CodeGuru Blog - Programming - Page 9

"It is dangerous to depend on C#, so we need to discourage its use."

While last month was Microsoft and Tech Ed, this month is Sun and JavaOne. While last month Microsoft didn't have much to say at TechEd, it seems that there is a little bit of developer news at JavaOne. Of course, some of the key pieces of news at JavaOne were the release of JavaFX 1.2 and the first public preview of JavaFX TV. Also coming from Java in the future are a visual designer for creating JavaFX applications. This was previewed at JavaOne today. Also released was JavaSE 6 Update 14. The big new feature in SE seems to be the "G1" Garbage Collector. Of course support for Windows 7 and IE 8 are also added. What is a keynote without a few statistics to toss around. Sun indicated that there are 6.5 million Java developers world-wide. The Java platform is on more than 800 million desktop computers. It is on over 7 billion internet-connected devices. It is on 90 percent of desktop and laptop computers. It is on 85% of mobile devices. It is in TVs. Java is out there. One of the editors on my team is attending JavaOne in San Francisco. Glen Kunene was at the keynote and wrote some of his thoughts in his blog entry, Ellison Hints at Oracle's Java Priorities: JavaFX-based OpenOffice Apps and Mobile Devices. Glen stated that in the keynote, Larry Ellison of Oracle challenged Sun's OpenOffice and JavaFX groups to innovate. Ellison also wondered out loud why Sun/Oracle couldn't produce mobile devices based on the JavaFX platform.

Microsoft is cranking out Silverlight and trying to get to the "magical" third version that seems to be a turning point in adoption for many of their products. Today I was invited to a launch event for Silverlight 3 and Expression Studio 3 that is taking place on July 10th. Seems like a launch party wouldn't be much of a party if the products weren't actually launching then. As such, for those that recently asked when Silverlight 3 was going to be available, I believe there is now a date you can mark on your calendar!

One of the sessions I attended at Tech Ed 2009 was on developing for mobile devices presented by Nick Landry. It was an interesting session. The most memorable quote from the session was:

If you listened to many of the discussions in the hallways of the LA Convention center during TechEd 2009, you quickly realize that many of the conversations are not on the typical buzz of newly released technologies or cool new technical insights learned in sessions. Rather, the discussions are on trivial things such as the lack of snacks and the number of attendees. Generally the buzz at a Tech Ed, or a other large Microsoft show, is on the cool new announcements or on what is happening with technologies.

At PDC last November, there were lots of Surface machines around the LA Convention Center. For TechEd 2009, there aren't Surface devices all over, but there are a few. The Microsoft Surface is releasing a Service Pack 1 (SP1) update to current Microsoft Surface customers and partners which includes: