Is there any one who has been working with java for a long long time?

[Larry Coon]

I didn't know that Java has been around that long? Any evidence?

There are petroglyphs with clear evidence of having been
created using a LayoutManager.


Larry Coon
University of California

 

[Michael]

I have noticed that in some pharmaceutial industry, programmer with

experience in J2EE, JDBC, JSP, and database knowledge such as Oracle
with "CHEMISTRY" knowledge is desired.

Three years ago, they were using C++. I am wondering whether they will
move to C# or will some remain using Java?

My experience is in biotech, so it may be slightly different in the big
pharma, but here goes anyway.

We typically used C++ for individual number crunching tools that are
computationally intensive and operate on a particular kind of data and
Java for database-related tools that are more integrative and operate
across many kinds of data.

So, for a chemistry example, if you're doing some sort of 3D protein
folding or something, you'd typically use C++ over Java. If you're
writing the code that tracks the chemical inventory, and which
compounds had been tested against which targets, you'd use Java.

My impression is that roughly 1990-2000, a tremendous amount of push
was made for the C++ type of programs. Number crunching, replacing
experiments with computations, etc. So the idea would be that you'd get
rid of labs and just have big computers. Algorithmic focus. These
things would be labeled computational chemistry, etc. And I think that
to the extent they still exist today, these are still using C++.

Eventually, people realized that wasn't working nearly as well as had
been hoped, and the new approach is to use computers to tie existing
knowlege together. So computers become more integrative of existing
data, and their role is to help make the lab processes more efficient,
and tie their data together, rather than to replace labs. This is more
IT or informatics. Data focus. And Java has been great in this latter
field. Depending on a given company, they might use Java with various
frameworks or go for C# and .NET.

Michael

 

[Simon Brooke]

So have you been teaching Java lately?

Occasionally, and specific bits. I wrote a course on Tomcat earlier this
year, which you can find here:

http://www.weft.co.uk/library/tomcat/

and am working on a course on the Location API for J2ME.

My Java/database/XML tutorial from 2000 is here
http://www.weft.co.uk/library/inet2000/

....but it contains a series of absolute howlers in slides 86 - 89 of day
two - the example given just happened to work with the version of Xerces
available in 2000, but is not compatible with the DOM API and you should
not follow it!

--
(e-mail address removed) (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/
Just as defying the law of gravity through building aircraft requires
careful design and a lot of effort, so too does defying laws of
economics. It seems to be a deeply ingrained aspect of humanity to
forever strive to improve things, so unquestioning acceptance of a
free market system seems to me to be unnatural. ;; Charles Bryant

 

[Simon Brooke]

I didn't know that Java has been around that long? Any evidence?



I need to develop a reasonable size project (or more than one) using
jsp, using JDBC, so that I can show as personal project on my resume.
Any guidance?

Find a concrete real world problem that needs solving. Choose a toolkit on
which to base your work - personally I tend to use things I've rolled
myself, simply because I've been doing this longer than most people and
when I started there weren't good toolkits out there so I had to build my
own; and now I'm so practised with my own toolkit that there's little
benefit in trying something new. But if I was starting over I would
probably start with Struts:

http://struts.apache.org/

I'd then find an open source project built with that toolkit and pull it
apart looking for patterns to learn from.

Would you recommend Tomcat or JBoss? MySQL or another database such as
oracle. I have SQL Server (not express ed) btw.

Personally I very much like Tomcat. As to databases MySQL is getting better
but it's still not as robust as Postgres, which I would recommend in
preference.

--
(e-mail address removed) (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

;; Human history becomes more and more a race between
;; education and catastrophe.
H.G. Wells, "The Outline of History"

 

[Amanda]

Simon Brooke wrote:
[..]

Occasionally, and specific bits. I wrote a course on Tomcat earlier this
year, which you can find here:

http://www.weft.co.uk/library/tomcat/

Great. Thanks. There was a book I bought about Tomcast 3 years ago but
returned it since I wasn't ready to dive into it right away. Then many
things happened that kept me from it.

and am working on a course on the Location API for J2ME.

I see.

My Java/database/XML tutorial from 2000 is here
http://www.weft.co.uk/library/inet2000/

...but it contains a series of absolute howlers in slides 86 - 89 of day
two - the example given just happened to work with the version of Xerces
available in 2000, but is not compatible with the DOM API and you should
not follow it!

Okay. I took an XML class in Summer 2003. The rpofessor used Perl for
a couple of homeword assignment but the rest was in Java but I don't
remember much.

Thanks.

 

[Amanda]

My experience is in biotech, so it may be slightly different in the big
pharma, but here goes anyway.

We typically used C++ for individual number crunching tools that are
computationally intensive and operate on a particular kind of data and
Java for database-related tools that are more integrative and operate
across many kinds of data.

So, for a chemistry example, if you're doing some sort of 3D protein
folding or something, you'd typically use C++ over Java. If you're
writing the code that tracks the chemical inventory, and which
compounds had been tested against which targets, you'd use Java.

My impression is that roughly 1990-2000, a tremendous amount of push
was made for the C++ type of programs. Number crunching, replacing
experiments with computations, etc. So the idea would be that you'd get
rid of labs and just have big computers. Algorithmic focus. These
things would be labeled computational chemistry, etc. And I think that
to the extent they still exist today, these are still using C++.

Eventually, people realized that wasn't working nearly as well as had
been hoped, and the new approach is to use computers to tie existing
knowlege together. So computers become more integrative of existing
data, and their role is to help make the lab processes more efficient,
and tie their data together, rather than to replace labs. This is more
IT or informatics. Data focus. And Java has been great in this latter
field. Depending on a given company, they might use Java with various
frameworks or go for C# and .NET.

Thanks so much for the explanation. It clearifies a lot of things for
me.

I was in analytical Chemistry and my knowledge in Biochemistry is
strictly academic and so was Molecular Biology which I registered and
sat in a course recently - I told the instructor that I didn't want to
do the labs and would withdra before dealine.

If a particular company has been using Java instead of C#, it would
most likely to remain using Java, right?

 

[amanda]

Find a concrete real world problem that needs solving. Choose a toolkit on
which to base your work - personally I tend to use things I've rolled
myself, simply because I've been doing this longer than most people and
when I started there weren't good toolkits out there so I had to build my
own; and now I'm so practised with my own toolkit that there's little
benefit in trying something new. But if I was starting over I would
probably start with Struts:

http://struts.apache.org/

I'd then find an open source project built with that toolkit and pull it
apart looking for patterns to learn from.

Thanks.



Personally I very much like Tomcat. As to databases MySQL is getting better
but it's still not as robust as Postgres, which I would recommend in
preference.

--
(e-mail address removed) (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

;; Human history becomes more and more a race between
;; education and catastrophe.
H.G. Wells, "The Outline of History"