[Arathorn]

fwiw, the team that created Matrix almost exclusively used Java serverside from 2003-2014 (when we switched to creating Matrix). The last gen of Java servers we wrote were super efficient and nice to maintain thanks to netty.

The only reason we switched to Python and Twisted for the first gen Matrix server (synapse) was for rapid prototyping using a platform that we reasoned the open source and selfhosting community would already have installed and be comfortable with. Java felt way too enterprisey and non-open-source-friendly, making quick tweaks to the codebase a huge pain, not to mention the verbosity of the language. The team agreed that expecting casual folks to install and use a JVM just for a chat server would be a major turn-off, and we continue to feel that was the right call.

[sitta]

I think this perfectly demonstrates my point. Thanks for sharing. Java was perceived as "enterprisey and non-open-source-friendly".

It's also interesting to hear that a Java deployment was thought to be more difficult than a Python deployment. My baised opinion is the exact opposite. Java services are generally incredibly simple to run, especially if you make a fat jar executable.

[pron]

There is no longer any need to download a JDK (which, BTW, also no longer requires any installation) to use Java. Applications are now encouraged to bundle a custom runtime which, thanks to jlink, can be quite small; usually smaller than a Python runtime (~40MB for a runtime suitable to many or most servers).

[Arathorn]

I know. I’m not sure this was the case in 2014 though when we made the decision to switch to Python.

[pron]

Right, it wasn't. This was done in 2017-18.