6 ms·

Choosing Java and Dalvic was probably a mistake for Android.

by cft 14y ago

blinkingled 14y ago
Not buying Sun was the mistake. $7B is all that would've taken (less if they sold the os and hardware division) to make the computing world a better place.
- smrtinsert 14y ago
  7B is pocket change to them, completely agree. I was shocked to hear they let it pass iirc. I figured they were playing hardball and it just blew up in their face.
  - MichaelApproved 14y ago
    Or did they make the right decision? Just because they have the money doesn't mean they need to spend it. Did litigating cost them 7 billion? The legal win shows they made the right choice in not spending 7 billion on what they are allowed to use for "free".
- trust-me 14y ago
  IMHO you're over simplifying. Oracle was better positioned to capitalize on Sun assets, so they were likely to pay more than Google. Microsoft or Apple may have decided to bid to prevent Google from acquisition. Merging with a huge enterprise is always painful.
  - protomyth 14y ago
    I'm not so sure given the results. Google (with selling the hardware / chip division to Fujitsu) would have done pretty well given all the tech projects Sun had. If Apple had bid to prevent (patents I suppose), I wonder if ZFS would have finally been on OS X. Java would have been the truly odd man out in that acquisition. I could see Java being sold to IBM.
    - mitchty 14y ago
      zfs actually was on a few leopard betas. Not that it worked well mind you, it made Finder even more useless than before. But it did "work" for varying definitions of the word.
      - protomyth 14y ago
        Yeah, I was more thinking production ready default and integrated into the shipped programs (e.g. Disk Utility).
        mitchty 14y ago
        Oh I agree, what was there was nice too by the way. Shame it never made it though. At least we have dtrace!
  - bigiain 14y ago
    While you're obviously right (Oracle _did_ pay more that whatever Google offered (if anything), in retrospect perhaps blinkingled's assertion that $7B might have been a reasonable amount for Google to have offered seems at least arguable. In one sense perhaps you are oversimplifying - sure Oracle was in a better place to use some of Sun's assets, but Google is clearly now in a dangerous place having a competitor like Oracle owning major parts of technology Google's mobile strategy depends on. Whether that's seven billion dollars worth of danger I have no idea - but I suspect there are people at Google regretting the decision _not_ to buy Sun (or more specifically, buy Java and get all the rest of Su for free) back when they had the opportunity.
  - camus 14y ago
    Google is basically a java shop. Are you saying they are unable to capitalize of Sun assets ? they choosed java as Dalvik first class language , what more do you need to capitalize of Sun's asset. It is a mistake and google will pay a huge price in the future.
- pekk 14y ago
  Question: will this cost Google $7B?
- comex 14y ago
  Not necessarily. If the judgement that APIs are not copyrightable is upheld (which is a big if), the computing world will be a better place than it would be if Google had managed to avoid the question.
  - chii 14y ago
    the edge goes both ways - if it somehow (hopefully, now its false) judged that API's _are_ copyrightable, then what?
cageface 14y ago
I've thought this myself lately but what alternatives did they really have? The only other real alternatives are C++ and C#, which are both problematic for different reasons. I wouldn't mind seeing a new mobile OS build around Go but it's way too late for a change that fundamental for Android. For better or worse Java & Android are married now.
- fauigerzigerk 14y ago
  "what alternatives did they really have?" JavaScript
  - cageface 14y ago
    I really hope you're joking. No dynamic language is suitable for software engineering at that scale and particularly not one as badly flawed as JS.
    - fauigerzigerk 14y ago
      I'm not a huge fan of JavaScript (to say the least) but I'm not joking either. Most Android apps aren't exactly "software egineering at scale". Certainly no more so than a modern web app. The first Dalvik versions didn't even have a JIT, so performance apparently wasn't the main concern. They could have added optional static typing to their JavaScript VM as well. I think Google chose Java because many people know it and because the Java faction inside Google is powerful. But many people know JavaScript as well, and arguably the typical Java developer isn't exactly a UX guru. So JavaScript would have been a better fit for Android even though I (and you) don't like it.
      - cageface 14y ago
        Actually a lot of apps are every bit as complex as a typical desktop app. I'm not sure if you've done much app development but many of the apps I've worked on have been pretty large. Unless you propose writing the entire OS in JS then there's also a huge advantage in using the same language for core OS and APIs and for application development. In any case as some of the more modest Java replacements like Xtend and Kotlin mature I expect to see Java the language recede in importance for Android.
jsight 14y ago
Java might have been, but I am not sure about Dalvik. Without the Java language conversion, I doubt Oracle would have ever bothered to attack Dalvik. On the other hand, so far this case has been nothing but a boondoggle for Oracle. It seems that is unlikely to change at this point.
rdtsc 14y ago
If they had to redo it today, what could it be instead? * Javascript -- I hate the language, it has enough warts to make it unpalatable * Dart -- I can see it, that would be great, still kind of new though * Python -- I understand they could have done it, but it was a political decision not to (at least according to Guido's remark during one of the PyCon's), performance might not be up to par on some devices * Go -- too low level perhaps, but it would be cool
- cft 14y ago
  Go, C/C++, but in the ideal world- Python (they would have to very seriously tweak the interpreter)- imagine how easy app creation would have become with Python? They would have a huge advantage over iOS by lowering the entry thresholds for developers.
  - cageface 14y ago
    Python is neither fast enough or robust enough to use as the foundation for an OS. You need static typing and strong tooling both for performance and for correctness. Those that disagree with this need only point me to a successful counter-example.
    - justincormack 14y ago
      LuaJIT is a performance counterexample for dynamic typing, being around the same as Java.
      - PommeDeTerre 14y ago
        LuaJIT may make the performance of Lua better or even just acceptable in some cases, but it does nothing to help ensure correctness. Correctness is almost always more important than performance. It most cases it is useless to do something quickly, but to also be doing it incorrectly.
        justincormack 14y ago

