Here it is!
Java threatened?
From "grunky" <grunky@midwest.net>
Organization Midwest Internet
Date Mon, 15 Jul 1996 20:06:09 -0700
Newsgroups comp.lang.javascript
Message-ID <01bb72c3.bcb9c120$05479ece@default>
I found this artical in the August issue of Java World. I think that
Java, even though I like it will die at the hands of MS and its ActiveX.
I hope Sun and Netscape won't be run over.
What can kill Java?
The new programming language must now dodge
some serious land mines
Summary
Java is finding its way into browsers, operating systems, telephones, and
Internet appliances. While it sometimes seems to be taking over the
computing universe, Java can still fail. For Java to prevail, the
community must keep an attentive eye on potential Java killers.
By William Blundon
In the first two years of the Second World War, the allies found
themselves in retreat across a broad front. Most news was bad news, or
worse, as Britain rapidly found itself alone, facing the world's most
formidable military machine. The situation first began to reverse itself
in November 1942 in North Africa. Facing Irwin Rommel's beleaguered Afrika
Corps, Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery led a devastating series of
attacks against combined German and Italian armies; these have become
known as the Battle of El Alamein. The result was a decisive victory for
the allied armies, and a growing sense of confidence in Britain. Winston
Churchill brought home the meaning of this victory in a famous speech.
"Now we have not reached the end;" he said, "we have not even reached the
beginning of the end; but we have perhaps, reached the end of the
beginning."
In 1996, the momentum behind Java is formidable. It is impossible to read
an article in the technical press that does not describe another
commitment to Java, another new product based on the language, or another
customer success because of the environment. Despite this early success,
Java has not yet reached "the end of the beginning" and there are many
opportunities for it to fail, or at least fall short of its true
potential.
Java can be damaged by friend and foe alike. In particular, Sun
Microsystems, Microsoft, Intel, and the Unix computer vendors can all
significantly slow the adoption and limit the evolution of the language.
Some of these companies can do damage intentionally and for strategic
advantage; some can do so through ineptitude or miscalculation.
Sun Microsystems: make it up in volume
Traditionally, Sun has done an excellent job of using software as a loss
leader to sell computers. In the mid-1980s Sun jumped ahead of the other
workstation vendors in part by "owning" Berkeley Unix and providing free
access to its extensions like NFS. Licensing software at no charge became
a major point of differentiation for Sun, as it became known as the expert
Unix software and the definer of standards.
In the Internet world, distributing free software is a tactic employed by
most competitive companies. The prevalent theory is that to succeed in the
long term, a company must attempt to own a product or market segment by
establishing itself as a de facto standard as early as possible. Once
established, it should be easy to convert millions of users to paying
customers (at least in theory). While Sun has successfully used a variant
of this strategy, it has really never used free software as a way to sell
software. Sun's software revenues have always fallen short of its
technical prowess.
Java will help Sun sell lots of servers, but the company has yet to prove
that it can sell software as well as mainstream software companies do.
This creates a potential problem for Java. For it to win, there must be
one Java: one language definition, one virtual machine, and one process by
which the definition is enhanced or extended.
Sun is in the strange position of owning one of the world's hottest
technologies, but finding it difficult to exploit it to its full financial
potential. While Sun can license the JDK freely, it will be difficult for
it to license other Java-based products aggressively without threatening
other developers of Java products. A good example of this is the Java
Workshop, a set of browser-based tools that Sun is selling. The smart
strategic move was for Sun to give this product away for free for a long
period of time to establish itself as a player in development tools on
non-Sun platforms. But to do so threatens the markets of key Java
customers like Borland.
To win in the long term, Sun must become a successful software company. To
accomplish this, it must both own Java and let it go. The best strategy
for Sun is to spin out JavaSoft as a separate company and permit ownership
by other players, even Microsoft. Doing so will allow it to place the
future of Java in safe hands and set it free to compete with other Java
software companies. If Sun holds Java too closely, or conversely, allows
multiple variants to survive, it will kill the language.
Microsoft: adopt it, adapt it, own it and then kill it
Microsoft clearly agrees with Don Corleone. "Keep your friends close,"
said the Godfather, "but your enemies closer." Microsoft is an active but
reticent adherent to the Java religion. It's Visual J++ product
undoubtedly will be the de facto standard for Java developers on Windows,
and will provide a healthy revenue stream for the company. However, making
a little money on Java is not Microsoft's intent. The smart move is for
Microsoft to adopt Java while it must, and attempt to own the language
over time. There are several opportunities for the company to do so.
