Ask HN : Which should I learn : C# or Java

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=366114

by aniketh • 18 years ago

33 85 18 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

I have been lurking on HN for some time now, and I have noticed that the languages of choice are python, lisp and ruby. However, I would prefer to learn either C# (and thus asp.net) or java. which one would be better? For the record, I have used php a lot, and code in c, c++ on the day job.

bdittmer2• 18 years ago

I think as a language C# is superior to Java. That being said, learn Java. The open source community alone makes it a much more attractive platform to build apps on. The number of choices in terms of frameworks + no vendor lock in makes it a winner. If you're serious about learning it pick up a copy of Effective Java by Joshua Bloch -- by far the best general Java book out there.

geuis2• 18 years ago

Man I know that I'm gonna get burned for saying it, but java isn't all that it's cracked up to be. I've worked for two companies that are java-based and both experiences have been horrible. Except for a handful of people, every java "engineer" I've known has been a siv. The ones that rock happen to just know java in addition to experience in other languages. Point in case, we are implementing some new web apis soon. I have been extolling the benefits of JSON and REST. Friday, the manager/lead java dude that is in charge of our 10+ engineers and making critical technology decisions asks me, "So, what is JSON"? Oy...

bdittmer2• 18 years ago

Clueless management is platform independent.

jcromartie• 18 years ago

"Java programmers" are the worst part about programming in Java. There are plenty of smart people doing smart things on the platform, but you won't find them on the average project due to the fact that it seems like every idiot programmer on the planet works in Java too. Perhaps it is second to VB in this regard, but I am not sure.

axod• 18 years ago

"java isn't all that it's cracked up to be"

"every java 'engineer' I've known has been a siv"

It depends if you're learning a language to build stuff, or to work with good people (community). As a language, I'd say java rocks most of the time and does a good job of things.

It's similar to javascript. A large number of people who program javascript are really pretty poor programmers, who just program by trial+error, or copy+paste code they found on the web. This doesn't mean javascript as a language is bad though. It just attracts a wide range of users.

alnayyir• 18 years ago

siv?

amichail• 18 years ago

Learn Scala: http://www.scala-lang.org

jorgeortiz85• 18 years ago

Agreed. As a language, Scala is superior to both C# and Java. It's open source and it has the advantage of being compatible with Java's platform, environment, and libraries.

jrockway2• 18 years ago

Exactly. If you need to use Java for some reason, like getting at their libraries, you will do well to use anything other than the Java language. The platform is good. The language is 20 years behind the state of the art. Unless you are forced to work with other people that can't learn a language other than Java, there is no point in using it. I lean in the direction of Clojure, but lately the constant fanboi-ing is really putting me off.

C# is similar -- F# is a much better way of interacting with .Net libraries. It is even "fully-supported" by Microsoft from what I've read, so it is definitely a good alternative to C# if you prefer its functional style. (And who doesn't?)

Finally, if you don't need Java or .Net libraries, SBCL is a very nice Common Lisp implementation. It's fast, and if you like emacs, the tools are great. It is quickly becoming my favorite environment. (Perl is my other favorite.)

Despite what others say, you can write maintainable and well-performing code in any of these languages. So pick one and get started... that's the hardest part.

delano• 18 years ago

You're not going to find a clear answer one way or the other. If you enjoy working with Microsoft products, including Visual Studio, go for C#. If you like, or would like to learn, using other platforms, go for Java.

Keep in mind a lot of the value of Java is the JVM. It's everywhere now so it's kind of like a perl for enterprises.

mikeryan• 18 years ago

I'm in Silicon Valley - so this skews me a bit, but Java by far.

It does depend a bit on what you want to do, but most everything I see is sliding towards java. You can do web development, mobile (except iPhone) and though it hasn't fully caught on yet, I'm seeing more apps on the desktop in Java than in the past.

geuis2• 18 years ago

If you are looking to only program for windows, C#. Stay away from java at all cost. Java is a career trap, and more importantly a destroyer of intellect. My roommate is a C# programmer and a system architect. Really smart and he makes close to $150k per year. Java would qualify you to flip French fries in comparison. Also, keep Objective C in mind. That opens up Mac and iPhone development to you. Macs are at 20% marketshare now, iPhones the best selling smart phone. Plus programming for Mac/iPhone is just fun. Further afield, look at languages like Erlang. The future of computing is hundreds and thousands of parallel cores and parallel languages like Erlang are in many ways increasingly important.

vlad3• 18 years ago

I think the Systems Architect position earns that salary, not just a developer who uses that specific language. I don't think anybody is saying C# developers are paid badly, but that Java is open source in (I think) every way by now, and that means it will survive for a long time.

