[clug] Why isn't Java popular on the Linux Desktop? [SEC=PERSONAL]

[Bob Edwards]

Hugh Fisher wrote:
> Francis Markham wrote:
>> Actually, OpenOffice.org isn't a good datapoint for this.
>> OpenOffice.Org is based on the StarOffice code-base.  The integrated
>> StarOffice suite, written in C++, was created in 1994 when Java was
>> still called Oak and not publicly available.  Sun purchased StarOffice
>> in 1999, apparently because it was cheaper for them to purchase the
>> rights to StarOffice and its developers than it was to license MS
>> Office for internal use at Sun.  In any case, much of the C++ code
>> base was open sourced and became OO.org, and has seemingly remained a
>> relatively low priority for Sun ever since.  Re-writing the whole
>> office suite in Java would be a monumental waste of already scarce
>> resources.
> 
> IIRC, in the late 90s when the Java hype was in full swing
> Netscape announced they were going to rewrite Navigator in
> Java, and Corel announced they were going to rewrite their
> application suite in Java, including WordPerfect. Neither
> project ever finished, or even got to beta.
> 
> Java the language and Java the virtual machine are useful
> for education and research, and the Java web SDK seems to
> be useful for servers. As a development tool for end-user
> applications - desktop or web - Java has crashed and
> burned.
> 
> My suggestion is that the attempt at cross platform lowest
> common denominator design played a big part. Mac owners
> want apps that look like othe Mac apps and take advantage
> of MacOS capabilities such as QuickTime; MS Windows owners
> want apps that know about COM; Linux owners want apps that
> know about DBUS/Gstreamer/etc. Java apps ended up pleasing
> nobody.
> 
>     cheers,
>     Hugh
> 

Apparently, Google Wave is written in Java, both client (desktop)
and server ends. Don't know if that is particularly relevant to
this discussion, though.

I completely agree with Hugh's synopsis of the situation with
respect to the different environments/features that each O/S
brings to the desktop and the challenge for a language like
Java to seemlessly integrate these features across all platforms.

Cheers,

Bob Edwards.