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I did a few learning projects in GWT when it was new, in 2007. It was truly groundbreaking. Fast forward to 2022 and GWT is completely obsolete. Today, systems

I did a few learning projects in GWT when it was new, in 2007. It was truly groundbreaking. Fast forward to 2022 and GWT is completely obsolete. Today, systems like this compile to WASM. (IE, C# in the browser is done with WASM.) Furthermore, manipulating the DOM in code, as done in GWT, is extremely tedious and time-consuming compared to template-based approaches. GWT's live debugging leaves a lot to be desired. Finally: Google abandoned GWT development. When I looked at its site in 2020, it looked like a hobby project; or something maintained by a small group of developers who still had projects using it. Honestly: Don't be afraid to try a new language! In-browser development with C# (via Blazor) is really awesome, and coming from Java, it'll be an easy transition. (And it really is much, much better than GWT.)

zasdffaa 4y ago
I don't know. Learning a new language isn't to be taken lightly and while I sort-of like C# I'm constantly aware that it's MS's property and shit is going to change and break. Also it seems Blazor is by MS, so ditto twice. I do not trust MS not to screw anyone over. Caveat emptor. If you want to learn a new lang and still have java access, maybe look into scala. I really did like that but I don't know what state it's in now.
- gwbas1c 4y ago
  > while I sort-of like C# I'm constantly aware that it's MS's property and shit is going to change and break You can say the same about Sun. There's also the Mono project, which is kind of the analog of OpenJDK.
kaba0 4y ago
While the GUI frontend part in GWT is indeed mostly abandoned by Google, they still use the Closure compiler (which is the evolution of GWT in a way) very heavily in all of their flagship web applications. That way, most of the business logic is written in Java on every platform (backend, frontend with the aforementioned compiler (which produces crazy good output), android, and ios with a similar objc compiler), and the frontend can be native everywhere, which is imo the best tradeoff.

zasdffaa 4y ago

I don't know. Learning a new language isn't to be taken lightly and while I sort-of like C# I'm constantly aware that it's MS's property and shit is going to change and break. Also it seems Blazor is by MS, so ditto twice. I do not trust MS not to screw anyone over. Caveat emptor. If you want to learn a new lang and still have java access, maybe look into scala. I really did like that but I don't know what state it's in now.

gwbas1c 4y ago
> while I sort-of like C# I'm constantly aware that it's MS's property and shit is going to change and break You can say the same about Sun. There's also the Mono project, which is kind of the analog of OpenJDK.

kaba0 4y ago

While the GUI frontend part in GWT is indeed mostly abandoned by Google, they still use the Closure compiler (which is the evolution of GWT in a way) very heavily in all of their flagship web applications. That way, most of the business logic is written in Java on every platform (backend, frontend with the aforementioned compiler (which produces crazy good output), android, and ios with a similar objc compiler), and the frontend can be native everywhere, which is imo the best tradeoff.