On the other hand, I'm never putting faith into Microsoft's development tools again, as nice as they are, because in recent history, Microsoft has killed off programming languages and tools at will, even their most popular ones. Microsoft makes developers depend on Microsoft's ability to update and improve their programming tools, in order to make the case they should charge for them, but has killed off popular programs or languages in order to concentrate on new ones, given that they themselves don't have resources to support all of them at once.

johns10• 18 years ago

I assume you're mostly referring to VB6 being EOL'd. Any other examples?

time_management• 18 years ago

Java, then Clojure. I've never used Clojure, but my understanding is that it's a Lisp dialect that targets the Java VM.

Do learn a language like Lisp, Ruby, or Ocaml, though. Once you get used to the functional paradigm, you'll realize how much more powerful these languages are, and you'll never go back.

PieSquared• 18 years ago

Yup, you'll never look back! ...unless you need to get a job, of course...

Though Python is used more and more now, you can definitely get jobs in languages other than Java and C# and such... But sadly, not Lisp or Ocaml though, at least not easily.

vlad3• 18 years ago

So you've learned C, and C++. Of Java and C#, you may as well continue learning them in that order to see how one tries to improve on its predecessor, though by now it's likely that Java has adapted some ideas from C# as well.

Oh, and learn Objective-C!

speek• 18 years ago

C# has got a bunch of neat functional stuff in it (Microsoft's researchers have seen the glory of functional languages), but Java might be easier to start off with.

Once you can get through Java, everything else you learn will feel immensely superior...

johns10• 18 years ago

Can you back up your claim that Java is easier to start with?

rbanffy2• 18 years ago

Nobody can. But then, C# isn't easy to start with.

"The least painful" is what I would say.

kstenson• 18 years ago

I would recommend looking at c#, or more interestingly the .net framework and the CLR. Once you've learn't the framework then you can also look at the other .net languages. Ironpython, IronRuby and F# give you a width breadth of languages and ideas but with the benfit of the shared .Net framework and the object inter opt that comes with the CLR/DLR

tzury• 18 years ago

Once you said ASP.NET it is clear that you are heading to the web.

If you insist not to develop web applications using the greatest open source platforms which serve today all the largest sites, then C# would be better than Java simply because ASP.NET has much more to offer than Java in the web field.

mickt3• 18 years ago

I've noticed that no-one has talked about the cost of using either.

Yes the Java IDE's are somewhat inferior to MS's, but you can get everything you need to write, develop, manage, and host Java applications for free compared to MS; the OS, IDE, Web Server ... all cost money which can be a substantial amount for commercial purposes.

icey4• 18 years ago

Due to Mono, this is only like 63% true.

krschultz• 18 years ago

Yea except 63% true X 40% of .NET that Mono actually implements is a lot less than the 100% of Java that can be accessed from Eclipse.

aschobel• 18 years ago

I love IntelliJ IDEA, it kicks some serious ass: http://www.jetbrains.com/

The last time I used VS was with VC++ 6.0, so no clue how IntelliJ compares.

alexkay• 18 years ago

JetBrains has an add-in for VS called Resharper: http://www.jetbrains.com/resharper/

I wouldn't consider using VS without it.

gaius• 18 years ago

Time is money, and Visual Studio is a very productive environment.

mickt3• 18 years ago

I agree it might be more productive (I've never used it). But I do feel the costs and associated costs are quite high.

Imagine you get accepted by PG into Ycombinator and you have your $15000 in hand to start. Using MS technologies you have to pay ~$700 per developer for a Visual Studio license: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000WM04HU . As you are now a commercial enterprise you can't use the cheapo student version for $50 anymore. Plus you need to pony up a IIS license for each developer to test on, and Windows Server 2008 license for each developer, and an even more expensive OS license for your multi-processor multi-core server ...

