While most technological hardware, like our phones and laptops, might seem obsolete after 20 years, computer software coding language Java is alive and strong today. The coding language celebrated its 20 year anniversary recently and is, to date, one of the most popular programming languages in the world at large corporations.
Running on operating systems MacOSX, Windows, Linux and Solaris; cellphones, laptops, tablets, and desktop computers, Java is considered one of the most prevalent coding languages on the Internet. Being responsible for powerful data sorting software, and our favorite social networks, Java can do almost anything.
In fact, Java is so popular, according to a study performed by independent developer industry analyst firm, RedMonk, Java ranked #2, just behind JavaScript, on their January 2015 Programming Language Rankings.
Here are 3 modern tech juggernauts who are using Java to deliver some of the most sought after internet services and products on the planet.
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Netflix
Before Netflix, Americans drove miles to retrieve movies, video games, and music at now obsolete companies likes Blockbuster and Video Showplace. The industry was disintermediated by Netflix, who filed for their IPO in 2002. They’ve since, next to YouTube, grown into the most used video streaming service on the Internet.
The vast majority of Netflix’s infrastructure is run on the pliant coding language used across the Internet. “We have thousands of Java processes running all the time, yet as we grow we don’t have huge infrastructure challenges,” said Netflix delivery engineering manager Andrew Glover.
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NASA
Despite the fact the United States sent a team of men to the moon with less computing power that exists in one a modern smart phone, NASA uses more technology and computing power than most.
“Java is the glue that ties our legacy software capabilities together, and provides a cross-platform modular framework for a collection of unrelated tools and capabilities via the NetBeans platform,” said a NASA developer in software developer magazine, JAXenter.
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Minecraft
Meteorically popular 16bit computer world building game, Minecraft, exploded onto the scene in May 2009. The game has since built an active player base of almost 10million people. The game was created by Markus Persson, better known as “Notch,” who sold the company for $2.5bn in September of 2014.
Notch, who worked on independent projects for King Digital, makers of popular games like Candy Crush Saga, while initially making the game, created Minecraft completely out of Java. He’s said time and time again that the reason he chose Java was because it was so prevalent in the community, and because so many of his peers knew the language—lending credence to Java’s mantra “Write Once, Run Everywhere.”