Java 2 Platform Standard Edition (J2SE) software is the premier platform for rapidly developing and deploying secure, portable applications that run on server and desktop systems of many operating systems. Java allows you to play online games, chat with people around the world, calculate your mortgage interest, and view images in 3D.
Java SE 6 is the current major release of the Java SE platform, with full support from NetBeans IDE 5.5. Sun endeavors to foster the highest level of transparency and collaboration on the platform with the Java community through Project JDK 6, resulting in the following key features. Sun’s Java Multi-Platform Support, Training, and Certification can provide you the peace of mind to develop and deploy Java solutions with confidence.
Visit java.sun.com to download Java SE Runtime Environment
“Together with Oracle, we’ll drive the innovation pipeline to create compelling value to our customer base and the marketplace.” said Jonathan Schwartz, Sun’s CEO. Sun Microsystems was purchased by Oracle around one year ago. This purchase became either expanding opportunity for some developers; or it changed into predicament s for others developers.
For example in November, Apple® and Oracle announced the open source OpenJDK project for Mac OS® X. Later, IBM agreed to join on this project as well. “We are excited to welcome Apple as a significant contributor in the growing OpenJDK community,” said Hasan Rizvi, Oracle’s senior vice president of Development. Apple will be providing a 32-bit and 64-bit HotSpot-based Java virtual machine, class libraries, a networking stack and the foundation for a new graphical client. Oracle in return will provide Mac OS X with Java SE 7 and future version of Java to Apple.
However, the purchase of Sun Microsystems might not always be a plus for every company. For instance, Oracles sued Google for breaching the open source licenses. Google uses Java platform for development of their android mobile phone. Google claimed that, “We are disappointed Oracle has chosen to attack both Google and the open source Java community with this baseless lawsuit.”
Whether it is good or bad, there might be possible legality changes with many services that depend on open source Java in 2011.
The challenge of garbage collection is almost as old as Java itself. Java Virtual Machines (JVMs) store programs’ objects in a heap that is cleared from time to time to free up memory.
The process was inserted so that programmers did not have to manually program the need to free up allocated memory. It provides an automated, periodic sweep.
However, the process can slow apps down just when you don’t need them to drag as the application takes time out from normal execution. Historically, this problem was limited to real-time operations but can now show up in server farms running large web properties, where customers need instant gratification – such as in social networking, media or gaming.
As servers with hundreds of gigabytes of memory have become the norm, the tendency has been to tackle garbage collection by increasing the heap size. Terracota, an open source clustering specialist, argues that this simply makes the application pause even longer – creating a “serious impact” on performance.
Garbage collection in memory
Terracotta has customers who try to keep the garbage heaps of their big or growing apps small by putting them on small servers and partitioning using VMware.
Terracotta’s riposte is to shove garbage collection into memory. In-memory processing is used elsewhere in software to speed data processing and application performance. Terracotta says also brings performance-enhancing gains to the heap and garbage collection.
The company today announces the general availability of BigMemory for its Ehcache caching program. BigMemory can do memory management and bypasses Java’s own heap. It provides an off-heap in-memory store for up to 256GB of in-process, off-heap memory in a single JVM.
BigMemory is designed to stop unacceptable slow downs in Java apps that can happen during garbage collection, while also letting you scale Java applications without chopping the app into separate VM instances or continuing to run your apps on lots of “small” servers.
Terracotta told The Reg that one large beta in France has cut 25 instances of VMware to just two. Using BigMemory means another customer has reduced the amount of time taken to physically tune its application’s garbage collection from three months to three hours.
BigMemory is an add-on to Enterprise Ehcache, the enterprise caching product based on the Ehcache project whose IP and brains Terracotta bought in 2009. The project is used in about 70 per cent of Java caching. Enterprise Ehcache works with Hibernate, Spring, Tomcat, Oracle’s WebLogic and IBM’s WebSphere.
Java remains the most popular programming language. At least that’s the case if you follow the latest TIOBE index results which show Java remaining at the top spot. The latest chart is a big indication of the popularity of mobile app development, and the trends that have surrounded this branch of software over the last few months.
Android’s surge in popularity has surely been a contributing factor to Java’s continued dominance in the index. You’ll see that the main movement in the index has been Objective-C, which has jumped 2.35%, no doubt as a result of the update to Apple’s terms. Another side effect to this is that Javascript and Ruby have both dropped – both languages are popular for cross-compilation approaches to iPhone development.
