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Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

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Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#151

Post by kitd »

saiya-jin wrote: post #138
hnlmorg wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Internet Explorer dominated for years. Microsoft killed Netscape not the other way around. Mozilla helped with the downfall of IE but it was really Google that put the final nail in the coffin. As for backend, Microsoft had some systems running IIS and Apache can run on Windows Server too, but UNIX and Linux was always the dominant platform for web hosting. Java didn’t change anything there. Javas impact on Windows c…

> Microsoft was taken to court for their own proprietary implementation of Java That's correct, they tried hard to fracture Java by making different implementation with their own classes and packages, runtime behaved a bit different too. While whole sales pitch for Java was to write and compile once, and run reliably anywhere (which was the case for every C/C++ app especially UI). Embrace part done, extinguish attemp…

(which was the case for every C/C++ app especially UI)

"wasn't" ?

My early career was blighted by having to write cross-platform C++ apps. At the time, Java was utter bliss in comparison.

Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#152

Post by steve1977 »

resonious wrote: post #30

> First, the excitement is overblown - at least from a business perspective. At the moment Java is expanding into a vacuum. It allows you to make cool web pages, and that is a very attractive thing for people. It gives programmers something new to learn, book people something new to sell books on, software tool companies a way to issue new development tools etc. This is a pretty interesting take, and it feels relevan…

> it's interesting to consider that people also profit off of these "fads" by selling books and tools, resulting in a sort of perpetual motion machine.

The machine is called IT.

Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#153

Post by blowski »

thejammahimself wrote: post #144
mrblampo wrote: post #132

This was super interesting, and it would seem Bill Gates absolutely predicted the effect that not Java, but ultimately interactive web apps in a broad sense would come to have by making it less important to have one operating system or another. Interesting that the reply mostly implied that there wasn't much reason to worry, and that the future and dominance of web apps was still uncertain. But we are reading this em…

In the reply though he said: > Pundits always say that this is going to kill the old businesses - eventually that happens but not anywhere near as soon as they say. So to me maybe he was implying that he did think that web apps would eventually take over, just not at a rapid speed.

Perhaps Microsoft's internet strategy of the late 90s changed the trajectory, just as they intended after seeing the impending doom.

Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#154

Post by peoplefromibiza »

saiya-jin wrote: post #138
hnlmorg wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Internet Explorer dominated for years. Microsoft killed Netscape not the other way around. Mozilla helped with the downfall of IE but it was really Google that put the final nail in the coffin. As for backend, Microsoft had some systems running IIS and Apache can run on Windows Server too, but UNIX and Linux was always the dominant platform for web hosting. Java didn’t change anything there. Javas impact on Windows c…

> Microsoft was taken to court for their own proprietary implementation of Java That's correct, they tried hard to fracture Java by making different implementation with their own classes and packages, runtime behaved a bit different too. While whole sales pitch for Java was to write and compile once, and run reliably anywhere (which was the case for every C/C++ app especially UI). Embrace part done, extinguish attemp…

> While whole sales pitch for Java was to write and compile once, and run reliably anywhere

which was never true, BTW

There are few things in the story that are simply corporations VS corporations and not good vs evil.

Sun wanted to completely control Java and they sued MS for not completely adhering to the standard they imposed. It wasn't simply a different implementation, it was a Windows only implementation, the fastest Java implementation on Windows plus some Windows only extension.

Which, honestly, wasn't that bad, considered that Java applications on Windows started to be a viable option almost 10 years later. Those who remember the first editions of Eclipse know what I mean. Many java programs were tied to specific OS implementations anyway, especially UI, Swing was always quite out of place on every platform.

Anyway, long story short, Sun sued MS for not respecting their standard, but then Sun almost killed Java because the development stagnated for a very long time, features were not coming, bugs weren't being resolved and they mostly made a big ball of corporate ready mud.

Their inability to handle the success made .Net a much more viable platform on Windows first and *nix much later, which otherwise would not exist.

Visual J++ was probably the best Java IDE at the time, probably second only to IBM Visual Age Java for OS/2, that was born for SmallTalk and had a lot of the SmallTalk vibes.

Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#155

Post by Beltalowda »

un_ess wrote: post #129
Beltalowda wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which Java engine you wanted your browser to use and Microsoft Java (or whatever it was called) It was called JScript. It was released after JavaScript. I am a peaceful man; never been in a fight with anybody, and oppose the death penalty. The exception is that I think all the people responsible for this clusterfuck of names should be shot.

jscript was JavaScript engine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JScript J++ was a 'clone' of Java https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_J%2B%2B . Sun sued Microsoft, https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/sun-microsoft-settle... and that's how .Net was born ( with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_J_Sharp to ensure transition)

Welp, it seems I misremembered how it all fitted together.

It was a stressful time to be a non-MS user back then, so I blame Post-Microsoft-Stress-Disorder.

Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#156

Post by prmoustache »

mccorrinall wrote: post #44
nostromo wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a Silicon Valley pro-tip: spelling and grammatical mistakes are signs that you’re super busy or too rich to care. There’s a few famous VCs that are apparently too busy to ever capitalize a letter... Too busy to shift!

Or maybe they write on an iphone. I had to turn auto capitalization off because it would capitalize emoticons after a full stop: turning xD into Xd

How does it prevent one to put caps manually? I too have disabled mose auto-things on my smartphone yet I use caps. It is not a technical proble, it is about decency and respect.

Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#158

Post by bravura »

I am fascinated no one has commented on the last point of Myhrvolds reply, which was prescient and seemingly ignored. It was almost like a playbook for what MacOS did.

The tldr:

We must not lose Windows on Desktop. To do so:

1) have the best audio and video tools and multimedia experience

2) we should be bug-free and boot fast

3) we should solve desktop storage with transparent cloud storage

It’s funny this omen explains exactly one way they took their ears off the ball and lost the desktop, their core business. This email wasn’t just about the web as an os, but also the end user desktop experience.

Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#159

Post by kaba0 »

icelancer wrote: post #142
Beltalowda wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question is whether an omnidominant platform like Microsoft's would have arisen in the first place. While the current Android/Apple situation isn't ideal, it's certainly better than only one of the two. I don't think it's a forgone conclusion that a "Microsoft-esque" monopoly would have happened.

For as bad as Microsoft was/is, imagine if Oracle filled that role.

For whatever it worths, oracle has been spectacularly and surprisingly good at shepherding Java since the takeover, they held onto almost the whole core team from Sun (which is not a common thing with takeovers) and the platform is advancing faster then ever (and not in a haphazard way).

Re: Bill Gates: I'm literally losing sleep over Java (1996)

#160

Post by kaba0 »

steve1977 wrote: post #149
jbverschoor wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a tombstone of Gates during hackers in progress (hip97) iirc. Shows you how much he and windows was loved. Today’s microsoft is forced to play nice.

> Today’s microsoft is forced to play nice. And looking at the success of Visual Studio Code and GitHub, people actually fall for it.

Every big enough company is a paperclip optimizer. So just look at the incentives.

It turns out that playing good citizen and profiting off an easy to use cloud is better business today than desktop is.

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