According the Standish Group, 84% of all IT-related projects are not delivered on time or within budget. Now when the world reads 'IT-related projects,' the automatic assumption is that the IT department is to blame.

Apparently it hasn't been a good quarter for many PDA makers. Shipments were down from the same period last year so, of course, doom and gloom are predicted by all and sundry. Actually I'm exaggerating; one of the reports I read was fairly evenhanded in its approach ­ another was about as subdued as Chicken Little.

This past June, the crew and I spent a week in one of the best cities in the world. New York City played host to SYS-CON's Web Services Edge Conference & Expo, where all the major players in the Web services market come under one roof to talk and debate the emergence of this new wave of technology. It was good to catch up with people and I thoroughly enjoyed grabbing some quality face-to-face time with a number of authors, including Joey Gibson and Rick Hightower, to name but a few.

I'm sure you've heard many of the cannibal jokes. One of my favorites is a news flash in a cannibal tribe announcing the invention of the 'pressure cooker': 'We have news of a device that cooks a man within minutes, and even lets out a whistle when it's done.' Though technology brings to fruition concepts that were conceived of only a few decades ago, our expectations of technology far exceed the speed at which it makes solutions available.

You may be aware of a radio program in the UK called 'Desert Island Discs.' Basically, well-known people choose which records they would want if they were stuck on a desert island (I've yet to hear anyone say they're taking a CD player). Something of a similar nature is happening to me at the moment, as I'm working from home (but far from stranded).

At times, I wonder just how far short the computer industry has fallen of its promise of a few decades ago. I'm not talking about the lofty ideal of the computer of the future that science fiction authors were predicting we'd be using by now, such as machines capable of holding a proper conversation (or better yet, capable of withering sarcasm in the face of human stupidity), human-computer symbiosis, etc.

When I wrote my last editorial I was on a plane to Toronto. What I neglected to tell you was where I was off to after Toronto. It was to Redmond, Washington, as the guest of Microsoft, where they showed me the virtues of their .NET framework. It was a very interesting visit and I learned a lot. I'm in the throes of writing up my report on the whole shebang and once I have my facts straight, I'll publish them in JDJ.

Here's a short pop quiz: Have you ever built an application in J2EE and taken it through the entire product life cycle? Or, for that matter, any distributed computing application? If the answer is 'Yes,' then answer this one: Have you handled all the facets of the application on your own - as a one-man team?

There's no escaping that the evolution of programming languages has its advantages and disadvantages. The addition of the java.util.regex package to the JDK1.4 API is a perfect example of Java's development since 1995. However, there's a group of programmers who know only Java and no other language, so it's difficult for them to see why things like regular expressions are included. It all boils down to how your own career evolved.

A recent press release from Palm got me thinking about their PDAs, as well as why Palm (in the UK) never returned my e-mails...but that's another matter (and half a world away now). In any case, according to the release, 5,000 Palms are to be purchased as part of a three-year grant program for several New York State school associations.

Fly me to the moon...let me walk among the stars' or at least America. I am at present sitting in a Continental plane flying over the beautiful Scottish islands, sun beaming in through the window, contemplating the week ahead of me. My destination is Toronto where I will be attending the CFML conference, CFNORTH. It has been very interesting to watch how the CFML community is reacting to the Java releases. Their responses serve to illustrate the point I have been banging on about for the last few months: outside of the Java community, we still have a long way to go in the education and perception of our beautiful language. Allow me to give you another example of ignorance.

Some years ago I did all my coding in vi, then later in Emacs. I still believe these are great editors; I just don't use them anymore for Java development, especially J2EE application development. I'm much more productive if I use an IDE whose sole purpose in life is to facilitate product development. I can probably still write code faster if I use vi. However, I doubt I could meet my deadlines if all I had was a tool that was primarily meant to be an editor. Emacs is a great environment for setting up and using a development environment. However, it is for all purposes a code editor, not an IDE..

This month I'm at peace with the world so this editorial may seem somewhat relaxed and, dare I say, floppy. I've recently taken up Yoga - calmness in the mind, strength in the body, peace in the soul (or words to that effect). I mention this because I've felt the need to relax more outside the office, and this seemed the perfect way. I know this is common in certain jobs where perhaps a lot of money is at stake with every minor decision. The kinds of jobs that frankly provide way too much stress and people problems.

