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Re: Lucent Technologies & Sun Microsystems




>Consider Limbo as NetC and Java as NetBasic. Each has its own audience - NetC
>mainly for programmers and NetBasic for other people.

Actually, from everything I've been able to tell, Limbo is NetC, and
Java is NetC++.  Java has taken some of the sharp edges off C++, and
added garbage collection.  Limbo appears to have taken the sharp edges
off C, and added garbage collection.  Both of them appear to have
learned from the predecessors and made very similiar decisions about
what the mistakes of the "last generation" were.

Java really does appear to be "Limbo++" (i.e. Limbo with objects,
not "one more than Limbo") to me..  And that's where the comparison
can be best made.

I just don't see a "NetBasic" comparison by any definition of Basic
I've ever encountered..

And the strength of an OO language, to some degree, is the number of
"standard" objects that are available.  For that reason, defining lots
of objects (i.e. APIs) is a strength for Java, not a weakness.  For 
a language targetted at embedded work, you don't want the clutter, 
you just want a language that can do everything you might need.  

So why is everyone so utterly anti-Java?  It looks to me like it
will have a place in the universe, possibly along-side Limbo, for
the very reason that C++ has a role while C stays a viable language..

An Embedded C Programmer who thinks Java is cool,

Keith Graham
skg@sadr.com

P.S.  If I were to ship an actual product with Limbo/Inferno, what's
      the per-board or per-system licensing costs?