Known as the first choice for web and mobile app development, Java is a prevalent programming language with over 25 years of history of use. Previously owned by Sun Microsystems, now a licensed programming environment offered by Oracle.
Java is a common platform used to build top-notch desktop and mobile applications. Like every other tool, there are Advantages and Disadvantages of Java Programming language. It’s time to look for Java is among the best and the most feared programming languages.
Its uses and application make this high-level platform-independent language a choice for millions of programmers even today. The capability of code Write Once Run Anywhere (WORA) is one of the known advantages of Java. Listed among the best platforms to develop desktop and web-based applications, Java programming language has the following benefits for coding professionals.
If you have already worked on C++, Java programming is even simpler to understand as its syntax is based on C++. As a high-level programming platform, Java uses automatic garbage collection, which doesn’t require manual removal of unreferenced objects from memory.
Java has also removed the features like explicit pointers, operator overloading, etc., making it easy to read and write.
Code reusability is possible because of the use of Object-oriented programming. Its reprogrammable code gives you the freedom to make standard projects enhancing flexibility. Furthermore, using the OOPs concept, programmers can boost code security as you can bind the data and functions into a single unit and limits its access for outsiders.
This advantage of Java programming lets you break bigger modules into smaller parts which is also easy to understand.
Platform independence is one of the major benefits of the Java programming language as you don’t need another tool to interpret the machine language. Java Virtual Machine is all you need to install on your system to run the compiled code on any computer, whether Mac or Windows. Boasting the Write, Once Run Anywhere feature lets you reuse the platform-independent compiled code (Byte Code) on any OS of your choices, such as Linux, Mac, or Windows.
A thread is the smallest unit in a program. Multiple threads share a common memory area and increase the efficiency and performance of the application. These threads run independently of each other without affecting each other. Multithreading allows you to run more than one task in a program simultaneously using the CPU resources more efficiently.
The Java Virtual Machine also performs memory management tasks as the objects that are no longer in use in a program are dereferenced automatically. This task is done with the help of an automatic Garbage Collection process.
Having incomplete knowledge about a programming platform may be more problematic than beneficial. There are also some disadvantages of Java you should know before starting over.
Java Netbeans is infamous for the slow execution of programs, even if it’s a simple one. Java is a significant memory-consuming programming language and is slower than native languages such as C and C++. Since each code of the language has to be interpreted to the machine-level code, this could be one of the major disadvantages of Java.
Due to the involvement of abstraction and compilation of a virtual machine, Java often renders poor performance. Moreover, the garbage collector causes the same issue as it consumes more CPU time. Executing multiple threads can also result in deadlock situations which often throws Out-of-Memory errors.
Bought by Oracle, the standard edition of the programming language has recently been commercialized. Unfortunately, this means, students will not get it for free, and professionals will have to pay either by the number of users or per processor.
The current version of Java is an open-source programming platform and available for redistribution for general-purpose computing. To prepare for the change, each company has to assess whether they need this technology or its alternative.
JRE, along with NetBeans, requires a significant amount of disk space as compared to other languages. Installing a JVM is also mandatory to be able to run the Java Code across multiple platforms. Running low on disk space may be the biggest disadvantage of Java Runtime Environment as your system gets slower than normal.
It could be a pesky task for beginners to get a hold of Java programming as there are many words and long & complex sentences that are difficult to read and understand.
This certainly affects the readability of the code for beginners. Despite being manageable, its codes are complex, which are followed by lengthy explanations. To understand the syntax, you’ll have to understand the explanations first.
Conclusion on Advantages and Disadvantages of Java Programming
Understanding the advantages and disadvantages of Java Programming will help you learn the environment and the concept easily. Java is a highly preferred tool to develop front and back-end business applications in this age. Also, it’s the most feared platform for many due to its overwhelming limitations. Most of the drawbacks of Java can be circumcised at the developer’s end.
Java was created to be straightforward to write, compile, debug, and learn. Java is an object-oriented language. This allows you to build modular programs and code that can be reused. In addition, Java is not dependent on a particular operating system.
Java programs take significantly longer to execute than C/C++ apps. Because Java Virtual Machine is used, it requires more memory. In addition, there is no support for low-level programming in Java.
The size of the array is necessary to be mentioned. The length of the array is set. There's a danger of memory waste here since fixed-length arrays are used. To remove an item from an array, we must traverse through it; thus, performance will be reduced.
In the past, Java was regarded as slower than C and C++. As a result, any Java performance test or comparison must always indicate the version, vendor, operating system, and hardware architecture of the JVM being tested.
Java is secure for the following reasons: Java programs run inside a virtual machine, known as a sandbox, are safe. Java does not allow for explicit pointer control. Instead, the byte-code verifier examines the code fragments to ensure that they do not contain illegal content that might violate access rights to objects.