An experience on the outside (my awakening to Javascript).

I am now 3 1/2 months into my third stay at Sun. After my first stay, I was gone for 8 years. This past time I was gone for 3 1/2 years. What drew me back to Sun for a second stint about 11 years ago was Ken Arnold calling me up and telling me about this project called OAK that they needed some consultants for on the east coast.

 
By the time I completed the interview process it became clear that OAK was Java and that I was being given a huge opportunity.

More about those wonderful early days of Java and why I returned to Sun this time in a different post.

After several years at Sun I turned into a manager. I had a great time leading all sorts of efforts and learning great things from many managers at Sun. Mostly what I managed were efforts around the Java platform.

After 8 years at Sun, evangelizing and advancing the Java Platform I was presented by a Boston area pre-IPO company to actually lead the development of a J2EE application.

Couldn't resist.. So off I went to my pre-IPO company to put my experience with J2EE, Java and development management to the test. When I arrived at this company my foundation of all things Java was rocked to the core. I had to re-think a lot of what I had preached and learned.

At this company in 2003, I was presented with J2EE Web Application that had an amazing rich client experience. It had a Microsoft project interface that ran in a browser. What made it amazing was that you could change task dates and right there in your browser, the rest of the dependent dates would change instantaneously. In addition, the gant chart would update. I could assign task to a list of users on the project and update the list almost instantly. I was wondering how is this possible??? Doesn't this all need to be communicated back to the server to for calculations to be processed correctly? How can that be occurring so quickly. It was possible because we had a world class Javascript Guru who was the product interface designer.

I said to myself this is not how you do a J2EE application!!! However, all our users loved it. The product was extremely usable and customer couldn't stop gawking at it. I loved giving demos of it. But...but...where is the J2EE blueprint for this, what book tells you to develop these sorts of rich clients for Web Apps. via Javascript. Myself and the other Java bigots frequently argued with our Web GUI Guru:

-This won't sacale, this work won't work!

-How are we going internationalize this?

-Javascript is unmaintainable!!

-We are screwed, we have a mess on our hands.

Well, the product did scale, we did internationalize it, we weren't screwed and we had a great product not a mess. I even wrote about 1000 lines of Javascript at one point. What a pleasure, what a great client side compliment to Java.

Well roughly 3 1/2 years later, Javascript and AJAX are all the rage in developing the next round of J2EE applications and are a big part of the Web 2.0 craze. I have since taken this Javascript Guru out to lunch to say you were right.

Upon returning to Sun I was happy to find some very interesting Java / Javascript technologies.

Project Phobos allows for Server Side Javascript which allows you to take full advantage of the Java / Java EE patform.

Project jMaki which provides a great framework for creating Java / Javascript applications.

Great additions to the Glassfish effort. 

I believe these projects are only the beginning though. We are going to see more and more Java / Javascript frameworks start appearing in the Open Source world as well as in standards such as Java and Java EE.

Javascript has been a largely untapped resource for creating great Web Applications over the past 5 years. However, that is the case no more. Looking forward to seeing Java and Javascript grow together going forward.

I know many people have all ready concluded what I have shared above. However, for those of you who hadn't, I hope you find this blog post useful.

Posted at 03:57PM Mar 28, 2007 by tjkincaid in Software Industry Trends  |  Comments[1]