Fortune 1,000 companies are optimistic but cautious about the future of the cross-platform programming language Java. In a recent survey of IT executives from 50 Fortune 1,000 companies, conducted by market analyst firm Forrester Research, 48% of respondents said that Java was already a part of their company’s development activities, and 72% of respondents said they expected to be using Java by 2000. At present, however, unease over security and compatibility issues means that IT managers are focusing their Java development efforts on internal and server- side applications. Half of the respondents to Forrester’s survey said they were working solely on internal Java applications, while 42% reported that they were working on a mixture of internal and external applications. By 2000, however, just 17% of the respondents expect to be working solely on internal applications. Cross-platform support remains Java’s most compelling feature according to 71% of the IT managers interviewed. Other reasons given for the use of Java for corporate application development were developer productivity (mentioned by 33% of respondents), functionality (29%), and scalability (17%). But there are still significant barriers to overcome; Forrester’s survey shows that users are still deterred by the lack of vendor compliance with ‘pure’ Java which poses a threat to its cross-platform promise and its relative immaturity as a programming language.
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