[3602] in java-interest
There needs to be a book with the whole story
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Dave McDorman)
Fri Nov 17 06:44:44 1995
Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 01:54:49 -0800
From: David.McDorman@West.Sun.COM (Dave McDorman)
To: java-interest@java.Eng.Sun.COM
A previous poster wrote...
>> The Java team has done a great job,
I feel the need to tell a couple of personal Java stories. Somebody really needs to
write a book about this whole development team, like Tracy Kidder's
"Soul of a New Machine".
I feel the need to tell a personal Java stories.
I think they have really carved out a niche in programming history. Many of them
have developed "start up fever" and taken important jobs with Internet based
companies but the small, intense nature of the group is adding mass and not shrinking.
Anyway, a story... I met some of these engineers when they were applying
similar technology for potential Interactive Video business as "First Person"
for a Sprint Distance Learning Project that I did the first few visits
on. When they announced the re-deployment to Internet uses months later I told
my co-workers that something really big was in the works.
I downloaded the first incarnation of the browser when it was intended to be
called by another name... a good one but previously owned. It was a few
mega-bytes in size but I wanted my fellow techies to get the word so I sent
out an e-mail and attached the entire compressed tar archive to about 15
co-workers in three different sites. Nobody ever said a thing... "Who needs
another Browser... It's pretty buggy... Alpha1."
Java is much better since the deeper you dig into the doc's and capabilitesd
the more you see that it's essentially a complete, self-contained OO Programming
Environment. The Browser just proves that it's useful for modern computer
kinds of issues but my previous First Person exposure made that clear.
I studied the code and said. I could do something with this... I never
did with C++ but I could make something interesting with this. And if I
could do that then a professional could really get the job done...
I have since heard some productivity stories from "real coders" that
indicate the java design and implementation helps them get complex
applications done in very short intense sessions. It sounds pretty
fulfilling and I sometimes wish I went that way but it's pretty
intense, draining work... anyway Java gets rave reviews. When next next
release was posted, I sent out a note indicating where it was on our
server. "Still pretty buggy" they said.
Later I needed to do a technology presentation for my co-workers and my boss said
"Have you taken any classes lately?" "No" I said. "Well, research something
that interests you and present it to the group." he said. "How about the HotJava
Browser compared to Mosaic or Netscape?". "It's pretty late to ship... but
if it's gonna be a product we'd better know something about it" My manager
at this time was one of those rare individuals who feels a responsibility
to the company behind the paycheck. I figured that's why he was a manager.
A bit odd. Anyway... I started digging though the Java stuff... HTML documentation,
whitepapers, working code with sources (Tic-Tac-Toe, Hangman, Audio and Animation
Applets), a simple programming tutorial "Hello World" and some coding, documenting
tools. Then I read the licensing doc's and pulled over the actual source to the
whole thing (after filing in a form justifying my interest and accepting
some terms). I spend 5 days researching the capabilities and got more and more
excited. I put together my presentation just before the deadline (I never have
put together a presentation weeks before a deadline). If I did, I'd just
keep fixin' it until it was time.
Anyway on the big day I was the last presenter. I usually get put on the bill last and
since it's a technical audience this is not an honor. Three of my peers got up and
started to walk out saying "We understand HotJava, it's just the W--R-----
Browser with a funny new name and "Oak" is now "Java". We've got a 90 mile drive home
so I'm sure you'll understand..." "Just give me 5 minutes." I begged.
They sat down... grumbling.
So, I sold the programming angle for all it's worth. Write on a PC and run it
on a Mac or Sun and it's free for non-commercial use (those were the license terms then).
Another SE said, I hate writing code. I'm a database admin. I don't write software at home.
I buy software for home. And that code is supposed to be pretty buggy... I don't use
"alpha" products. Well...
Later, I met one of the Java Team at a internal demo event and
he explained that every time they had to do a demo, it made the final release slip
accordingly or they had to work weekends to stay on track. I gave him my e-mail address.
I'd be willing to help off-load for any bay area demo's that may come up. I showed
him my presentation. He pointed out some errors. So, I volunteered to
work a Sun Java Demo station booth for the Sun World announcement when they he e-mailed
a few weeks later. So the final product should ship 4 hours early or maybe 15 minutes since
they had about 16 programmers at that time.
I was scheduled to demo the then never before seen (by me or any other non-Java type)
NT Alpha version for 4 hours. The interest was very high and most of the on lookers
had already devoured the on-line doc's, they just wanted to see the NT performance
and verify that the same "binaries" were being used. Many started explaining the
miracle of Java to other viewers. I didn't get grilled to often for nitty gritty details.
"Will there be a Windows 3.11 port?" they'd ask. "I wouldn't touch a 3.11 port
for a threated application that needs to be secure... Would you?" I can really
tap dance when I'm cornered but eventually I was trapped by a marketing type
and was attempting to explain the internal security mechanisms of the applets
and of the alpha design. He either wasn't getting it or I was doing it right so
he asked "What's size of the virtual machine
code in on this Intel system?". I pulled an answer from my recollections of repeated readings
of the on-line documentation. "Oh, about 40KB I believe". From behind me a deep
Nordic voice snapped "That's not right.. It's larger than that." and I saw the rather
large, disheveled and exhausted looking programming "demi-god" Arthur Van Hoff
(that I recognized from the downloaded Jpeg image of the whole team and his photo
on the Tic-Tac-Toe Applet. He started walking away shaking his head.
I resisted the urge to tell him to "get the documentation fixed then" did I mention
that he's rather large and gets surley when he's hasn't slept for a few days and
someone takes wild guesses about his "work in progress"? Did I mention that I'm
not particularly big and I don't enjoy being criticized by gruff Nordic demi-giants,
both literally and industrially "demi-giant". Well, after reading dozens of Arthur's
e-mails I know I should have called out "Have Fun". He always signs off that way...
just after explaining some detailed clarifying technical point, like:
"I think you a bit confused here"
"You can't imposed strict class inheritance design in a finite-state parsing heuristic
with forward exception estimation and maintain the essential alignments of function
and balanced resource utilization."
"Have Fun"
Arthur
Argue with that logic, huh. Then go have some fun. I'm just glad he's on our side
Anyway, I felt pretty close to a "startup experience" that day. I told my wife that
Java was gonna be "really big". "How big?" she asked. "Huge..." I said.
"Will you get a raise?" she asked. "I always get a raise." I snapped. I should
have used Arthur's line on her, "Have Fun". She generally does, especially when
I point out my significance in history and "really big events".
Well. That NT box must have had a lotta RAM... I never even had to care about
the fact that it ran NT by the way. The interest was in the HotJava behavior. The fact
that I had NEVER used an NT system just indicated the platform irrelevance
of the whole technology.
That's what pulled me into the Java Dream. I could create something at home then pop it
on a floppy or a WWW server and absolutely forget about platform dependencies.
I bought Win 95 the week it shipped just to get Java at home. Hell, I almost
bought NT but I only have 8 MB of RAM, as I said.
Anyway, somebody needs to write a book. I'll buy it and show my wife. "Are you in
there?" she'll ask. "No... but it's pretty big thing, Java, just like I said... huge
actually" I'll say. "Not unlike your raise" she'll say.
Have Fun,
Dave McDorman
>
>I Agree. Will it be enough, though, to satisfy the performance requirements
>of the average real-world application?
>
>Jason Coombs
>jasonc@science.org
>-
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