Java versus C

• ... is a really redundant topic!
• There is even a Wikipedia page telling all about the differences between the two programming languages.
• So - I will only place some links to the gory, technical details and write some prose about life in general.

Reason for this post

• Smartphones and tablets with Android OS are omnipresent and likely processors find their way into our daily work.
• In every Android OS, the apps are mostly written in Java and work beautifully
• The comparisons tell us that with new Just-In-Time-Compilers and the Dalvik VM, Java hasn't got any real performance penalties anymore
• So it makes you wonder, if Java will eventually replace C in most devices - even if it is just a small microcontroller.

Why Java can't rule alone

• There are still many systems out there that are just too small (code footprint < C64) for Java
• The boot time for Java based systems is much higher - and many low power applications boot every few seconds and are asleep for 99.9 percent of the time.
• Java can't access the hardware ... and shouldn't, since it's such a niiiice language ... it shouldn't get its hands dirty ;-)

Watching the PROs

• When you watch the success stories closely you see, that All isn't Java that glitters
• The Android systems are basically Linux systems - but they do good, not to tell anyone
• Linux has been around a long time but few have the nerves to cope with it
• Inside the Android OS, all the drivers are implemented in C and probably some more low level stuff is implemented in C.
• The user / app writer however gets a nice clean interface and can forget about the rest.

And can you also make _a_call_ with your smartphone?

• The tablets were the first "phones" that couldn't ring anybody anymore
• Samsung has brought out the next step
• GoogleTV will bring the apps to the television
• It might not take too long until we see more industrial applications that incorporate the Android OS - just to get the interface right
• ... and the application programmers will thank them.