How to Build Java Applications Today: #59
README
Welcome to my newsletter “How To Build Java Applications Today”! If you like it, then subscribe to it on Substack! Or read it on dev.to or Medium. Even better: Share it with people who may be interested.
Next Issue: Wednesday, February 2, 2022
My newsletter is published on the first Wednesday of every month.
Stand-Up
Are you still Log4Shell-shocked? Too soon? My last newsletter issue appeared on December 7, 2021, just two days before Log4Shell got disclosed. Feels like an eternity ago, doesn’t it? Well, I had to write about Log4Shell as well — see below.
When I thought I got the hang of my new monthly cadence, I made many changes again. As promised last month, I have a new section in my newsletter. Not one but three: News are back in “New & Noteworthy”, the “Release Radar” lists essential releases, and the “Editorial” is my monthly opinion piece. This month, there can be only one topic for the editorial. So please read it: Log4Shell Shows The Need for “Trustworthy Java”.
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New & Noteworthy
This new section has the most important news for Java developers from last month — in my opinion, at least.
Critical Log4j Vulnerability Log4Shell with Zero-Day Exploits, Garbage Collection Improvements from JDK 8 to JDK 17, Red Hat Reluctant on Proposed 2-Year Java LTS Cadence, JetBrains IDEs Get Remote Development, JetBrains Clones Visual Studio Code — But At What Price, An Oral History of Stack Overflow — Told By its Founding Team, and Benedict Evans’ Annual Tech Presentation.
Technology Index
What do we need to build a Java application today? A JVM language, a database, a back-end framework, a web framework, and — if we want to get fancy — a mobile app framework. So my index recommends technologies in these five areas, based on popularity, industry analysis, and my 23 years of Java experience.
Why am I measuring popularity?
Picking a popular technology makes our developer life easier: Easier to learn, easier to build, debug & deploy, easier to hire, and easier to convince teammates & bosses. Popularity can make a difference in two situations: When multiple technologies score the same, you could go for the most popular one. And when a technology is very unpopular, we may not use it.
How am I measuring popularity?
I measure popularity by systematically observing what millions of developers do: Google searches to measure interest, Udemy course buyers to measure learning, Stack Overflow questions to measure learning & application of technologies, and mentions in Indeed job ads to measure the demand for technologies.
So what’s changed over the index from December?
- I updated all charts for all technologies with the latest numbers. I collected the data from December 28–31, 2021.
- All technologies now compare the numbers of Udemy students and job ad mentions against a previous month. This hints at trends, but these trends need more time to become visible.
Release Radar
This new section has the current releases of essential tools & technologies for Java developers. I shamelessly stole the name from GitHub because I’m an aspiring allegorist. 😌
Last month saw new releases for Gradle, Spring Boot, Quarkus, DropWizard, IntelliJ, and Eclipse.
Editorial
This new section is my opinion on an important topic of the month.
I believe Log4Shell is Java’s biggest crisis ever. How did we handle Log4Shell? And how can we prevent another Log4Shell? My answers are in this month’s editorial: Log4Shell Shows The Need for “Trustworthy Java”.
About
Karsten Silz is the author of this newsletter. He is a full-stack web & mobile developer with 23 years of Java experience, author, speaker, and marathon runner. Karsten got a Master’s degree in Computer Science at the Dresden University of Technology (Germany) in 1996.
Karsten has worked in Europe and the US. He co-founded a software start-up in the US in 2004. Karsten led product development for 13 years and left after the company was sold successfully. He co-founded the UK SaaS start-up “ Your Home in Good Hands” as CTO in 2020. Since 2019, Karsten also works as a contractor in the UK.
Karsten has this newsletter, a developer website, and a contractor site. He’s on LinkedIn, Twitter, and GitHub. Karsten is also an author at InfoQ.
Originally published at https://bpfnl.substack.com on January 5, 2022.
