[Mawr]

> Java has AOT compilers since 2000, they just weren't free beer.

Commercial offerings are quite obviously not comparable to free ones.

Seems like Java can't really do AOT, even in 2022: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30444454

Now, I say "really", because this is not about whether you can technically compile Java AOT or not. It's about the level of support - in Go AOT compilation is first-class. In Java, you're stuck looking through multiple second party options, some paid, some with caveats, bugs, etc.

First-class vs second-class support makes a massive difference.

As an example, this is like seeing "Go's advantage over java is its autoformatter - gofmt" and responding "Well, Java has autoformatters too!". Technically true, but irrelevant - in the real world, gofmt is used on 90%+ Go projects. The few Java projects that do use autoformatting each use a different formatter with different sets of rules. First-class vs second-class.