The battle for the hearts and minds of developers is heating up, with .NET starting to compete fiercely with Java. The war is being waged mostly inside corporations -- department by department, and project by project. True, many companies will use both technologies. But because Java traditionally is considered more complex and difficult to use, .NET will have the edge in some head-to-head comparisons.
On the other hand, developers who want cross-platform interoperability will take Java, hands down. Can Microsoft blow Java out of the water? Not likely. But even Sun Microsystems recognizes that improvements to J2EE and other Java technology will be key to holding on to and increasing the Java developer base. For Sun, the next two years represent a critical time in the maturation of Java and its market position.
Easy Does It
.NET"s ease-of-use characteristics are forcing Sun to try to simplify Java development. When J2EE first came out, there were many developers using distributed computing, so J2EE was targeted at a very high-level developer, said Ralph Gallantine, group marketing manager at Sun. Now, however, Sun is trying to make J2EE development easier. (J2EE is Sun"s standard for delivering multitier enterprise applications.)