What do you use Kaffe for?

[Peter C. Mehlitz]

Seems that there are a lot of shy people, so let me tell you what I'm using
kaffe for (well, Tim already knows, but others might not).

I try to build a free (re-distributable) system with kaffe on top of linux and
BISS-AWT on top of kaffe. Just one VM process, "apps" are just Java modules
with main() methods (which are called via on-the-fly generated classes (JAS) by
a little server thread waiting on a socket). I would like to see Java as some
kind of a "programmable shell", something between Tcl and Oberon.

This whole thing is meant to be a platform for Linux based turn-key systems (do
you read this, all you big companies with lots of small road warriors out there
carrying even smaller laptops, always complaining about ease-of-use and
safety?).

The reason why I'm using kaffe is both religious and down-to-earth: folks, if
you are serious about Java programming, you have to be aware of the fact that
you really depend on VMs. This is your vulnerable side. And - because of bad
experience in more then 15 years - I don't want to depend any more on system
software I can't look into. The free alternatives (also kaffe) might have their
flaws, but it is up to us to detect and fix them, right? I don't see any reason
why we shouldn't be able to get with kaffe in small to where Linux already got
at large. And who really doubts that Linux today is a better OS than most of
the commercial stuff? And if you think of in terms of "support": I can
tech-talk with Tim way better than with a commercial hotline.

More about this as soon as I can see the end of my to-do list again.

Peter