Introducing Java
If this were a carnival, this post would be titled “Introducing Java, The Programming Wunderkind That Everyone Loves After They Actually Try It And Stop Being A Hater”.
Which is entirely too long, I think.
Anyways, I’m proclaiming to the world that I have been experiementing with Java (corporate site | Wikipedia), and have found it highly useful. So useful, in fact, that I’m going to use it to write the backbone/most-of-the-real-code for the JanePrime project… instead of the planned C/C++.
Why? My main problem, which is also a “benefit” ironically enough, with C/C++ is the disjointed nature of the library structure. A few libraries are naturally included, but it’s a huge hassle if you want to do anything past string maniuplation… but this is also part of the “control” that I love about C/C++.
But. The biggest reason I’m doing this in Java is: NetBeans IDE 6.1 (corporate site | Wikipedia).
It’s like a Visual Studio environment for Java. Except that you know your program isn’t going to be Windows-only, and randomly decide not to work if they’re not using the correct version of Windows. Project and code management becomes very easy.
The long and short is that I don’t have to poke around in an advanced text editor and juggle a terminal. NetBeans handles it all, in addition to letting me know in-flow if I reference a “method” (function), class, etc. that doesn’t exist.

Awesomeness in a can. Er, uh, in a software package.
Now if only I could find one of these for PHP, then I’d have the programming environments triple threat…
Visual Studio + NetBeans + ??? = Profit!



