Java
The Java programming language, developed by Sun Microsystems, is a language aimed at allowing high performance, cross-platform application development.
Java source files (.java files) are typically compiled to an intermediate bytecode language (.class files) and executed by a Java Virtual Machine. Most modern JVMs further compile the bytecode of a Java program into your processors' native machine code during execution. This native code translation is done via a JIT compiler that is built-in to the JVM. Some Java compilers (such as GCJ) can compile Java code to native machine code ahead-of-time rather than just-in-time.
The primary benefits of Java are:
- Cross-platform (Write Once, Run Anywhere)
- High performance (Java code running with a modern JIT is often comparable to the speed of C++)
- Comprehensive class library
- Automatic memory management
- Huge user community
- Well supported by the open-source community and commercial industry (Sun, IBM, Oracle, HP, BEA, Apple, etc.)
Java is used in a variety of environments including desktop applications, embedded device (PDA and wireless phone) applications, server-side web page serving applications (as JSP) and applets embedded in web pages.
According to a variety of sources, Java is currently the most popular programming language in the world.
Useful Java links:
Programming Language
This is a programming language. It may be used to instruct computers to accomplish a variety of tasks which may or may not be domain-specific.