Should we just learn Java?

Nov 21, 2007 · 2 minute read

As a wandering web designer cum developer and now occasional consultant I’m generally pretty technology agnostic. At some point or another I’ve written HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP, C#, Python and Rails for a living - often on the same day. But something has me thinking and I thought I’d see what other people thought as well.

That thing is Java. I have books on Java. I’ve done the usual examples (hello world in 20 lines for instance). I didn’t really like it and left it at that. But a few presentations, both from Google, at both Future of Mobile and @media Ajax got me thinking. First you have Android in the mobile space which Dave Burke did a good job of making look pretty interesting. Then you had the guys from Ajaxian talking about using Java for everything.

A few other thinks to throw into the pot. Beyond Java is an interesting read - summing up with a call for more fragmentation and for small nimble languages to be used where it makes sense. Oh, and I think Tom is busy learning Java as well. Mmmmm.

Some good coverage around of both conferences and I know my first impression was basically this way lies madness. But it would have been more interesting had their been a few more Java people around to argue with.

Note that I’m not advocating a Google like disregard for the web here. Markup really matters, I happen to disagree with Douglas and think CSS rocks and I love writing Javascript. But should we just learn Java anyhow and try to subvert some of the existing tools to be more web like?