Choosing Java and Dalvic was probably a mistake for Android.

by cft 14y ago

Choosing Java and Dalvic was probably a mistake for Android.

Not buying Sun was the mistake. $7B is all that would've taken (less if they sold the os and hardware division) to make the computing world a better place.

smrtinsert 14y ago
7B is pocket change to them, completely agree. I was shocked to hear they let it pass iirc. I figured they were playing hardball and it just blew up in their face.
- MichaelApproved 14y ago
  Or did they make the right decision? Just because they have the money doesn't mean they need to spend it. Did litigating cost them 7 billion? The legal win shows they made the right choice in not spending 7 billion on what they are allowed to use for "free".
trust-me 14y ago
IMHO you're over simplifying. Oracle was better positioned to capitalize on Sun assets, so they were likely to pay more than Google. Microsoft or Apple may have decided to bid to prevent Google from acquisition. Merging with a huge enterprise is always painful.
- protomyth 14y ago
  I'm not so sure given the results. Google (with selling the hardware / chip division to Fujitsu) would have done pretty well given all the tech projects Sun had. If Apple had bid to prevent (patents I suppose), I wonder if ZFS would have finally been on OS X. Java would have been the truly odd man out in that acquisition. I could see Java being sold to IBM.
  - mitchty 14y ago
    zfs actually was on a few leopard betas. Not that it worked well mind you, it made Finder even more useless than before. But it did "work" for varying definitions of the word.
    - protomyth 14y ago
      Yeah, I was more thinking production ready default and integrated into the shipped programs (e.g. Disk Utility).
      - mitchty 14y ago
        Oh I agree, what was there was nice too by the way. Shame it never made it though. At least we have dtrace!
- bigiain 14y ago
  While you're obviously right (Oracle _did_ pay more that whatever Google offered (if anything), in retrospect perhaps blinkingled's assertion that $7B might have been a reasonable amount for Google to have offered seems at least arguable. In one sense perhaps you are oversimplifying - sure Oracle was in a better place to use some of Sun's assets, but Google is clearly now in a dangerous place having a competitor like Oracle owning major parts of technology Google's mobile strategy depends on. Whether that's seven billion dollars worth of danger I have no idea - but I suspect there are people at Google regretting the decision _not_ to buy Sun (or more specifically, buy Java and get all the rest of Su for free) back when they had the opportunity.
- camus 14y ago
  Google is basically a java shop. Are you saying they are unable to capitalize of Sun assets ? they choosed java as Dalvik first class language , what more do you need to capitalize of Sun's asset. It is a mistake and google will pay a huge price in the future.
pekk 14y ago
Question: will this cost Google $7B?
comex 14y ago
Not necessarily. If the judgement that APIs are not copyrightable is upheld (which is a big if), the computing world will be a better place than it would be if Google had managed to avoid the question.
- chii 14y ago
  the edge goes both ways - if it somehow (hopefully, now its false) judged that API's _are_ copyrightable, then what?

