Newsletter sign-up

View all newsletters

Sign up for our technology specific newsletters.

Enterprise Java

Email Address:

Java's secret weapon

Revisiting the Jini vision

By Frank Sommers, JavaWorld.com, 08/16/02

A recent New York Times article ("Unfazed by Defectors, Sun's Chief Charts Next Era," John Markoff (May 3, 2002)) asked Sun Microsystems Chairman and CEO Scott McNealy about the company's plans to increase its software offerings' prominence. Sun has lately reorganized its software operations under one umbrella, which now includes its Java division. Far from becoming a pure software company, said McNealy, Sun's strategy is to sell "metal-wrapped or plastic-wrapped software"—software and hardware combinations that together present a more attractive solution than one would without the other.

Sun's business strategy should worry any Java developer: Sun is the only major technology company entirely dedicated to the Java platform. While firms such as IBM, HP, Oracle, or Motorola, have significantly contributed to the Java platform, they all have other chestnuts in the fire. With Microsoft's promotion of the .Net framework—in effect, a paraphrase of key Java features—Sun's successful execution of its strategy holds increasing importance for Java's long-term future. In this article, I focus on how Sun leverages Jini, and why Jini might be a secret weapon in ensuring Java's viability in the coming years.

At the heart of Sun's announcement lies a desire to forge closer ties between its hardware and software offerings. In other words, Sun portends to offer, as Sun Fellow and Chief Engineer Rob Gingell says, "systems of computing." Those systems, in turn, might be realized either in hardware or software, or both. The distinction between hardware and software becomes an implementation issue and might not even be visible to system users. (Gingell discusses systems of computing and more in "Jini's Relevance Emerges, Part 1.")

In one of the first articles describing Jini in 1998, Jim Waldo, Jini's chief architect, remarked: "One of the keys behind the Jini system is that we have tried to erase the distinction between hardware and software." If Sun is to create a more coherent offering of systems of computing, Jini, a technology originated at Sun, should play a crucial role in that process.

However, Sun has received much criticism recently from Java developers over its seeming lack of support for Jini. The 2002 JavaOne Conference, while featuring numerous Jini-related sessions, gave center stage to XML-based Web services. Informal conversations during JavaOne revealed that seasoned Java programmers view Sun's promotion of XML-based Web services as a setback. These developers believe that, while XML has a place in Java, Jini accomplishes the software-as-services vision much better. Some claim that Sun is admitting that Jini failed to catch on in the marketplace and is back-pedaling on the original Jini vision.

Sun cofounder Bill Joy expounded that vision in his presentation at the first Jini Community Summit in Aspen, Colorado in May 1999. Bill Venners summarized part of Joy's speech in "The Jini Vision," (JavaWorld, August 1999):

...as Joy put it, the only kinds of applications desktop computers are really suited for are spreadsheets and word processors. But, as he pointed out, most people don't do word processing or spreadsheets. "Web and email are what people care about when they turn the machine on," he said. As a result, Joy claimed, "Many people would prefer a simple machine that is more communications-oriented."

During his speech, Joy echoed earlier visions of the "invisible computer," or ubiquitous computing, a term coined in the late 1980s by Mark Weiser, then head of Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC). Ubiquitous computing places information in the center of our computing world, in contrast to the devices that let us access that information. Computers in that world are embedded everywhere. Receding into the background, they make us unaware of their presence, allowing seamless interaction between the machine world and the human world. (See Resources for more on ubiquitous computing).

 

Improve efficiency with Visual Studio(r) 2010 Beta 2. - Microsoft

About Us | Advertise | Contact Us | Terms of Service/Privacy

Copyright, 2006-2008 Network World, Inc. All rights reserved.