Java, a programming language created for the Web back in the 1990s, has become increasingly important to developers who create the latest AI functionalities, according to a study by Java-focused software company Azul.
It found that 62 per cent of organisations now use Java to code AI functionality – up from 50 per cent last year. This, it says, is a reflection of the integration of machine learning models with existing Java apps.
The finding, released earlier last month, comes from a study of more than 2,000 Java professionals across thew world.
While Java is used to develop AI features, Azul also found that Java apps now integrate AI features tightly as well. Thirty-one per cent of respondents in the study say more than half of the Java apps they build now have AI functionalities.
In Southeast Asia, the trend is similar. Sixty-nine per cent of respondents say they are using Java to code AI functionalities, up from 56 per cent last year.
Java has evolved over the years since its inception at the now-defunct Sun Microsystems. Today, it is indispensable for software used in anything from smartphones to Web servers enabling today’s digital economy.
Oracle bought Sun in 2010 and has in recent years started charging for its version of the open-source software differently.
The huge AI, software and data centre player has irked many of its Java customers in recent years with licencing models that charge by the number of employees in a company, instead of the actual users.
According to Azul’s study, 31 per cent of Southeast Asia organisations have been told by Oracle to show their Java inventory, while 24 per cent have already been subject to an Oracle Java audit.
In the region, just about every Java professional (97 per cent) is concerned with the cost of Oracle’s Java’s licencing, up from last year’s 91 per cent.
This has opened the door to alternative Java vendors such as Azul, which sells versions of Java that are fully compatible with the open-source OpenJDK as well as optimised versions that promise to cut cloud costs by running more efficiently.
It has found that 78 per cent of Southeast Asian enterprises have migrated, are migrating, or plan to migrate at least part of their Oracle Java to a non-Oracle OpenJDK alternative distribution.
Sixty per cent intend to or have already moved all their Java applications and JVM-based workloads to a non-Oracle alternative distribution, according to Azul.
