Java played a pivotal role in popularizing object-oriented programming, because it was intentionaly designed to be simpler and safer than C++, and it was rapidl

Java played a pivotal role in popularizing object-oriented programming, because it was intentionaly designed to be simpler and safer than C++, and it was rapidly adopted as the primary teaching language for OOP in universities and colleges worldwide. OOP languages before Java were either niche (Simula, Smalltalk) or, in the case of C++, considered complex and less accessible for beginners. Java introduced millions of new programmers to OOP concepts, much more than any older language.