Beyond Java: A little Dabble?

From the article "Moving Past Java" an interview with the author of "Beyond Java"...

Bruce Tate: Keep in mind that I'm suggesting Java will be dead like COBOL, not dead like Elvis...

Madhu Siddalingaiah:I agree with you that innovations are beginning to appear outside of Java.

Don't worry. Madhu will kind of correct himself in just a few paragraphs...

Madhu Siddalingaiah: Ruby is a dynamic language, but there are many others, such as LISP and Smalltalk. Are there lessons we can learn from the one of oldest and one of the most innovative of languages?

Bruce Tate: Sure. Ruby is actually a nice fusion of Smalltalk and Lisp. I think the biggest lesson is that you need a catalyst. Ruby has Rails. None of the other dynamic languages got a catalyst.

Maybe a little Dabble do ya as a catalyst for Smalltalk, building on Seaside.

Then Bruce nails the essence of the problem...

Bruce Tate: Java just doesn't express data well. Other languages make it easy to put data into a hash map. Not so with Java, so we just drop down into XML.

They wrap it up like this...

Madhu Siddalingaiah: Do other leaders in the open source community share your opinions about Java?

Bruce Tate: You can see people ramping up on Ruby on Rails in a big way. David Geary, JSF expert group member, and one of the greatest Java authors, is writing a Ruby on Rails book with me. James Duncan Davidson, inventor of Tomcat and Ant, is now working with Rails. There are many, many others.