Java is such a love hate relationship, at least for me. Its versatility and power pull me in, but its lack of friendliness makes me turn away.
That's Java's fundamental problem. Full stop. Java only looks powerful because it has a comprehensive library. Common Lisp is powerful. Ruby is powerful. Java is not powerful. Clojure and Scala both offer more expressibility on the JVM. briandmyers hits the nail on the head: Java is the new Cobol. It's the current industrial language for legions of mediocre programmers. If you become a Java expert, you'll never be out of a job. I don't know about you, but unfortunately, that's not how I want to spend my life.Java’s designers were consciously designing a product for people not as smart as them. – Paul Graham
Its versatility and power pull me in
It's not THAT bad... There are a lot of better langauges to get jobs done in, but I'm thankful there is a new Cobol, so we don't have to use Cobol. It's better these jobs are being offered to Java experts rather than something much more low level, I'd rather buy odd shapes wheels then invent them from scratch over and over again.
I didn't say it was bad; just weak. In fact, Java is an excellent language for mediocre programmers. It prevents them from doing bad things. As well as making trivial errors and unreadable constructs. Java's weak and rigid system helps prevent all these things. Absolutely. That's also not to say there aren't great programmers using Java. I just wish I knew why.invent them from scratch over and over again.
It's better these jobs are being offered to Java experts rather than something much more low level