GraalVM: Database Integration, Serverless Innovation and the Future

An airhacks.fm conversation with Thomas Wuerthinger (@thomaswue) about: clarification of GraalVM release cadence changes and decoupling from openJDK releases, GraalVM focusing on LTS Java releases only (skipping non-LTS like Java 26), GraalVM as a multi-vendor polyglot project with community edition and third-party vendors like Red Hat BellSoft and microdoc, increased focus on python support due to AI popularity, GraalVM team alignment with Oracle Database organization, Oracle Multilingual Engine (MLE) for running JavaScript and Python in Oracle Database, MySQL MLE integration, native image support for stored procedures in Oracle Database, shipping lambda functions from client applications to database for temporary execution, treating Oracle Database as an operating system for running business logic, serverless workloads directly in Oracle Database, application snapshotting similar to CRaC but running in user space without kernel privileges, efficient scale-to-zero capabilities with native images, Oracle REST Data Services service generalization for serverless execution platform, database triggers for workflow systems and application wake-up, durable functions with transactional state storage in Oracle Database, comparison to AS400 architecture with transaction manager database and operating system in same memory, memory price increases making GraalVM native image more attractive, lower memory consumption benefits of native image beyond just startup time, CPU-based inference support with SIMD and Vector API, TornadoVM for GPU-based inference built on Graal compiler, WebAssembly compilation target for native images, edge function deployment with WebAssembly, Intel memory protection keys for sandboxed native image execution, native image layers for shared base libraries similar to docker layers, profile-guided optimizations for size reduction, upx binary compression for 3x size reduction, memory savings from eliminated class metadata and profiling data not garbage collector differences, 32-bit object headers in serial GC smaller than HotSpot, polyglot integration allowing Python and JavaScript embedding in Java applications, Micronaut framework compile-time annotation processing, quarkus framework best alignment with native image for smallest binaries, GraalVM roadmap focused on database synergies and serverless innovation Thomas Wuerthinger on twitter: @thomaswue

An airhacks.fm conversation with Alvaro Hernandez (@ahachete) about: discussion about LLMs generating Java code with BCE patterns and architectural rules, Java being 20-30% better for LLM code generation than python and typescript, embedding business knowledge in Java source code for LLM context, stackgres as a curated opinionated stack for running Postgres on kubernetes, Postgres requiring external tools for connection pooling and high availability and backup and monitoring, StackGres as a Helm package and Kubernetes operator, comparison with oxide hardware for on-premise cloud environments, experimenting with Incus for system containers and VMS, limitations of Ansible for infrastructure automation and code reuse, Kubernetes as an API-driven architecture abstracting compute and storage, Custom Resource Definitions (CRDs) for declarative Postgres cluster management, StackGres supporting sharding with automated multi-cluster deployment, 13 lines of YAML to create 60-node sharded clusters, three interfaces for StackGres including CRDs and web console and REST API, operator written in Java with quarkus unlike typical Go-based operators, Google study showing Java faster than Go, GraalVM native compilation for 80MB container images versus 400-500MB JVM images, fabric8 Kubernetes client for API communication, reconciliation cycle running every 10 seconds to maintain desired state, pod local controller as Quarkus sidecar for local Postgres operations, dynamic extension installation without rebuilding container images, grpc bi-directional communication between control plane and control nodes, inverse connection pattern where nodes initiate connections to control plane, comparison with Jini and JavaSpaces leasing concepts from Sun Microsystems, quarter million lines of Java code in the operator mostly POJOs predating records, PostgreSQL configuration validation with 300+ parameters, automated tuning applied by default in StackGres, potential for LLM-driven optimization with clone clusters for testing, Framework Computer laptop automation with Ubuntu auto-install and Ansible and Nix, five to ten minute full system reinstall including BIOS updates Alvaro Hernandez on twitter: @ahachete

