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Java was influenced by Objective-C. First-hand evidence: http://cs.gmu.edu/~sean/stuff/java-objc.html http://cs.gmu.edu/~sean/stuff/java-objc.html As it turns
by jrajav 14y ago
Java was influenced by Objective-C. First-hand evidence: http://cs.gmu.edu/~sean/stuff/java-objc.html http://cs.gmu.edu/~sean/stuff/java-objc.html
As it turns out, Sean and Tom are both absolutely correct. Usually, this kind of urban legend stuff turns out to be completely inaccurate, but in this case, they are right on. When I left Sun to go to NeXT, I thought Objective-C was the coolest thing since sliced bread, and I hated C++. So, naturally when I stayed to start the (eventually) Java project, Obj-C had a big influence. James Gosling, being much older than I was, he had lots of experience with SmallTalk and Simula68, which we also borrowed from liberally.
- Intermernet 14y agoThanks for the link! This is why I love HN... I learn something within 10 minutes of querying. (By the way, I'll accept that if Java was inspired by Obj-C, then C# was, by proxy) As I said, I love Obj-C, I just heard nothing of it's inspirational nature in the Java (or C#) release days, despite learning about it somewhere between those two dates. I type corrected!
- chc 14y agoWell, nobody's going to tout "Our language was inspired by this weird, unpopular little thing that lost hard to C++" in their marketing materials, which was pretty much the perception of Objective-C among the few who knew about it at the time. Remember, in those days, C++ was king — it was basically "the programming language for grown-ups" in a lot of people's minds — so Sun wanted to encourage that association above all others, even if it wasn't really where the designers' heart lay.
- huxley 14y agoHere's a longer and more detailed essay Patrick wrote about Java's history: http://www.blinkenlights.com/classiccmp/javaorigin.html http://www.blinkenlights.com/classiccmp/javaorigin.html