So off the bat you've already spend more than a month's rent for that studio in Sommerville your going to be camped out in ...

Whereas if you go the freebie Open Source route all you need to buy is hardware. Maybe your labour is more, but it's your blood, sweat, and tears which at an early point in the game is cheap. VS is a lot of .99c noodles! ;)

iamelgringo• 18 years ago

If you're interested in working on the Microsoft stack, they actually make it very easy for startups and ISV's. You can get a full Action Pack subscription of licenses for $300: https://partner.microsoft.com/US/program/managemembership/ac...

Or, if you can find a Network Partner, join the BizSpark program and use their stack for free for $100 after 3 years: http://www.microsoft.com/BizSpark/

The argument of Java is better because it's cheaper tends to fall apart when you look at that.

Encosia• 18 years ago

That was once true, but the "Express" (free) versions of Visual Studio and SQL Server all but completely negate the cost argument.

ensignavenger• 18 years ago

You should look at doing C# and learning .NET, and as has been stated, you could then use .NET with all sorts of languages (IronPython, IronRuby, etc.) You could also look at the Mono project for Open Source development, and as you are doing web apps, take a look at Silverlight/Moonlight. Silverlight has very impressive capabilities and potential.

webwright• 18 years ago

Would probably be good to specify your goals. Long term job security? Payscale? Building your own startup/app?

jimfl• 18 years ago

C# and Java are very similar. Learn one, and the path to the other is quick. The languages have essentially the same feature set, though some of the advanced concepts (reflection metadata, generics) are easier to learn on C#. XML in C# makes Java seem like a major pain in the 455.

rbanffy2• 18 years ago

If those were my only choices, I would consider changing my career. Maybe learn to cook and open a gourmet restaurant.

Now, seriously, I would go for Java because, at least, it can run cross-platform without the danger of Microsoft suing you out of existence.

johns10• 18 years ago

"it can run cross-platform without the danger of Microsoft suing you out of existence"

Please explain further. MS isn't suing Mono (and supports them in many ways) and is increasing their cross-platform capabilities with Silverlight. These are not cure-alls, but they are progress.

nailer• 18 years ago

How is Silverlight cross platform? Have you tried finding and installing Silverlight on Linux? If you managed to, what percent of the sites on Microsoft's showcase worked?

Hint: I know the answer to all the above. That's why I'm asking the question.

ricky_clarkson2• 18 years ago

Go for the one with lambdas.

zcrar70• 18 years ago

That'll be C# then - but I'm guessing that's not what you meant :-)

ricky_clarkson2• 18 years ago

Yes, actually, that's what I meant.

gills• 18 years ago

Have you considered learning both? They have a lot in common, and 'which one is better' is a decision you need to make for yourself in the context of your project.

Oddly enough, geography might matter. For example, Seattle seems to have a bunch of consulting shops and even a few product startups using MS tools. (There are also startups using the usual suspects...Java, PHP, Python, Ruby,...).

Both languages' VMs are accessible to a number of other languages if you decide to branch out later. As many have said already, Java gets a slight leg up from open source.

xefyr• 18 years ago

Why would you only learn one of them? Learn every language you can. Learn them well enough to love and hate each for 5 different reasons. Learn them well enough to know which should be used when.

IMHO: they are very similar languages with converging library offerings. I think Java is ahead of the game in this regard because it's been "in the wild" longer and has more of an open source following.

And don't forget, they can interop very easily with SpringFramework and XML-RPC.

ra• 18 years ago

Java was a great choice of language to learn 10 years ago. c# was a mediocre choice to learn 5 years ago.

In terms of employability, they both have enclaves of popularity around the world.

Java would be my recommendation, if limited to those two.

However there are better languages around today including those already mentioned.

MaysonL• 18 years ago

Component Pascal: available in both .NET and JVM versions, as well as a native Windows app. Reasonably well-chosen splashes of OO, functional, and meta programming in a spare, Wirthianly simple language.

caustic• 18 years ago

From my experience of working with both Java and .NET I can say that: the weakest part of the .NET technology stack is community, and the strongest part of the Java world is community which produced the huge pool of quality, free and open-source frameworks. Currently Maven repositories count for more than 14,000 unique artifacts and almost 60,000 versions (http://www.mvnbrowser.com/faq.html).

