place on the day before he or she was due to go on vacation.

Reasonable excuses, but surely not showstoppers, Mike thought. And so he persisted and to cut a long story short he managed to ramp up the total number of volunteers to ten – thus exceeding the dream’s requirement by two. Personal engagement clearly works when it comes to selling a vision (or in this case a dream.)

Things were suddenly looking good. And things got even better when CFO Dirk decreed that Canoo would cover the costs of participation – a bonus the participants hadn’t counted on, and a clear demonstration that management was not only prepared to run the “risk” of supporting a dream, but was prepared to commit resources to the dream’s realisation. CEOs everywhere: Take note.

And then things took a slight downturn when two volunteers pulled out due to client project commitments (the client comes first at Canoo, obviously.) But due to the in-built resource buffer, which consisted of two persons, the dream was still safe and good to go. As Tom de Marco once noted: every project needs slack.

But as luck would have it another two volunteers showed up (now that never happens in a project!) and so we were back to ten Canooies – consisting of seven guys and three girls, none of whom disagree with Mike’s proposed team Motto “Leave no Canooy Behind.” There’s no stopping us now!

And so the big day came and we arrived at the venue of Firmenlauf ’09. So far the only thing the dream had wrong was that it didn’t involve another 1300 runners showing up. This was obviously going to make the goal crossing the finishing line simultaneously rather challenging; especially given that the trail is very narrow at some points, not even allowing for three runners to run abreast, let alone ten!

TO BE CONTINUED…

Top (left > right): Nicolai Kilian, Thomas Ernst, Alberto Mijares, Guenter Losert, Christian Ribeaud;
Bottom (left > right): Sibylle Peter, Susanne Batz, Lais Gemperle, Andrei Socaciu, Mike Mannion

Today, Thursday June 18th, we have been invited by CIS Computer Information Systems to give an update about the new ULC features to an audience of 75 people in Bratislava. The venue took place in the busines park of Kerametal.

CIS is a very successful partner of Canoo, based in the capital city of Slovakia. CIS has 7 employees and exists since 18 years. They are specialized in IBM Rational, Oracle WebLogic, UltraLightClient and other RIA technologies.

Twice a year, CIS is inviting customers to a one day conference. In spring more product, in fall more hands on focused. Even if this time the products where in focus, it was an all technical oriented event. The presenters mostly where sitting in front of their PC’s, talking and programming in parallel. It looked like this was the style the audience was used to and so Marcel Rüedi gave his UltraLightClient pitch in the same way. Marcel was presenting all new features and functions within 45 Minutes in perfect Swiss English All other presentations have been presented in Slovakian language and guess what, it is not really similar to German, so we didn’t understand anything.

During the brakes we where talking with the CIS developers, mainly Anton Levcik and Pavol Diveky. Anton is the ULC specialist at CIS. In this role he is supporting customers in developing ULC based applications and interfaces. Several times a year he’s giving ULC trainings in Slovak language. So if you’d ever need a ULC training in Slovak….

Anton and Dalibor have introduced us to several ULC customers:

• Smart Management: SW developer, which has replaced an AS400 based solution for a Slovak hotel group.
• SZP: Slovak health insurance company for public services (police, army, etc.), semi government working with an ULC based application to internally handle customer information
• Ness a.s.: worldwide group, SW developer with 13 ULC Licenses.
• Siemens: developing applications for T-Systems and government.

CIS and all customers, where extremely pleased with ULC and that they had a chance to talk with Canoo directly.

Next Steps:

• CIS is trying to arrange for us a view into some of the customers application
• CIS will invite us to the conference in November. They are very interested in ULC / Groovy & Grails integration, ULC / FX and ULC Mobile.