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Comment by oftenwrong | Hacker News Reader

Java is poor choice as a language for teaching programming. There are simply too many irrelevant bits that will get in the way of learning.

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I think the opposite actually.

Python, JS and C/c++ are full of idiosyncrasies.

Java allows students to quickly get up and running and focus on the 'CS'.

That said, Python might be more practical for anything applied in school.

I don't that find Java as a language has fewer idiosyncrasies (perfect term btw). For example, the many modifiers: public, private, "package-private", protected, default, abstract, static, final, volatile, synchronized, etc. How much of that is relevant to a fledgling programmer?

If you extend your consideration to build systems and other tooling, it's easy to see that students have a lot to overcome with Java as an intro language.

I think purpose-built languages like the HtDP languages or Logo are better choices. Students can get started with zero faff, learn the essential concepts, and move on.

Java is a fine choice for higher level courses, with students that are already capable programmers.

I don't think concepts such as public/private/abstract are idiosyncratic because scoping and non-instantiable entities are common in programming.

Yes - 'Logo' is a good choice for the most entry-level users, maybe for high schoolers who are taking CS as a 'required' part of the curriculum, but anything beyond that Java is fine.

I think Generics, Java9++ 'Modules', jar files and class files might be the idiosyncrasies to worry about.

That said, it's weird that in 2021 we don't have a universally 'basic' programming language that is essentially the 'vanilla' of programming.

Somewhere inside JS/Python/TS/Java/Dart I think is that 'basic vanilla' imperative language I think.

Schools use it because it used to be the best way to get a job. Not anymore.

> Used to be the best way to get a job

Java is the most in-demand technology in my home country, Estonia. Java also has around 800 open positions at any given time where I live now (Buenos Aires, Argentina). In fact, pretty much everywhere I've looked, Java is consistently one of the best ways to get a job simply because it has the most jobs available.

HN favourites like Go and Rust? I haven't yet found a city in Europe that would have more than 10 job offerings for either of them.

Go/Rust will get you hired in Silicon Valley working on "cool" teams. I believe a bunch of AWS teams are deep diving into Rust, and not to mention the hundreds of startups working in Go/Rust.

However, the sausage is still made Java. Amazon, Google, and Apple are, as far as a I know, primarily Java shops. It's just no one ever starts a blog with "Here's something cool I did in Java".

Ah yes, I keep forgetting that HN folk are American-centric and often either do not know or forget that the vast majority of developers do not actually live there, or work for FAANG.

Outside of USA, a little digging I did via Glassdoor:

Buenos Aires, Argentina: - Rust: ~5 jobs - Go: ~3 jobs - Java: ~800 jobs

Lisbon, Portugal: - Rust: ~6 jobs - Go: ~30 jobs - Java: ~278 jobs

Barcelona, Spain: - Rust: ~1 job - Go: ~50 jobs - Java: ~751 jobs

These are just places I've lived at and while I can see Go slowly becoming a thing, Rust is still half a decade away from anything tangible for the real world I would say. So if anyone asks me what should they become an expert in for the next 10 years, I would not hesitate to say Java.

Yeah, I've been on HN for a decade now (back when Ruby was the new hotness), and I remember looking through the engineering jobs in Ireland and almost entirely Java and C#.

Additionally, pretty much all the distributed data processing tools run on the JVM, which is a big deal if that's what you do for a living.

Not just American-centric, but "Silicon Valley working on "cool" teams"-centric. Across all jobs in the US, Go and Rust are still a tiny share.

Try London.

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