cageface 14y ago

I've thought this myself lately but what alternatives did they really have? The only other real alternatives are C++ and C#, which are both problematic for different reasons. I wouldn't mind seeing a new mobile OS build around Go but it's way too late for a change that fundamental for Android. For better or worse Java & Android are married now.

fauigerzigerk 14y ago
"what alternatives did they really have?" JavaScript
- cageface 14y ago
  I really hope you're joking. No dynamic language is suitable for software engineering at that scale and particularly not one as badly flawed as JS.
  - fauigerzigerk 14y ago
    I'm not a huge fan of JavaScript (to say the least) but I'm not joking either. Most Android apps aren't exactly "software egineering at scale". Certainly no more so than a modern web app. The first Dalvik versions didn't even have a JIT, so performance apparently wasn't the main concern. They could have added optional static typing to their JavaScript VM as well. I think Google chose Java because many people know it and because the Java faction inside Google is powerful. But many people know JavaScript as well, and arguably the typical Java developer isn't exactly a UX guru. So JavaScript would have been a better fit for Android even though I (and you) don't like it.
    - cageface 14y ago
      Actually a lot of apps are every bit as complex as a typical desktop app. I'm not sure if you've done much app development but many of the apps I've worked on have been pretty large. Unless you propose writing the entire OS in JS then there's also a huge advantage in using the same language for core OS and APIs and for application development. In any case as some of the more modest Java replacements like Xtend and Kotlin mature I expect to see Java the language recede in importance for Android.

jsight 14y ago

Java might have been, but I am not sure about Dalvik. Without the Java language conversion, I doubt Oracle would have ever bothered to attack Dalvik. On the other hand, so far this case has been nothing but a boondoggle for Oracle. It seems that is unlikely to change at this point.

rdtsc 14y ago

If they had to redo it today, what could it be instead? * Javascript -- I hate the language, it has enough warts to make it unpalatable * Dart -- I can see it, that would be great, still kind of new though * Python -- I understand they could have done it, but it was a political decision not to (at least according to Guido's remark during one of the PyCon's), performance might not be up to par on some devices * Go -- too low level perhaps, but it would be cool

cft 14y ago
Go, C/C++, but in the ideal world- Python (they would have to very seriously tweak the interpreter)- imagine how easy app creation would have become with Python? They would have a huge advantage over iOS by lowering the entry thresholds for developers.
- cageface 14y ago
  Python is neither fast enough or robust enough to use as the foundation for an OS. You need static typing and strong tooling both for performance and for correctness. Those that disagree with this need only point me to a successful counter-example.
  - justincormack 14y ago
    LuaJIT is a performance counterexample for dynamic typing, being around the same as Java.
    - PommeDeTerre 14y ago
      LuaJIT may make the performance of Lua better or even just acceptable in some cases, but it does nothing to help ensure correctness. Correctness is almost always more important than performance. It most cases it is useless to do something quickly, but to also be doing it incorrectly.
      - justincormack 14y ago