An airhacks.fm conversation with Ales Justin (@alesj) about: Slovenian Christmas traditions, career journey from Bitcoin to Strimzi to quarkus development, Quarkus gRPC implementation using Google's legacy gRPC versus native Vert.x-based gRPC server, plans to make Vert.x gRPC the default in Quarkus with Vert.x 5, gRPC transcoding and gRPC-web browser support coming with new Vert.x version, OpenTelemetry integration in Quarkus with Bruno Baptista leading the effort, LGTM container image from Grafana containing Loki Grafana Tempo and Mimir for observability testing, Quarkus observability dev services providing out-of-the-box Grafana dashboards, custom Grafana dashboard configuration support in Quarkus applications, evolution from MicroProfile Metrics to micrometer to OpenTelemetry as the preferred standard, Protocol Buffers (protobuf) version migration challenges from proto 3 to proto 4 breaking Pulsar integration, WebAssembly-based protoc compiler replacing platform-specific binaries reducing dependency size from 100MB to 2MB, gRPC service development in Quarkus using GRPCService annotation and generated classes, gRPC client injection using GRPCClient annotation similar to REST client pattern, sharing protobuf definitions between projects using Git submodules for source code sharing, gRPC bidirectional streaming support in Quarkus, OpenTelemetry spans attributes and events for business and technical observability, gRPC interceptors for server and client telemetry instrumentation, VictoriaMetrics as Prometheus-compatible alternative with push-based metrics, OpenTelemetry logging support in Quarkus, OpenBlend Slovenia Java conference history from Java Blend to Oracle partnership, conference details with 400-450 attendees at Slovenian Adriatic coast in late May Ales Justin on twitter: @alesj

An airhacks.fm conversation with Johan Haleby (@johanhaleby) about: first computer experience with Commodore C64 and typing Basic programs from instruction manuals, early gaming experiences and interest in understanding load commands, transition to Amiga 500 Plus for demo scene scripting and composition, moving to PC era with 486 SX25 and four megabytes of RAM, learning Turbo Pascal and creating 2D Super Mario-inspired games, experimenting with inline assembler in Pascal and reading "The Art of Assembly Programming", reverse engineering games using Win32 disassembler to bypass license checks, studying computer science at Blekinge and Lund University in Sweden, first job at JayWay consultancy firm working on IKEA project in 2005, early adoption of Spring framework and automated testing practices, comparison of old-style EJB with heavy XML configuration versus Spring's lightweight approach, the evolution from XML-based configuration to annotation-based Java EE 5 and 6, creating PowerMock with colleague Jan Kronqvist to mock static methods and final classes, using asm and JavaAssist for bytecode manipulation instead of AspectJ, implementing custom class loaders where each JUnit method executed in different class loader, deep clone module for cloning object graphs between class loaders, tight coupling challenges between PowerMock and Mockito/EasyMock/JUnit versions, transition from EasyMock's record-replay pattern to Mockito's when-then approach, modern preference for avoiding mocks and testing against real cloud environments, optimizing for fast CI/CD pipelines rather than local simulation, structuring code to separate infrastructure concerns from pure business logic, using Java Records as pure data carriers versus adding behavior to records, Clojure-inspired philosophy of decoupling state from behavior and identity, Rich Hickey's "Simple Made Easy" talk and definitions of simple versus easy, multi-methods in functional languages as alternative to polymorphism, domain modeling example with network devices and fiber channel connections, benefits of object-oriented polymorphism for transparent persistence and simple code, avoiding religious adherence to patterns in favor of pragmatic solutions, Maven's stability and opinionated approach versus Gradle's flexibility, reducing external dependencies and Maven plugins in favor of CI/CD automation, the NPM ecosystem's over-modularization compared to Java's more reasonable approach, decline of OSGi hype and return to simpler monolithic architectures, Johan's current work on Occurrent Event Sourcing library and cloud events Johan Haleby on twitter: @johanhaleby

