I switched from IE on XP to Firefox on Suse mainly because I was so frustrated with the instability and memory consumption of Java on Windows. Little did I know then, it wasn't a MS conspiracy that Java wasn't working well, SOME of the problem was that the Java community failed to provide a sleek Java plugin. I've now run Java on OSX which PROVED Java can preform as well as any native code. On Windows we know Java stinks because MS won't allow it to be optimized. But what's the excuse for Linux and Firefox!?!?
I now use Firefox on Suse with Java NOT enabled for one reason - when Java is enabled the browser becomes unresponsive with 15 Firefox tabs/windows open. With Java turned off I can go higher than 30! And that's without any actual Java apps running! That's just for the plugin to exist. Even stand alone Swing apps perform almost as poorly on Linux as they do on Windows - and sadly they are even more out of tune with native widgets in KDE/Gnome.
Pathetic.
I once tried to run JBoss and the JBoss console applet on the same machine - huge mistake. JBoss sucked up 400Mb and the console applet sucked up a whopping 350Mb. Enough to overwhelm the memory and swap of any average PC. After trying to open another Firefox window I actually CRASHED my Suse Desktop for the first time. Imagine my embarrassment and shame at the irony that after switching to Linux FOR BETTER JAVA SUPPORT it was Java itself that brought my Linux box to it's knees.
You know that when a simple little console program uses almost as much memory as a massive application server hosting over 30 services that something in the plugin architecture has gone foul.
While still a Java zealot I now exclusively write server side Java and keep my clients Java-free (unless on OSX).
There is no excuse for this. Sun, IBM, Oracle, et al need to wake up and fix this mess before we all switch to dot-net. As it stands today, I (as big a Java fan as can be) would be more inclined to try writing a client using Mono or SWT than trying out Mustang's Swing.
It's just sad. Pathetic and sad.
John J Yates |
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