C# is a nice language, but when you have to develop a real-world application, it does not help much. .NET simply lacks too many essential tools and frameworks. You can do basic things with it, but when you have a non-standard task at hand, you are alone to implement the solution by yourself or pay for crappy third-party closed-source component. Even for trivial tasks. Want a decent HTML parser to sanitize HTML documents? Write it by yourself or pay for crappy third-party closed-source component. Want to read email messages from the server? ... you got the idea. The list goes on and on. I am currently working on a C# project which has integration with source control systems. We had to invest a lot of time to write our own framework and providers for several most widely adopted tools, such as Subversion and Perforce. If we based our project on Java, we would saved lot of time on development by choosing Maven SCM providers, which are free and open-source. Another example is that we needed a decent audit history for the documents in the database. Again, we had to develop somewhat working home-grown solution. If we based our project on Java, we would simply pick open-source Envers framework (http://www.jboss.org/envers/) which does exactly what we need for free.

And I hate Visual Studio. It offers a little more than a notepad with syntax coloring and debugger. It is horrible for coding and those variegated wizards and diagramming tools don't make me productive either. Being unable to attach third-party source codes is a huge PITA. Eclipse in size is just a fraction of the VS installer, but still is feature-packed, better for refactoring and has a plenty of plugins. Speaking of IntelliJ Idea, it's simply the best IDE ever.

.NET build and CI tools suck, there is nothing to compare with Maven.

If you like to learn new languages, I think there is nothing to beat JVM in terms of variety programming languages running on top of it. Just for example, the most notable ones are JavaScript, Python, Ruby, Groovy (Python-like language with Java-friendly syntax), Scala, Clojure (Lisp-like), CAL Language (Haskell-like) and many more. By the way, JVM by itself is quite a decent piece of engineering.

My experience makes me think that Microsoft is trying to be popular at any cost, targeting inexperienced programmers, intentionally oversimplifying their solutions, making simple things trivial, complex things impossible. The Microsoft culture is to give you a big bright flashy button, which does a lot of things under the hood, but when accidentally it breaks, you are unable to guess what is going on and how to fix it. Living in the world of closed-source .NET code makes me cry.

So the conclusion is: choose Java over .NET, but learn more uncommon programming languages as well. Haskell, Lisp and Prolog were huge "brain-washers" for me.

jules3• 18 years ago

What if you want to sell software components/libraries? Which platform would you choose?

michaelneale2• 18 years ago

From my experience - Java will get you a much larger audience, but .Net audience is more happy to pay for tools/libs. In .Net pay-for is the norm, in Java open source is the norm. Opportunities on both sides.

The main other issue on the .Net side is if you get in the way of MS - the will just run over you and make you irrelevant.

jaycee2• 18 years ago

To add to the list of examples of places where you have to roll your own:

At my company we needed a simple CSV reader for a file submission. That's it--just something that could read CSV files. We figured that had to be available in classic .NET We look around, dug into forums, and finally got in touch with the local .NET user group guru. The ideal solution? Use MS's communication tools to open the CSV file in excel and read it there. Or? Roll your own.

We ended up doing the thing in python and imported the csv lib.

jaycee2• 18 years ago

So, uhm, to bring that back to the OP's question:

I would go with Java, out of the two. It's as verbose as C#, but has, in my experience, much better support for pretty much everything.

johns10• 18 years ago

To be honest, you didn't look hard enough. There are multiple, mature OSS projects to handle this.

Where should the framework end? People complain all the time about the size of the framework, but then when their pet feature is missing, they cry foul.

13ren2• 18 years ago

Want a decent HTML parser to sanitize HTML documents? Write it by yourself or pay for crappy third-party closed-source component.

