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Java at 30: How a language designed for a failed gadget became a global powerhouse (www.zdnet.com)

submitted 5 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Unlike other older languages, such as Cobol and Fortran -- which are still used, but almost always in legacy projects -- Java has constantly evolved to meet new demands while maintaining backward compatibility.

can't speak on the FORTRAN claim but with COBOL this couldn't be less true. last i checked the newest Enterprise COBOL LTS is newer than Java's

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 days ago (1 children)

The difference is people still write Java, regardless of whether it's a dated pos or not, so the use cases have evolved

Then there's the use of the JVM/JRE which have evolved even more due to Scala, Clojure & Kotlin

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 days ago (1 children)

COBOL is still being updated because, believe it or not, people are still writing COBOL

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 days ago (1 children)

People aren’t writing new projects in COBOL. It’s mostly to maintain 40+ year old systems. Unless you’re working in the bank sector, it’s unlikely you will write a program in COBOL.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 days ago

Don't forget this small sector called government. Loads of Cobol there.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

And Java is very much considered legacy in the vast majority of projects that use it.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Then it would not be constantly evolving with more than a new release per year. Do you know anything about gigantic Java ecosystem? Guessed so ...

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago

Yeah, I know that the vast majority of Java applications out there are stuck on ancient versions of the JVM and spew back traces in their logs as if they bought them in bulk.