After a period of nearly 8 years, I’m coming back to Java. I looked at it in 1996 when I was in college. I bought Java 1.0 in a nutshell. Times have definitely changed. I picked up Java 1.4 in a nutshell and it’s 4 times the size. Yikes, it’s at least 3 times the size.
But anyway, the employer is directing me at Java, after 4 years of Perl. It’s time to learn about servlets, which thankfully appear to be quite similar to mod_perl. It’s not totally surprising given that they cover much of the same ground. But as everything with Java seems, it’s far more wordy, verbose and formal. I fully understand those who call it the COBOL of the future.
Of course, it’s not just Java to learn. It’s also the environment that goes with it. I’ve been using Unix for a long time and know my way around compilers, linkers, makefiles and so on. But now I have to contend with eclipse, netbeans, ant, tomcat and a host of other things. Lots to learn, but hopefully rewarding.
Jabbering Giraffe 