James Arthur Gosling (born 19 May 1955) is a Canadian

computer scientist A computer scientist is a scientist who specializes in the academic study of computer science. Computer scientists typically work on the theoretical side of computation. Although computer scientists can also focus their work and research on ...

, best known as the founder and lead designer behind the

Java programming language Java is a high-level, general-purpose, memory-safe, object-oriented programming language. It is intended to let programmers ''write once, run anywhere'' ( WORA), meaning that compiled Java code can run on all platforms that support Jav ...

. Gosling was elected a member of the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American Nonprofit organization, nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. It is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), along with the National Academ ...

in 2004 for the conception and development of the architecture for the Java programming language and for contributions to windowing systems.

Early life

Gosling was born in

Calgary, Alberta Calgary () is a major city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Alberta. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a Metropolitan area, metropolitan population of 1,481,806 making it the List of ...

, to Joyce Morrison and Dave Gosling. He is of English, Welsh, Scottish, and Icelandic descent. Gosling attended

William Aberhart High School William Aberhart High School is a public senior high school in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, which teaches grades 10, 11, and 12. It is operated by the Calgary Board of Education. It is a comprehensive English and French Immersion school of 1300 stude ...

. While in high school, he wrote some of the software to analyze data from the ISIS 2 satellite, working for the

University of Calgary {{Infobox university , name = University of Calgary , image = University of Calgary coat of arms without motto scroll.svg , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms , former ...

physics department. He received a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

from the University of Calgary and his M.A. and Ph.D. from

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The institution was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools. In 1912, it became the Carnegie Institu ...

, all in

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...

. He wrote a version of

Emacs Emacs (), originally named EMACS (an acronym for "Editor Macros"), is a family of text editors that are characterized by their extensibility. The manual for the most widely used variant, GNU Emacs, describes it as "the extensible, customizable, s ...

called Gosling Emacs (Gosmacs) while working toward his doctorate. He built a multi-processor version of Unix for a 16-way computer system while at Carnegie Mellon University, before joining

Sun Microsystems Sun Microsystems, Inc., often known as Sun for short, was an American technology company that existed from 1982 to 2010 which developed and sold computers, computer components, software, and information technology services. Sun contributed sig ...

Career and contributions

Gosling was with Sun Microsystems between 1984 and 2010 (26 years). At Sun he invented an early Unix windowing system called

NeWS News is information about current events. This may be provided through many different Media (communication), media: word of mouth, printing, Mail, postal systems, broadcasting, Telecommunications, electronic communication, or through the te ...

, which became a lesser-used alternative to the still used

X Window System The X Window System (X11, or simply X) is a windowing system for bitmap displays, common on Unix-like operating systems. X originated as part of Project Athena at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1984. The X protocol has been at ...

, because Sun did not give it an open source license. He is known as the father of the

. He got the idea for the Java VM while writing a program to port software from a

PERQ The PERQ, also referred to as the Three Rivers PERQ or ICL PERQ, is a pioneering workstation computer produced in the late 1970s through the early 1980s. It is the first commercially-produced personal workstation with a graphical user interface ...

by translating Perq Q-Code to VAX assembler and emulating the hardware. He is generally credited with having invented the

Java Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...

programming language in 1994. He created the original design of Java and implemented the language's original compiler and

virtual machine In computing, a virtual machine (VM) is the virtualization or emulator, emulation of a computer system. Virtual machines are based on computer architectures and provide the functionality of a physical computer. Their implementations may involve ...

. Gosling traces the origins of the approach to his early graduate student days, when he created a p-code virtual machine for the lab's

DEC VAX VAX (an acronym for virtual address extension) is a series of computers featuring a 32-bit instruction set architecture (ISA) and virtual memory that was developed and sold by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) in the late 20th century. The V ...

computer, so that his professor could run programs written in

UCSD Pascal UCSD Pascal is a Pascal programming language system that runs on the UCSD p-System, a portable, highly machine-independent operating system. UCSD Pascal was first released in 1977. It was developed at the University of California, San Diego (UC ...

