Re: [GNUnet-developers] Java (was Freenet 0.5)

[Blake Matheny]

That decision by the FSF had absolutely _nothing_ to do with 'religious bias'
as you put it. The fact is, when GNUnet was starting out (and still today),
GNU Java wasn't ready for prime-time. The FSF would _prefer_ that an
application is written in a non-proprietary language, but it isn't required.
When GNU Java, or another GPL friendly Java interpreter is ready, I'm sure
that the FSF will warm up to the idea.

As Krista said earlier, the majority of the initial code was C. In this way
GNUnet didn't really 'move away from Java', it just continued moving code to C
and eventually phased out the little bit of Java that was there.
This was done to be a 'friendly' free software project (no one likes mixed
languages when it isn't necessary), but mostly for portability reasons. I was
doing a BSD port at the time and there just wasn't a Java environment that
would work well enough for GNUnet. Also, C compilers are more readily
available on a larger variety of platforms then Java environments are. If
GNUnet is going to succeed, we can't be stuck waiting for GNU Java or Sun to
port to new systems.

Finally, people know C. If you take some time and compare the number of open
source projects written in Java vs. C/C++, you will see that C/C++ has a
significant lead over Java. C has been around for decades and as a result
there are many many people who are proficient in the language. Choosing a
language that lots of people know is a good way to get volunteers.

There are GPL applications that are written in Java, but for the reasons listed
about it would not have been the best choice for GNUnet.

-Blake

Whatchu talkin' 'bout, Willis?
> Krista Bennett wrote:
> 
> >Actually, the Java stuff was abandoned because the GNU guys were against
> >it (proprietary software issues).
> >
> I'm all for GNU (L/GPL'd software), but that is just bullsh*t.  That 
> more than borders on "religious
> bias".  To say that GNU/FSF software can't be written in Java is 
> completely bogus.  Does that mean
> I can't write GNU software that runs on Windows or Mac?  Those are 
> proprietary software systems.
> They also have nothing to do with whether an application is written and 
> released under GPL.
> 
> -brett
> 
> 
> 
> 
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-- 
Blake Matheny           "... one of the main causes of the fall of the
address@hidden      Roman Empire was that, lacking zero, they had
http://www.dbaseiv.net   no way to indicate successful termination of
http://ovmj.org/GNUnet/  their C programs." --Robert Firth