
Sun bidding adieu to mobile-specific Java - theoneill
http://www.news.com/8301-13580_3-9800679-39.html
======
ardit33
I work everyday doing J2ME, and you can do really powerful things with it in
phones.

Main problems: You have to re-invent the wheel all the time. J2me, is
basically Java 1.2 with lots of things stripped out. No string tokenizer, no
iterators, no collections, etc. etc.

This actually makes it frustrating (re-invent the wheel all the time), yet
challenging fun at the same time (it is not bloated).

THe main problem of J2ME is it's very crappy implemetation from OEM, where
every fricking manufactor decides to implemt it differently, slapping their
apis, and making applications not work on most phones without some major
effort.

Carriers, deciding to bllock APIs, as basic as socket connections, media
players, etc. and you can't use them without their "permission", aka digital
signatures. Ah, and if you are not their "preferred" partner (i.e. surrender
half of your revenue to the carries), you will not get this certificates.
Which stilfes inovation, and drive small developers, or early startups out of
business, unless they are in bed with the carrier.

So, after years developing with J2ME, I can say that it has a leased time. It
is not easy to develop for, very very fragmented, and it's power stiffled by
the carriers.

------
mpfefferle
This is a good thing. J2ME is rather useless for real applications. For
example, if you're going to write an app for Nokia phones, target Symbian so
you can use the features that actually make those phones attractive.

~~~
jsjenkins168
Not useless, but just a headache to do well. There are some badass
applications written in Java ME.

You have to be very organized with your builds if you need to utilize many
optional libraries b/c phone support can be splotchy at best. Fortunately many
of the important libraries such as MMAPI and PDA are commonplace with new
phones.