While Microsoft's Internet Explorer runs Java applets, it does so by
wrapping them and executing them as ActiveX components. This strategy
gives Microsoft an opportunity to meddle with (or enhance) the virtual
machine. Microsoft extensions, modifications, and options to either the
language or virtual machine may permit it to create the de facto standard
for both. The same is true with Visual J++. If Sun can continue to define
the language and virtual machine, it cannot hope to match Microsoft in
supplying a set of integral class libraries, APIs, and other interfaces
that a majority of developers will use. Technology is no match for market
share as a defining force in the software market. By being the market
leader in class libraries and APIs (even second-rate ones), Microsoft can
end up "owning" the Java world just as Sun does today.
If Microsoft ends up owning Java, watch out. It will maintain an option of
continuing to own it, or enhancing it to death.
Intel: the soul of a new (virtual) machine
In an attempt to rapidly codify a standard definition of both the language
and virtual machine, Sun has been quick to drop Java into silicon. Java on
a chip is a great opportunity for Sun to sell microprocessors and computer
hardware, as well as a good idea for the market overall. However, even in
the Java world, Sun is a third-tier chip vendor. For Java to win at the
silicon level, Intel must support it.
Intel sees advantages and disadvantages in supporting the Java chip. The
advantage is continuing to own the desktop of the future in the way Intel
does today. Supporting Java directly in a follow-on microprocessor or by
providing surround logic for its existing chips means that Intel can be
well-positioned regardless of the ultimate winner in the great Internet
software race. The disadvantage is supporting an architecture it doesn't
own.
Another important twist may be in the way Intel supports Java in silicon
-- if it does so at all. If it supports the virtual machine directly, Java
will not only execute rapidly, it will have the opportunity to dominate on
the desktop and in Internet appliances of the future. If Intel supports
Java by supporting the Microsoft interpreter in hardware, then it has the
opportunity to own the reference platform for Java in the same way as
Microsoft may in software: adopt it, adapt it, own it, and kill it. In a
world in which market share is everything, the temptation will be to
follow the Microsoft path, and this path will be difficult for Java.
Unix vendors: follow the leader or get out of the game
In the last several years, but before Java, Hewlett-Packard was taking
market share from Sun in the Unix workstation market. The SPARC
microprocessor fell behind in performance (or at least perception) as HP
began to close the gap in available applications software.
Similarly, Silicon Graphics and IBM established significant and
differentiated customer bases in workstations, while a multitude of
computer vendors used Unix to build significant server businesses. While
Java has changed the computing landscape, it has not changed the corporate
cultures of any of these companies. Unix companies would like to see
Microsoft trip and fall, but their cultures are based on placing land
mines in Sun's path. The Unix landscape is littered with an endless string
of consortia, alliances, and competing standards all designed to stop Sun.
Java is clearly viewed as a Microsoft killer in the Unix community, but it
is difficult to break old habits. Unless Sun spins out JavaSoft or recasts
it as an open consortium, one or more Unix vendors will find a way to
support Windows NT and ActiveX against Java. Digital has already built a
successful business by providing NT on its Alpha chips; Hewlett-Packard is
expected to do the same. In doing so, both will be mightily tempted to
support any Microsoft initiative that helps them and hurts Sun.
There is a tremendous strategic advantage for all Unix vendors in
supporting the Sun Java standards in both word and deed; but public
companies (in America at least) make decisions on quarterly fiscal
boundaries, and more than one will be inclined to choose short-term gain
over long-term advantage.
Conclusion
Java seems unstoppable, but it is not. There are a thousand pitfalls for
it to overcome to realize its full potential. Churchill declared the
battle at El Alamein as the "Hinge of Fate" on which the future of
democracy hung. The next year will provide a dozen hinges for Java.
<Picture: []>
About the author
William Blundon is president and COO of SourceCraft Inc.
(http://www.sourcecraft.com), a leading developer of intranet development
tools for Java and C++. His focus in the last seven years has been on
distributed-object environments and the Internet. He is a former director
of the Object Management Group. He can be reached at
william.blundon@javaworld.com.
***for some reason i couldn't make this whole article an "active link"
-Brian |
