A new podcast series by Sparkling Client has an excellent interview with Ted Neward called, "Welcome to 1997". Ted is one of the few people I know that has mastered both the Java and the .NET worlds. I work with him sometimes on the No Fluff, Just Stuff symposium and I'm always impressed with his insights. In this podcast Ted surprises me by teaching me a couple new things about the demise of the Java applet.For those of you who may not know it, Java was actually the first RIA technology available starting in 1995. I remember working in it and I remember the frustrations the incompatibilities among browsers as well as UI presentation across operating systems. I've maintained that Java applets failed because of incompatibilities and that Flash prevailed because Adobe is the only maker of the Flash player and could ensure consistent execution accross browsers. Today Sun produces the Java browser plug-in for all browser (except, I think, Safari) so their compatibility issues are largely history. Perhaps Sun can leverage that to grow the JavaFX platform - only time will tell.
What I didn't know, and what Ted taught me in the podcast, was that starting around 1997 browsers (i.e. Microsoft & Netscape) stopped shipping the latest and greatest version of the Java plug-in. I moved to server-side Java in late 1996 and turned by back on applets out of frustration. Anyway, according to Ted browser vendors stopped updating the Java plug after Java 1.1 and eventually Microsoft stopped shipping Java with its IE browser all together. The fact that the Java plug-in stopped evolving is the reason Ted gives for its demise. I think the truth is that it was three things: the incompatibilities, slow performance, and lack of evolution that contributed.
Anyway, the podcast - as well as other podcasts on Sparkling Client - are worth listening too. Unlike so many other podcasts Sparkling Client is really polished - it reminds of NPR its so good.
