Why You Should Learn Java in 2019

Learning how to code might be slightly scary for the newcomers, and that’s hardly a surprise. It’s not easy to stay cool and smash along millions of programmers globally with zero experience and an intangible idea of your goals and career. Would your education be intense? Yes. Is it too late to try? Of course, not.

You probably look for a rapid progress, if you’re serious about programming, and the language is your basis to start with. Even if you search for the answer to the question, which is the best programming language to learn, you won’t find a unanimous opinion. First of all, every developer will try to “push” you his own choice. Secondly, there’s no such thing as the best language, because they serve different purposes.

There are at least half a dozen programming languages, which keep the highest positions of different rankings. According to TIOBE Programming Community ranking, Java firmly keeps the first place with the largest number of searches through the most popular search engines. It is tracked by C, Python and C++ languages. As for GitHub’s Octoverse ranking, the top three most popular languages of all time are Javascript, Java, and Python.

Why Java is so popular

Now you’re probably thinking something like: “why exactly do I need Java of all options”? As told before, there will never be a programming language with unchallenged authority. But still, you can make a choice quite easy, if you analyze the long-term benefits of mastering a certain language. Let’s talk about why Java is so popular and why little is going to change in the closest time.

You may heard something like “Java is too old, it will become out of use in a few years”. Actually, it’s of the same age as other widely used programming languages. The story of its creation begins in the 90s at a Californian company Sun Microsystems. You may know (or remember), that back in the 90s a TV was truly influential in communications and entertainment. For this reason, it inspired many useful progressive inventions. And, by implication, it kickstarted the creation of Java language.

It was initially developed for interactive television to let application developers write code once and run it on any platform without the need to decompile it, thanks to JVM (Java virtual machine). For the obvious reason, such flexibility and multiplatform usability can be applied anywhere.

What is Java used for

So, nowadays, what is Java used for? Particularly, for a majority of modern demands. Java is object-oriented, class-based, all-purpose language that allows developers to create programs, which are compatible with any devices. It has many benefits for a beginner in programming and for a further career development. Let’s see what’s waiting for a future Java developer step by step.

Step #1 Learning to code from point zero

One of the main reasons why you should learn Java is because it's quite easy to learn. You don’t even need to be a pro in math to start coding: you simply need to understand the logic. Secondly, it is a high-level language. This means that many processes in Java programming run automatically and you don’t have to delve too deep to create a program that actually works. Referring to a simple example, Java is like a car with automatic transmission: it’s easy to grasp a skill with a little help from your “machine”.

Even if you have any difficulties in learning Java, you can easily get help from a global community. There are more than 9 millions Java developers in the world, and their online community is vast and dynamic. You can easily find an answer to almost any question, that appears while you study and get useful sources to deepen your knowledge.

Some programmers say, that Java isn’t the first choice in learning how to code from scratch. Probably, it can be harder for a freshman to learn Java, than other languages. But a hard drill makes an easy battle. Once you learn Java, it will become a handy tool for a great number of tasks.

Step #2 Starting as a junior developer

Once you’ve gained core knowledge, you start a career as a programmer on Java: this is what you aspire, don’t you? As a beginner, you’ll feel more confident knowing that Java has a huge number of libraries and frameworks for numerous tasks. As a learner, you write your own routines to get plenty of practice and make sense of programming process. But later, as a developer, you can adjust ready-made solutions to your project. They will help you save time in numerous large-scale projects. Plus everything you need is there for you in a great Java documentation at Oracle and Stack Overflow.

Step #3 Boosting your career

When you get familiar with the Java Virtual Machine, you can easily use other languages with such a runtime environment. For example, Groovy, Scala, Kotlin and Clojure. So if you want to, you can join as many interesting projects as you wish and enhance the knowledge of the technology stack.

Anyway, Java itself will always inspire your progress. The latest versions were released within six months of each other, and the newest is coming up in spring, 2019. They are enhanced with new features, which answer the needs of modern enterprises, startups, medium and small-sized businesses. That puts Java developers in a high demand. Hence, they work on promising projects and earn high salaries. According to Indeed.com, an average Java developer salary in the U.S. is more than $100 000 per year.

Why learn Java in 2019? Because you will use all the benefits of a flexible, security-oriented, dynamic language. As told before, Java is among all-time leaders in the programming world.

Java is used for writing mobile applications, both Android and iOS. You can also choose it to create web pages by compiling to JavaScript (Google Web Toolkit). Considering that nowadays almost all B2C companies need to reach their clients through the mobile channel, there are thousands of projects waiting for you.

Java is everywhere and in the closest time is expected to become even more important in Big Data and the Internet of things developments. Building platforms and applications for any devices, such as laptops, computers, gaming consoles, navigation systems, monitoring facilities, terminals, etc., makes Java the best programming language to learn in 2019

All in all, the short answer fotohe question what is Java used for is “to create a mainstream software any business needs”.

How to learn Java

If you want to learn to code on Java, be sure you are ready to devote at least 3 to 6 month to a self-education and study daily. You probably already know, that programming is about practice, so you should have three times or even four times more coding than researching. In such a way you will get skilled at coding and won’t fall into an endless “rabbit-hole” of programming theory.

If you want to know how to learn Java fast, these tips are for you:

1. Set your goals in a career by answering a question “Why exactly do I need Java”.
2. With this context, create your personal educational plan with a schedule.
3. Choose tools to help your needs: books, courses, coding platforms, etc.
4. Find additional sources of information: media, forums, Java communities — everything to keep you up to date.
5. Practice a lot: you need hundreds of hours of coding before it becomes your habit.
6. Don’t get stuck on something you don’t quite understand — go on with your study and practice.
7. Never stop learning: this is what successful programmer do.

And if you were searching for the (almost) perfect environment for learning Java, this is what probably brought you to CodeGym :) There’s no better time for starting than right now.

Previously was published on CodeGym blog.