More on Java 6 ...

December 12, 2006 Data Platform

Danny Coward does a great job of capturing everything that comprises the Java 6 and highlighting the key features. Rick Ross gives his established and authoritative perspective on the release in his posting on JavaLobby; he is also able to unpeel some of the less publicized features that allows your to attach a variety of performance and monitoring processes without re-building a debug of your application... very cool. Later this evening, I'll have some time to look at the response to Java 6 in the Microsoft discussion groups; I expect interoperability to be a major theme, and it should be interesting to see how the .NET community are digesting this having enjoyed a recent platform upgrade of their own. Looking at both the recent releases of the .NET Framework 3.0 and Java 6, one question that inevitably gets the chattering masses going is when a wholesale migration might occur. Sigh. This is a well worn question and frankly somewhat of a red herring. Whether or not people jump to the a new development platform immediately, adopting a new platform could be fraught with unforeseen pitfalls. While it is nice to consider the bells and whistles that come with these releases, I'd recommend a more pragmatic approach: look at your project needs, current and future, weigh the advantages and risk and make sure you do what's best for your application and/or business.

Jonathan Bruce