I've been thinking a PhD student should consider doing a thesis on the life expectancy of a pen after it's purchased. I've come up with an approximate calculation for mine: LE (Life Expectancy) =DWU (Date of Wanting to Use)-1; in other words, a pen will go missing the day before you really need to use it. There's definitely a paper there somewhere waiting to be written.

The whole wireless space has been an interesting one to keep an eye on for the past couple of years, in particular how it relates to the Java space. Sure, we've heard wonderful tales about the vast millions of phones in Japan and how quickly Java is being adopted there, but for the rest of us here in the West, it's not quite as exciting. Regular readers know only too well my woes with my Nokia and the lack of Java support. The question is this: Is it a pipe dream or is it really coming?

I'll never buy a Casio watch again. Not just because they break down - that's just the luck of the draw - but because of their extremely poor service. I've spent months trying to get my $200 watch back from their service center, but to no avail. It isn't the money that matters; it's the principle of the thing. For a couple of months it was nearly impossible to get anyone on the phone, and there was no advertised Web address for contacting the service center.

If you read my editorial last month (JDJ, Vol. 7, issue 4), you'll recall that I was trying to work out just who the Java community was and whether or not you or I feel a part of it. Well, I think I met the community at JavaOne 2002.

JavaOne is over, and it's time to sit back and reflect...and to sift through the hundreds of press releases and announcements that ricochet around the Internet like balls around a pinball machine. While I couldn't be there myself, when I checked my e-mails each day, I felt as if I was there in spirit at least.

As Nat King Cole famously sang, we have to 'face the music and dance...' This month's editorial is coming to you with a reader beware warning! I've been engaged in some great debates over the last month on a variety of topics, but the one that has caught my interest is the old chestnut regarding the longevity of Java.

You want to develop a new business application based on your particular business problem. You get a software team to pull together the right mix of technologies to build the required software components. You choose an architect to capture your business requirements and to define the right mix of software and hardware to deploy the appropriate solution.

By the time you read this, JavaOne will be over and I'll have experienced my first visit to the world's grandest Java conference. For various reasons I've never been able to attend before, but this year (knock on wood), the gods have smiled on me and the constellations are positioned in my favor.

A strange accident occurred on my flight back to New Zealand. Somehow, the plane flew through a rip in space-time and we wound up in a freak alternate dimension. The thing is, it was initially very difficult to tell that we weren't in the right dimension anymore, because everything was pretty much the same.

The Pros and Cons of Certification. 'To Be or Not To Be Certified...' (Vol. 7, issue 2) by Keith Brown is a great editorial. Finally someone is standing up and saying what the entire community is thinking: certification is just another money-making route for Sun.

Guess what? It’s JavaOne month. That came around fast – and don’t panic if you’re sitting there wondering where the year went; it hasn’t, well not yet anyway. JavaOne is earlier this year, with only a nine-month gap from the previous one. It’s moved back to its old March time slot, which makes traveling and staying in San Francisco a little cheaper. Early reports indicate that attendance will be down this year, but I think that’s a good thing – it was getting too big. Never enough time for all the sessions you want to attend or to talk to the people you want to meet. We’ll report next month on the jewels we uncover and you can read about the goings on at www.sys-con.com/java

By the time you get this issue, JavaOne will be around the corner. Or you picked up this issue at the conference itself. This is JavaOne’s seventh year – and for J2EE, it seems that the middle-tier component wars are over, with J2EE clearly emerging as the winning platform for the enterprise.

My mother bought a computer for her birthday, the usual affair – Windows, printer, scanner, speakers, etc. She’s a complete novice and needless to say, she’s having a hard time working the thing. Her main complaint (I think in relation to word processing) is that it does far too many things that she doesn’t want it to do and the terminology is confusing.

A few months ago Alan mentioned that he had finally shifted to Star Office. As someone who has been using the software suite since Sun took it over, I applaud his decision to move away from that other office package. However, the shift doesn’t come without a few challenges that can be quite annoying when you first make the move.

A mobile phone (or cell for our American friends) is like a wristwatch in many respects. You don't change it too often, putting up with its little idiosyncrasies, loving its familiarity; you need something pretty spectacular to lure you away and start the hassle of getting to know another personality. This month I took the plunge and updated my Nokia to the latest model. I had my previous phone (7110) for a little over a year, and although it was WAP-enabled, it wasn't Java.

