Old Java can learn new tricks from C, Android

Experts say the language should crib app isolation, locality, and automated parallelism from more modern sources.

 

Java and its linchpin JVM (Java Virtual Machine) still have much room to get better even after debuting 18 years ago, say experts who would like improvements in such areas as locality, application isolation, and parallel operations.

The JVM, which has provided a mechanism to run Java applications on multiple hardware platforms, could be fitted with capabilities similar to the C language's struct feature, providing benefits in locality by improving linkage between memory and processors. "[Struct] gives advantages in the area of footprint," and provides a lightweight object with fields and no methods.

Java and mobile applications in particular, meanwhile, could benefit from Google Android's "failsafe" capabilities enabling application isolation Automated parallel operations for the Java language and runtime are desirable. Lambda capabilities in Java Standard Edition 8 bring this closer to happening via an API, but it would like to see parallelism go a step further. "Ideally, what you'd like to be able to have is a language and a run time that you don't have to express it explicitly. It just figures this out automatically."