Re: Low-level vs. High-level programming (was My First Computer)

["Kelly Hall" <hall@priest.com>]

"Paul Schlyter" <pausch@saaf.se> wrote in message
news:bcrog0$8k1$1@merope.saaf.se...
> The main disadvantage of Java here is the lack of an actual hardware
> platform able to directly execute Java bytecode.

There are several to choose from:
  - the aJ100 and aJ80 from Ajile (www.ajile.com)
  - moon2 from Vulcan Machines (www.vulcanmachines.com)
  - picoJava from Sun and their licensees (www.sun.com)
  - Patriot Scientific is a player, but I can't tell if their PSC1000 was
renamed IGNITE or if IGNITE is a new core.  Regardless: www.ptsc.com

Implementing VMs in hardware has a noble history going back at least to the
Western Digital Pascal MicroEngine on the LSI-11 chipset.

Personally, I don't find JVM hardware compelling because I don't trust the
above vendors to re-spin their chips for better fab lines as often as Intel
(say) re-spins their general purpose CPUs.  If your code runs on the
lowest-common denomiator hardware (which is x86 these days), you have
excellent opportunites to upgrade hardware for better performance.  However,
if you're in the embedded market you probably won't be upgrading anyway so
the Ajile parts aren't a bad deal: www.jstamp.com

Kelly