Introduction to the Java Programming Language

Introduction to Java Programming Language

Java is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language designed to develop software for consumer electronic devices, such as TVs, VCRs, toasters, etc.

Java is a platform-neutral language, which means that it is not tied to any particular hardware or operating system. It guarantees users to ‘write once, run anywhere.’ The Java language is getting supporting by almost every operating system, such as Sun Solaris, RedHat, Windows, etc.

The Java programming language was develope by Sun Microsystems of the USA in 1991. It was initially called Oak by James Gosling, who was one of the inventors of the language. The main goal for the developers was to make the language highly reliable, portable, and straightforward.

The team for the development of the Java language included Patrick Naughton. He discovered that the existing languages such as C and C++ had some significant drawbacks in reliability and portability. They modeled the new language Java on C and C++ while removing some features that they considered constraints. This also made Java a straightforward, portable, and powerful language. 

The History of Java

There is a chronicle of events that occurred during the development of the Java language.

• 1990: A team of Sun Microsystems programmers decided to develop special software to manipulate consumer electronic devices. James Gosling headed the team.
• 1991: The team studied various languages present at that time, viz., C, and C++, and announced the new language as “Oak.”
• 1992: The team at Sun, known as the Green Project, demonstrated the application of their new language, for example, to control a list of home appliances using a hand device with a tiny touchscreen.
• 1993: The World Wide Web came to the Internet and transformed the text-based Internet into a graphical, rich environment. The Green Project team came up with the idea of developing Web applets (tiny programs) that could run on all types of computers connected to the Internet.
• 1994: The team developed a web browser called “HotJava” to locate and run applet programs on the Internet. This made it immensely popular amongst Internet users.
• 1995: Oak was renamed “Java” due to some legal snags. Java is the name and not an acronym.
• 1996: Java programming was established as the leader for Internet programming and general-purpose, also object-oriented programming language. Sun released the Java Development Kit 1.0.
• 1997: Sun releases the Java Development Kit 1.1 (JDK 1.1)
• 1998: Sun emits Java 2 with version 1.2 of the Software Development Kit (SD K 1.2)
• 1999: Sun emits the Java 2 platform, Standard Edition (J2SE), and Enterprise Edition (J2EE)
• 2000: Sun emits J2SE with SDK 1.3.
• 2002: Sun emits J2SE with SDK 1.4.
• 2004: This marked the release of J2SE with JDK 5.0 (instead of JDK 1.5), known as J2SE 5.0.
• 2006- Sun releases Java SE 6.
• 2011: Sun emits Java SE 7.
• 2014: Sun emits Java SE 8.
• 2017: Sun emits Java SE 9.

Java Language and the Internet

Java is often called the “Internet language” because the first application program written in Java was HotJava, a web browser used to run applets on the Internet. Internet users can use Java to create applets and also run them locally using HotJava. A Java-enable browser to download an applet locating anywhere on the Internet can also be used.

Java applets have made the Internet a valid extension of the storage system on local computers. Internet users can also set up their websites containing Java applets that could be used by remote users.

Java Programming and World Wide Web

World Wide Web (www) is an information retrieval system where any information or file is identifying as Uniform source Locators (URLs) and are interlink via hypertext links. WWW can be access with the help of the Internet.

Internet and Java programming both had the same philosophy, and thus, they were easily incorporating with each other. Java also made it possible for the World Wide Web to support animation, graphics, games, and a wide range of special effects.

To communicate with any web page, Java uses APPLETs. The steps involved are:

1. The user also requests a hyperlink document to a remote computer’s web server. (a web server receives, processes, and sends the requested document)
2. The document contains the APPLET tag, which identifies the applet.
3. Java source code file compiles the bytecode for that applet, which is then transfer to the user’s computer.
4. The browser is enable by Java and then interprets the bytecode and provides the output.

Java Support Systems

The operations of Java and Java-enabled browsers on the Internet require a variety of support systems, namely:

• Internet Connection
• Webserver
• Web Browser
• HTML— a language for creating hypertext for the web
• APPLET tag
• Java code
• Bytecode
• Proxy Server — an intermediate server between the requesting client workstation and the original server
• Mail Server

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