In a tough competitive market one of the biggest challenges vendors face is what message to put around their product to distinguish it from their competitor's. The question of which features to focus on is a tough call. The dilemma is paradoxical. With the emphasis on standards, all vendors need to comply with published standards. However, this levels the playing field and leaves very little room for vendors to highlight the functionality that can distinguish them from others. Hence, each vendor needs to provide value-added features that attract clients to their fare.

Yesterday I received an A4 piece of cardboard from Sun Microsystems signed by Scott McNealy. I peered at the signature and angled it to the light to see if it was a printed signature or a real one from the pen of Mr. McNealy himself. It was hard to tell. The piece of cardboard said that I had 'Fulfilled all requirements as a Sun Certified Programmer for the Java 2 Platform.' Hooray!

I've been hearing lately that Bluetooth is making a comeback. Considering that it had hardly gotten started when it was written off in certain quarters, it's amusing to see a comeback prediction so soon. In any case, I can see that short-range wireless protocols, such as Bluetooth, will eventually be enormously useful in the device market.

It's the start of a new year; what fruits will our computing orchard serve up this season? This time last year the industry was excitedly preparing us for how Web services would take over. Sun was gearing up for their Sun ONE announcement in February after Microsoft had begun filtering out information on what their .NET was really about. With 12 months now in the time bank, I can truly say I have not seen any major change. Just a lot more people than usual, particularly vendor companies, talking a great game.

Welcome to 2002 J2EE. The year 2001 has been a learning experience for all of us in the Java technology universe. The lesson has been a painful one - focus on the business problem and apply technology to ensure the right ROI. About a year ago, several folks were riding out the fantasy of paper money; options would change their entire lifestyle.

Happy New Year! I trust you had a good festive break...not drinking or eating too much. Who am I? Good question. My name is Keith Brown and I'm the new J2SE editor of Java Developer's Journal. As this is the first issue of the new year, our editor-in-chief felt it was the perfect time for me to kick off and bring my flavor of Java to you each month.

I was reading a forum discussion recently that argued that J2ME was a mess. The general consensus (admittedly there weren't that many messages) seemed to be that this conclusion was correct. My automatic response was 'What a complete load of bollocks' (which I think means I've been living in England far too long). However, upon reflection, I still don't entirely agree, but I don't disagree either. I am officially in-betwixt camps. Neutral. Unbiased (yeah, right).

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire, Jack Frost nipping at your nose...damn, isn't this the best time of the year! Ironically, the actual event on the 25th isn't that memorable, but the lead up to this day is what gets me all fired up. And this year, I have two special celebrations. First and foremost, my son is in a state of motion - he'll be a massive 1.06-years-old (I bet you can tell I'm a developer can't you?). Second, this will be my first Christmas as editor-in-chief of JDJ and I'll be celebrating six months in this role. When I say things like that, I realize how much I sound like my parents and resign myself to the fact that I am getting older. Ho hum.

To help cut the cost of travel in today's economy, I flew ATA from Philadelphia to San Francisco last weekend. You know, if you live within the constraints defined by these airlines, it's not really a bad way to go. Of course, you travel in a full plane (and I mean packed to the brim), can't change your itinerary, spend an extra hour or so at the connection point, and so on. However, you end up paying less than you would at the major airlines, especially with a last-minute booking.

Much of Sun's emphasis lately has been on server-side and J2ME technologies, and many industry pundits have predicted death knells for client-side Java. This makes some sense. Let's look at some J2SE facts: The initial versions of Java Virtual Machines (JVMs) were bug-laden, slow, and unreliable, making it nearly impossible for the nascent Java pioneers who had invested heavily in this technology to deliver a reliable, high-quality end-user experience. Developers shied away from widespread adoption, despite rapid improvements to client-side Java.

After what seems like months of waiting (and it probably has been), a color mobile phone (as opposed to a PDA/phone combination) has finally appeared on the British market. With a 101x80 pixel 256-color STN display, an e-mail application, calendar, games, and PC synchronization, it has everything you might want in a mobile...hang on a minute...where's the Java?

This month the whole JDJ crew, minus Mr. Briggs, was at the Hilton in central Manhattan for our JDJEdge conference. It was a great show with much discussion regarding the state of our industry and where it's heading. As usual the old 'Web services' debate was high on everyone's agenda, discussing what exactly it means for us. I'm not too excited about the whole Web services revolution. Personally, I think it's just a marketing gimmick to repackage old products and technology.