. In the work leading to Java at Sun, he saw that architecture-neutral execution for widely distributed programs could be achieved by implementing a similar philosophy: always program for the same virtual machine. Another contribution of Gosling's was co-writing the " bundle" program, known as "shar", a utility thoroughly detailed in

Brian Kernighan Brian Wilson Kernighan (; born January 30, 1942) is a Canadian computer scientist. He worked at Bell Labs and contributed to the development of Unix alongside Unix creators Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie. Kernighan's name became widely known ...

and

Rob Pike Robert Pike (born 1956) is a Canadian programmer and author. He is best known for his work on the Go programming language while working at Google and the Plan 9 operating system while working at Bell Labs, where he was a member of the Unix t ...

's book '' The Unix Programming Environment''. He left Sun Microsystems on April 2, 2010, after it was acquired by the

Oracle Corporation Oracle Corporation is an American Multinational corporation, multinational computer technology company headquartered in Austin, Texas. Co-founded in 1977 in Santa Clara, California, by Larry Ellison, who remains executive chairman, Oracle was ...

, citing reductions in pay, status, and decision-making ability, along with change of role and ethical challenges. He has since taken a very critical stance towards Oracle in interviews, noting that "during the integration meetings between Sun and Oracle, where we were being grilled about the patent situation between Sun and Google, we could see the Oracle lawyer's eyes sparkle."Shankland, Stephen. (2011-03-28
Java founder James Gosling joins Google
CNET Retrieved on 2012-02-21. He clarified his position during the ''

Oracle v. Google '' LLC v. Oracle America, Inc.'', 593 U.S. 1 (2021), was a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States related to the nature of computer code and copyright law. The dispute centered on the use of parts of the Java programming langu ...

'' trial over Android: "While I have differences with Oracle, in this case they are in the right. Google totally slimed Sun. We were all really disturbed, even Jonathan chwartz he just decided to put on a happy face and tried to turn lemons into lemonade, which annoyed a lot of folks at Sun." However, he approved of the court's ruling that APIs should not be copyrightable. In March 2011, Gosling joined

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

. Six months later, he followed his colleague Bill Vass and joined a startup called Liquid Robotics. In late 2016, Liquid Robotics was acquired by

Boeing The Boeing Company, or simply Boeing (), is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product support s ...

. Following the acquisition, Gosling left Liquid Robotics to work at

Amazon Web Services Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS) is a subsidiary of Amazon.com, Amazon that provides Software as a service, on-demand cloud computing computing platform, platforms and Application programming interface, APIs to individuals, companies, and gover ...

as Distinguished Engineer in May 2017. He retired in July 2024. He is an advisor at the Scala company Lightbend, Independent Director at

Jelastic Jelastic is a cloud platform software vendor that provides multi-cloud platform as a service-based on container technology for hosting service providers, ISVs, telecommunication companies, enterprises and developers. The platform is available as p ...

, and Strategic Advisor for

Eucalyptus ''Eucalyptus'' () is a genus of more than 700 species of flowering plants in the family Myrtaceae. Most species of ''Eucalyptus'' are trees, often Mallee (habit), mallees, and a few are shrubs. Along with several other genera in the tribe Eucalyp ...

, and is a board member of DIRTT Environmental Solutions.

Awards

For his achievement, the

in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

elected him as a Foreign Associate member. *2002: awarded ''

The Economist ''The Economist'' is a British newspaper published weekly in printed magazine format and daily on Electronic publishing, digital platforms. It publishes stories on topics that include economics, business, geopolitics, technology and culture. M ...

'' Innovation Award. *2002: awarded '' The Flame Award'' USENIX Lifetime Achievement Award. *2007: made an Officer of the

Order of Canada The Order of Canada () is a Canadian state order, national order and the second-highest Award, honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the Canadian Centennial, ce ...

