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Comment by javaistheworst | Hacker News Reader

No really, Java the language is bad. Terrible in fact.

The fact I need an IDE to make it workable (just) highlights this point. J2EE was terrible too, because it showed where things can go, if you let the Java astronaut architects lead.

Some of my most profitable projects were helping to rescue systems by migrating to to an alternative language on the JVM, or off it completely.

The worst part is the damage Java inflicted upon a generation of developers.

I have a problem, I think I will use Java, and Eclipse, and Maven, and all the rest. Now I have twenty thousand problems!

Edit - if you disagree, then say so. Bit spineless to downvote without a valid point to back it up!

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Speaking of spineless, did you really need a throwaway just to say Java sucks?

As HN has grown it has attracted a more vocal contingent of Java developers. It's getting progressively harder to criticize the language without somebody shouting you down.

It seems the anti-Java ones are the more vocal ones most of the time. You see the anti-Java posts all the times.

Those of us who are recovering Java programmers might say there's a good reason for that. :-)

That doesn't make you right, it just makes you noisy

Didn't think I was being that noisy about it, but to each their own. Enjoy your design patterns! :-D

Are you insecure about your new found favorite language that you have to bash the old one that you didn't have much success with to justify your new choice? If you are really happy with your new favorite language, great. Do good work with it and move on. No need to keep smearing the old one.

Heh, no. Your comment didn't seem rhetorical so I was just providing an explanation for the phenomenon you've observed. However, we do engage in much spirited discussion throughout the software world about the relative merits of various languages and their features. There's no getting away from it, and Java's gonna get beat on until the end of time. Hope you don't take it personally.

None taken. If those frequent "spirited discussion" soothed your ego, by all means increase the weekly Java bashing. Meanwhile we just keep making software with it.

It's not about ego, it's about taste. Specifically the tastes of the majority of HN.

Sure, lots of software gets written in Java. And (less so) Cobol and Fortran. Every sensitive Java (and PHP, etc) user who is on HN and feels compelled to respond to every slight has to understand, though:

HN was founded by the guy who wrote Beating the Averages[0].

We're in PG's house. And he never liked Java.

So if Java fans come here with a chip on their shoulder about it and constantly take the bait and get into flamewars about how solid and adequate their language is, they should remember what forum they're in. Not that opinions in the forum can't be changed, but why bother when there's plenty of Java love out there elsewhere?

[0] http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html

So it's basically herd mentality with reinforced in-group cliche. Just because PG started HN, we all have to toe the party line to bash Java? If you think PG cared about everyone here has to agree and follow his opinion, you paint him a very shallow man.

And I think he's naive in that blog in using single language as a criteria to evaluate developers, but there's another story.

No, I'm just saying that like attracts like. If PG starts anything involving programmers, a lot of them are going to share a number of his opinions on the topic, because they self-select that way. So HN is naturally going to be dominated by those who dislike Java.

You can keep responding to that dislike, but on HN, given its natural audience, staking out much of a pro-Java position is doomed to futility.

And all throughout the land, the name "Viaweb" is on everyone's lips, synonymous with e-commerce, rather than the Blub technology also-rans at Amazon and eBay.

I have created a new account, but I don't recall mentioning it was a throwaway - sounds like someone has a bad case of the assumptions!

It's a trolling account.

So anyone who posts anything critical about Java the language is now a troll? Must be fun in your world!

No, just your name is telling. Must be sad in your world.

"if you disagree, then say so. Bit spineless to downvote without a valid point to back it up!"

I down-voted you just now because you do not make any specific points or claims about Java to disagree with, beyond "bad" and "terrible".

I don't need an IDE to write Scala (or Java I'm sure), but I certainly feel more productive not having to bother with memorizing package structures.

Working outside of Rails, I've found there's actually a fair amount of that in Ruby. And auto-require like functionality it helpful, with little to no downsides.

The same is true of IntelliJ IMO. Some developers prefer Sublime. I find code written in Sublime to be consistently messier, with more of a "this person just kept writing code until they got something that compiled" feel. Instead of having the ability to explore methods at your fingertips just an "arrow down" or ALT+SPACE or CTRL+J or CMD+B away, they use a map and filter where they probably wanted a collect.

>The fact I need an IDE to make it workable (just) highlights this point. J2EE was terrible too, because it showed where things can go, if you let the Java astronaut architects lead.

IMO you could say the same thing about C# and VS as well. Using tools that require as much work from the developer as the developer requires from the tools has gotten way out of hand. Delphi turned this sorry state of affairs into an art form.

> IMO you could say the same thing about C# and VS as well.

Or, for that matter, C++. You can write C++ in Vim, but I sure wouldn't. Especially with clang-driven features in Xcode being so helpful.

You can use clang in vim. https://github.com/Valloric/YouCompleteMe

I'm well aware. The folks who write Xcode have spent a significantly greater amount of time making their code completion put exactly what I want at my fingertips at exactly the right time.

The difference is significant.

I don't necessarily disagree, but that's likely not the reason your being downvoted. Your tone is incendiary and the comment is devoid of content. Claiming different parts of Java are bad without reason doesn't have any more substance than simply saying Java is bad.

Did you need to rescue the systems because Java couldn't do the job? Or because it had 500 different(many poor) developers in the code? My guess is the latter...but I don't know your projects.

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