An airhacks.fm conversation with Ales Justin (@alesj) about: Early computing experiences with spectrum 48ZX and game development in Yugoslavia, progression from Basic to Pascal to C/C++ and eventually Java, mathematics education and its application to programming, working on energy consumption analysis applications for Slovenian companies, transitioning from a big IT company to a startup focusing on energy sector software, implementing Spring deployer for JBoss and contributing to open source, joining JBoss/Red Hat after impressing Bill Burke and Mark Fleury with Spring-JBoss integration, working on JBoss microcontainer with Adrian Brock and emphasis on precise testing, development of CapeDwarf as a JBoss implementation of Google App Engine APIs, collaboration with Google on TCK (Technology Compatibility Kit) development, solving concurrency bugs for a billion-dollar kitten app company using Cape Dwarf clustering, transition to cloud technologies with kubernetes and openshift integration, brief departure to work on cryptocurrency exchange using Spring Boot and Kafka, experiencing and solving Kafka / Strimzi issues on Google Cloud Platform, returning to Red Hat to work on Strimzi and eventually quarkus, focus on runtime systems and reactive programming with grpc and observability, importance of open source contribution and community engagement, evolution from monolithic application servers to cloud-native microservices architecture Ales Justin on twitter: @alesj

An airhacks.fm conversation with Stanislav Bashkyrtsev (@sbashkirtsev) about: scientific software for chemists and drug discovery, peaksel flagship software for analyzing mass spectrometer data, parsing binary instrument formats up to gigabytes in size, mass spectrometry measuring molecular weights using electric fields and detectors, daltons as mass units, isotope patterns for molecule identification, storing experimental data in PostgreSQL with potential big data challenges, S3 storage solutions, drug discovery process from hit identification to molecule modifications, molecular libraries and combinatorial chemistry, enumeration of molecular structures in computers, synthesis reactions mixing reactants with solvents and various conditions, liquid handlers and laboratory automation challenges, return on investment issues in early drug discovery automation, lab of the future concepts, Molbrett product combining excalidraw with chemical structure drawing capabilities, SMILES format for representing molecular structures as strings, graph-based molecular formats storing atom connections and bond types, 2D vs 3D molecular visualization preferences, Meve centralized event system for tracking molecular experiments across different software systems, ETL processes for data integration, Crystalline software for documenting protein crystallography experiments, protein structure determination using X-ray crystallography, Synchrotron facilities for high-energy X-ray generation, crystal growing conditions and documentation, fishing crystals with microscope and lasso wands, liquid nitrogen cooling for crystal preservation, Java backend, JavaScript frontend, minimal dependencies approach, six-person team structure, sponsorship business model for open source scientific software development, free updates for sponsors, subscription model for non-sponsors, checkout: https://elsci.io Stanislav Bashkyrtsev on twitter: @sbashkirtsev

An airhacks.fm conversation with Ondrej Mihalyi (@OndroMih) about: OmniFish company founding with former Payara employees, Arjan Tijms as Jakarta EE Security lead and Jakarta EE 10 coordinator, David Matejczyk as Glassfish project lead and main contributor, OmniFish as the main maintainer and driver of GlassFish development, GlassFish optimization and bug fixes, embedded GlassFish improvements for command-line execution, comparison with Payara Micro, Slovak and Czech Christmas traditions including cemetery visits on Christmas Eve, traditional Christmas cookies like medovník (honey cookies) and perník, carp preparation for Christmas dinner with potato salad variations, fish scales tradition for wealth, Jakarta EE stability and backward compatibility over 15 years, migration from Java EE to Jakarta EE namespace changes, comparison between Jakarta EE and Spring regarding XML configuration history, Convention over Configuration in Java EE 5 and 6, WebSphere and WebLogic legacy issues, GlassFish as reference implementation advantages, runtime vs application server distinction, JSON-P usage for serverless lambda events, MicroProfile Health clean room implementation, Piranha experimental framework with new Servlet container implementation, AI and LLMs excellent knowledge of Jakarta EE specifications, no hallucinations when generating Jakarta EE code, separation of runtime and application deployment Ondrej Mihalyi on twitter: @OndroMih

