I've been working with Java since '98. I worked for Sun Micro, then Netscape, then the Sun-Netscape alliance, then iPlanet. I also worked for Oracle before I jo

I've been working with Java since '98. I worked for Sun Micro, then Netscape, then the Sun-Netscape alliance, then iPlanet. I also worked for Oracle before I joined Sun and would have lost a lot of money on the wager that Oracle would buy Sun one day. Java is not dying. The enterprise footprint alone will sustain the community (and developers) for years. And there is still plenty of innovation rolling out (SpringMVC is a good example) and I see some great angles for VMWare. That said, I finally broke down and started learning Ruby last week (after the Oracle litigation announcement). All I can say is...wow. In less than a week, I was pretty comfortable with RoR (OO and MVC felt right at home). Over the weekend, I built an app that I'm actually proud of and planning to share with the HN community for feedback this week. The community is friendly and I'm blown away by the ecosystem (Heroku is ridiculously great). Bottom-line: I built my home and fed my family with Java over the past decade and feel almost a sense of loyalty. I thought I was pretty fast in Java, but my productivity is up in RoR, even with the learning curve. I've loved every minute and have decided to build subsequent projects using RoR unless I run into some type of crazy roadblock along the way. The early adopters that embraced Java and pushed it before it was proven (.97b anyone?) are the same people that love trying new things now. That other options are so enjoyable is a bigger threat to Java than Oracle. Oracle might have just provided the nudge people needed to see for themselves.