Although physical RAM is inexpensive, allocating large of amounts of memory to a JVM instance is not generally a good idea, says Azul Systems' CTO Gil Tene in this interview with Artima. Tene shows how recent research in garbage collection and JVM implementation helps overcome the JVM's memory barrier, resulting in new types of applications.

Continuing its tradition of providing support for an increasing number of languages and environments, NetBeans 6.1 introduces advanced JavaScript and PHP features. In this interview with Artima, Sun NetBeans evangelist Gregg Sporar discusses JavaScript and PHP support, such as refactoring and intelligent code completion.

In this interview from JavaOne 2008, Coverity chief scientist Andy Chou discusses why traditional unit tests don't often help in uncovering concurrency-related errors, and why a combination of static and dynamic analysis yields better results when testing multithreaded code.

Ajax applications depend on asynchronous interaction between client and server. In this interview with Artima, ICEsoft's Stephen Maryka describes a potentially more transforming asynchronicity where updates are pushed to the client without the user having to request those updates.

The Java VM shields most developers from having to think about the memory-management aspects their Java objects, but it does not completely manage other types of resources automatically, says Gwyn Fisher, CTO of Klockwork in this interview with Artima. Great Java developers learn to understand what the JVM does, and does not do, for their objects.

Detecting concurrency-related bugs and performance bottlenecks is hard, especially on clusters consisting of a large number of nodes. In an interview with Artima, Terracotta co-founder and CTO Ari Zilka explains the importance of visualization in cluster-based applications, and introduces Terracotta's open-source cluster visualizer tool.

Object-oriented databases complement relational databases in important ways, says Anat Gafni, VP of Engineering at db4objects, the company behind the open-source object database db4o. In this interview with Artima, Gafni explains how OO databases support agile development, and how they co-exist with relational databases in an enterprise.

Software-as-service (SaaS) has started to permeate the field of software development tools, says Atlassian's Jeffrey Walker in this interview with Artima. Walker describes important characteristics of hosted developer tools, and highlights the need for such tools to integrate well with locally-installed tools, such as IDEs.

A programming language is as much about a set of design principles as it is about syntax and code structure. In this brief interview Martin Odersky, creator of the Scala language, talks about design tendencies that Scala encourages, especially in comparison with Java. He also discusses Scala's approach to concurrency.

Discovering security problems early in the development cycle is only the first step toward creating more secure and reliable applications, says Parasoft's Wayne Ariola in an interview with Artima. For developers to work effectively, addressing security-related coding issues must be integrated into developers' daily workflow.

In this article, which is based on Chapter 1 of the book, Programming in Scala, you'll get an overview of the Scala language and insights into its design.

Re-using developer knowledge is an important concern for many enterprises. In this interview with Artima, CodeGear's Jeff Anders talks about Application Factories, a feature of the new JBuilder 2008 IDE that facilitates knowledge sharing among developers.

Rich clients are more than just about user interfaces, argues Adobe's James Ward in this JavaOne 2008 interview with Artima. Rich clients are about architecture, and are also about collaboration between developers and designers.

In Artima's initial interview from JavaOne 2008, Patrick Curran, Chair of the Java Community Process, shares his vision for the JCP, and discusses how artisans and engineers differ in their approach to building software and in their attitude toward standards.