An airhacks.fm conversation with Stanislav Bashkyrtsev (@sbashkirtsev) about: Early programming journey starting with Pascal in school and C# self-study in 2005, transition from C# to Java through local programming courses in 2007, first experiences with Java 6 and EJB2/EJB3, working with Delphi for lawyers' desktop software before finding Java opportunities, first Java project for Madison Square Garden and New York Knicks website, career progression through entertainment and banking sectors including work with Barclays Capital and UBS, transition to CI/CD engineering in 2012 with heavy Jenkins usage and source code patching, challenges of implementing trunk-based development practices, automated QA engineering experiences with selenium testing, problems with separate QA and development teams affecting code testability, self-study of biology and chemistry leading to scientific software development, founding elsci company focused on high-performance enterprise software for chemists and biotech companies, disconnect between software developers and scientists' needs in scientific software, advantages of quarkus framework for serverless deployments on AWS, Quarkus build-time deployment optimization versus traditional application servers, comparison with Spring Boot auto-configuration complexity, migration experiences from Java EE to Quarkus maintaining standards compliance, virtual threads support in modern Quarkus, preference for Java 7 simplicity over modern Java streams, importance of end-to-end testing over unit testing pyramid, challenges of running a software company versus being an independent consultant, Helsinki Java User Group presentation on operating system thread mechanics Stanislav Bashkyrtsev on twitter: @sbashkirtsev

An airhacks.fm conversation with Olimpiu Pop (@olimpiupop) about: Romanian developer's journey from 486 computers to Transylvania Java User Group, early programming with Turbo Pascal at age 9-10, playing games like Jazz Jackrabbit and Prince of Persia, influence of Star Trek and science fiction on career choice, mathematics olympiads participation, computer science high school education, learning C and FoxPro, Java vs .net ecosystem in Romania during 2000s, Microsoft's university infiltration strategy, first Java exposure with version 1.4, Siemens internship on telecommunications servers, neighborhood network building projects, working without home internet until 2005-2006, nearshoring company experience, EJB and Spring framework with XML configuration, master's studies at Johannes Kepler University Linz 2008-2011, working with fabasoft on observability systems, .NET development for two years with C#, attributes vs annotations comparison, Java ME micro edition development, implementing DTOs and service architectures, agile methodology adoption, iterative development practices, data gravity concept from Ruby on Rails, working for Uniqa with WebMethods, brueckner Group spin-off developing industrial software, DevOps implementation with Jenkins and Git, choosing between Mercurial and Git version control, Broadridge financial technology work, stock exchange monitoring systems, low-latency Java implementations, Mechanical Sympathy and Disruptor pattern, taking over Java User Group from Gabi Pop, managing Java Advent Calendar for 15 years, WordPress to Java migration plans using quarkus-roq, transition from coding to management roles, challenging microservices adoption, modular monolith advocacy, Java verbosity improvements and scripting capabilities, young developers returning to Java, typescript developers discovering Java patterns, Romanian tech scene evolution, Cluj coffee culture and steampunk bars Olimpiu Pop on twitter: @olimpiupop

An airhacks.fm conversation with Gabriel Pop (@vwggolf3) about: transition from individual contributor to engineering management since 2011, managing developer tools and AWS code suite services, discussion of AWS CodeCommit entering maintenance mode but maintaining performance and security standards, benefits of AWS CodeBuild as a serverless build service, using CodeBuild for running JARs and automated testing, proper channels for submitting AWS feature requests through documentation and github repos, CodeArtifact as artifact repository for Java JARs and other packages, using S3 for serverless lambda deployment artifacts, multi-account architecture patterns for build systems, CodeDeploy flexibility for various deployment scenarios including ECS rolling updates, lifecycle hooks in CodeDeploy for Lambda deployments, Code Connections for secure third-party repository integration without storing secrets, CodePipeline as orchestrator for CI/CD workflows, CodePipeline V2 features with tag-based triggers for release automation, event-driven architecture using Amazon EventBridge with CodeBuild and CodePipeline events, comparison with GitHub Actions and Jenkins integrations, philosophy of using AWS-native services for consistency and security, Step Functions as alternative orchestration tool, importance of automation and infrastructure as code with CDK, challenges of prioritization and trade-offs in AWS service development, AWS region expansion and service availability, end-to-end testing strategies with Java interfaces and MicroProfile, security best practices with least privilege and dedicated build accounts, developer experience improvements and console UI updates, community engagement through AWS Hero program and user groups Gabriel Pop on twitter: @vwggolf3