Sounds like a fantastic platform/market, if you want to write great components and sell them.

donniefitz2• 18 years ago

I would go with C#. There are lot's of people who say that you are subject to Microsoft's directing of the language, but if you go with Java, you are subject to Sun/OS direction just the same. C# is a great language and ASP.Net is great for the Web. It's not popular to advocate a Microsoft product here but I'm very happy with C# and ASP.Net. Your goals will be the ultimate factor in your decision though.

jimbokun3• 18 years ago

"if you go with Java, you are subject to Sun/OS direction"

Not as much, now that Java is open sourced.

DomesticMouse• 18 years ago

As a ten year veteran of Java, currently learning C# (the world is full of irony), I can say that Java is a simpler language. There are a bunch of bones thrown to c++ and assembler focused guys in C# making it a more complex language to master. And I dispute that VisualStudio is a better IDE than IntelliJ. So, my honest opinion is start with Java.

Spend time writing code, and just as importantly, reading it. Read through Spring, Hibernate, et al. Understand the architectures, the trade offs, and the code tricks.

newsit• 18 years ago

Learn both. Seriously. Pick a good book about algorithms or data structures, open Visual Studio and Eclipse, load the Java and .NET docs in your browser, maybe pick some introductory books on both and start coding the examples. It might take a little longer to start, but it will pay out tremendously in the end.

I've been doing this with Scheme and Erlang using SICP (http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/) and it has definitely helped me understand better both the languages and the material.

In your case you have two very similar platforms, object-oriented, garbage collected, with a very similar syntax. The big strengths for both are their libraries and their VMs, learning them in parallel makes lots of sense.

lst• 18 years ago

You ask seriously?

Then you should stop programming and start hacking (in the spare time of your day job).

Seriously: what exactly do you expect from the only 2 languages left with exactly no fun?!

ruslan• 18 years ago

It seems, we are pretty close to epoch where C programmer to be treated as assembly guru nowadays who can read machine codes right out of hex dump.

Man, learn C/C++ first, I beg you!

asmosoinio• 18 years ago

He has done that already: "For the record, I ... code in c, c++ on the day job."

johns10• 18 years ago

One important thing I think is being missed in this conversation is the vibrancy of the .NET community, much of which is C# focused. There's a very active community of .NET devs out there that aren't doing things the Microsoft way, creating useful and popular open source libraries and sharing that information with other devs. The Dev Div at MS is extremely active in the community as well. If you look at how the new ASP.NET MVC Framework is being rolled out (open source, multiple rounds of community feedback) and the inclusion of jQuery AS IS (not extended or modified) in the MS stack you'll see a big difference from the MS you think you know.

NonEUCitizen• 18 years ago

Yes, learn C# OR Java, where OR != XOR:

  TRUE == OR(TRUE, TRUE)

When it comes to programming, be language, platform, vendor, and ideology agnostic.

SapphireSun2• 18 years ago

My startup was recently looking at platforms to target windows effectively. We just spent a lot of wasted time looking at .NET. Perhaps because it was because we are very cheap, but we couldn't find decent (well written) documentation. Also, visual studio is a bit confusing after working for a while in a linux development environment.

I then remembered that I was already familiar with Java syntax, and that if we needed speed, we could always code subroutines in C/C++ and link them through JNI. The thing that is nice about Java is the amount of documentation and tutorials (and source!) lying around. Of course, working with a big IDE like Eclipse will be a big change as well, but we are going to go with Java.

By the way,does anyone here know if it is possible to create a salable client side application using something like Python? It is my impression that it is a bit too easy to disassemble without including some sort of heavy duty DRM scheme that wouldn't be worth the effort. If it isn't, does Java suffer from the same problem since you compile to bytecode?

shiranaihito• 18 years ago

Java class files can be decompiled, but is it really a cause for concern?

At least someone has to go out of their way to decompile your stuff.

SapphireSun2• 18 years ago

I suppose. What we really want to do is make it so that if someone cracks it and posts it on thepiratebay or something that someone will need to consciously need to run a keygen program or something so they at least recognize they were supposed to get it from a more official source.

13ren2• 18 years ago

What's your purpose? That is, "better" for what?

dreur• 17 years ago

Grails !! Works with java (and uses professional java tech) but has the dev speed of rails or django.

Check the case studie of Wired : http://www.springsource.com/files/Wired.com%20Case%20study.....

Ask HN : Which should I learn : C# or Java

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