Is Computer Science fading to Computer Fashion

The debate returns on whether or not Java is cool or not. In today's Weblogs, Brett McLaughlin complains that "there's just something sort of boring about the Java space right now. Don't get me wrong--it's still my language of choice. It's still what I go for when I need something done, and I still have something like 3 or 4 Java books for every one of my other programming language books. But... it's not sexy anymore. It's like that hot girl in high school you knew, and then ran into the other day at Kroger, and thought... "Wow. What happened? I mean, she's still good-looking, but not like I remember!" Probably a sort of poor analogy, but it's the best one I've got."

The talkback already includes retorts that your programming language doesn't need to be cool, that 1.5 is more exciting than 1.4 was, and the question " Could it be that people concerned with "coolness" as a programming tool attribute merely have short attention spans?" Brett ends his post with "Java a fad? Nope. But it sort of feels like it right now. And--really--who wants to be the last kid on the block still playing hula hoop?"

The JXTA kitchen is coming up soon. James Todd tells you how you can attend this free event for JXTA application developers.

Are you lazy if you implement logging? Scott Elsworth says Trust the logger in his response to Marcus Baker's assertion that "if there really is a chance of error at that point then we should fix the probable root cause."

In Also in Java Today , Brian Marrick has posted the second chapter of Driving Software Projects with Examples. He argues that conversation is key saying "the main way that programmers learn what the product owner wants is through conversation. The main way the programmers learn what each other knows is also through conversation." In this chapter he begins to explore how using examples differs from using requirements.

ONJava recently featured an excerpt from Enterprise JavaBeans, 4th Edition by Bill Burke, Richard Monson-Haefel, and Sacha Labourey. In Developing Your First Enterprise Beans, Part 1, the authors walk through defining an EJB's interfaces and implementation class as well as creating the deployment descriptor. They also show how to jar up the file, build its needed database table, and deploy the EJB.

In Projects and Communities , The Mac Java Community reports that Apple made the Java 1.4.2 Update 2, available via Software Update to provide "improved behavior for applets in Safari, and increased stability for desktop Java applications. "

From the Jini Community home page, the Computerworld article Have Jini, Will Travel describes how Orbitz was able to build their multi-product, multi-vendor travel system on commodity PC's by employing Jini.

In today's Forums, Cajo explains that " By forking, I do not mean to create a new language; rather to allow Java to grow in functionality via a more competitive, developer-driven process."

In today's java.net News Headlines :

• Apple: Java 1.4.2 Update 2
• Eclipse 3.0.1
• HiveMind 1.0 Final
• Blitz JavaSpaces 0.92/2.18
• Eclipse Visual Editor 1.0
• Azureus Developers Interview
• JFormula 2.8
• Anti-Spam Group Calls It Quits

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