Does this topic remind anyone else of the vi/emacs wars? My $0.02: - Java is, in some significant ways, a stronger cross-platform language than Perl. Many 3rd party Perl modules are unix-centric, relying upon the presence of a C compiler and make utility (not generally included with windoze, so Perl users on Windows face some extra issues if the module they need is not available in binary form from ActiveState). On the other hand, Sun only recently designated Linux as a "tier 1" platform for Java. - Perl is more scriptable than Java. Much better for ad-hoc scripts and one-liners. - Java is more object-oriented than Perl. Designed as an OO language from the ground up. Highly buzzword compliant (makes PHBs happy). Additional evidence of Java's high levels of buzzword compliance and 3rd party support: http://java.sun.com/products/?frontpage-main http://java.sun.com/j2ee/docs.html http://www.appserver-zone.com/ http://www.bea.com/index.shtml http://www.orionserver.com/ http://www.enhydra.org/ - Java imposes more constraints on program structure than Perl. For large applications, I view this as an advantage for Java ("Hell is other people's Perl" ...) - The market for Java programmers is larger (based on a search at dice.com; 4817 hits for "perl", 11649 hits for "java"). - Both Java and Perl enjoy strong support by the Apache Foundation: http://perl.apache.org/ http://jakarta.apache.org/ http://java.apache.org/ If I were running a business, I'd be more comfortable writing my core business applications in Java than in Perl. This may be a partially subjective opinion, but it's the main reason I have personally chosen to focus on developing my Java skills -- in the past, I have worked using Perl under both *nix and windoze; haven't tried PHP yet, though. Joel P.S. Google reveals additional, seemingly endless, commentary on Perl vs. Java or Java vs. Perl: http://www.google.com/search?q=perl+vs.+java http://www.google.com/search?q=java+vs.+perl --- Member of the GNU/X/Apache/Perl/Samba/OpenSSH/Linux generation.