. The Order is Canada's second highest civilian honor. Officers are the second highest grade within the Order. *2013: became a

fellow A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned society, learned or professional society, p ...

of the

Association for Computing Machinery The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) is a US-based international learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 and is the world's largest scientific and educational computing society. The ACM is a non-profit professional membe ...

. *2015: awarded

IEEE John von Neumann Medal The IEEE John von Neumann Medal was established by the IEEE Board of Directors in 1990 and may be presented annually "for outstanding achievements in computer-related science and technology." The achievements may be theoretical, technological, or ...

*2019: named a

Computer History Museum The Computer History Museum (CHM) is a computer museum in Mountain View, California. The museum presents stories and artifacts of Silicon Valley and the Information Age, and explores the Digital Revolution, computing revolution and its impact ...

Fellow A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned society, learned or professional society, p ...

for the conception, design, and implementation of the

programming language.Computer History Museum names James Gosling a 2019 Fellow
/ref>

Books

Ken Arnold Kenneth Cutts Richard Cabot Arnold (born 1958) is an American computer programmer well known as one of the developers of the 1980s dungeon-crawling video game '' Rogue'', for his contributions to the original Berkeley Software Distribution (BS ...

, James Gosling, David Holmes, ''The Java Programming Language, Fourth Edition'', Addison-Wesley Professional, 2005, * James Gosling,

Bill Joy William Nelson Joy (born November 8, 1954) is an American computer engineer and venture capitalist. He co-founded Sun Microsystems in 1982 along with Scott McNealy, Vinod Khosla, and Andy Bechtolsheim, and served as Chief Scientist and CTO ...

, Guy L. Steele Jr.,

Gilad Bracha Gilad Bracha (Hebrew: גלעד ברכה) is a software engineer at F5, and formerly at Google, where he was on the Dart programming language team. He is creator of the Newspeak language, and co-author of the second and third editions of the Java ...

, ''The Java Language Specification, Third Edition'', Addison-Wesley Professional, 2005, * Ken Arnold, James Gosling, David Holmes, ''The Java Programming Language, Third Edition'', Addison-Wesley Professional, 2000, * James Gosling, Bill Joy, Guy L. Steele Jr., Gilad Bracha, ''The Java Language Specification, Second Edition'', Addison-Wesley, 2000, * Gregory Bollella (Editor), Benjamin Brosgol, James Gosling, Peter Dibble, Steve Furr, David Hardin, Mark Turnbull, ''The Real-Time Specification for Java'', Addison Wesley Longman, 2000, * Ken Arnold, James Gosling, ''The Java programming language Second Edition'', Addison-Wesley, 1997, * Ken Arnold, James Gosling, ''The Java programming language'', Addison-Wesley, 1996, * James Gosling, Bill Joy, Guy L. Steele Jr., ''The Java Language Specification'', Addison Wesley Publishing Company, 1996, * James Gosling, Frank Yellin, The Java Team, ''The Java Application Programming Interface, Volume 2: Window Toolkit and Applets'', Addison-Wesley, 1996, * James Gosling, Frank Yellin, The Java Team, ''The Java Application Programming Interface, Volume 1: Core Packages'', Addison-Wesley, 1996, * James Gosling, Henry McGilton,
The Java language Environment: A white paper
',

, 1996 * James Gosling, David S. H. Rosenthal, Michelle J. Arden, ''The NeWS Book: An Introduction to the Network/Extensible Window System (Sun Technical Reference Library)'', Springer, 1989,

References

External links

James Gosling's personal weblogPresentation
by James Gosling about the origins of Java, from the JVM Languages Summit 2008

– James Gosling's talk at

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

video archive

James Gosling interview
on Triangulation ( TWiT.tv). Recorded 2016-04-11 {{DEFAULTSORT:Gosling, James 1955 births Canadian male bloggers Canadian computer programmers Canadian computer scientists Canadian inventors Canadian people of English descent Canadian people of Icelandic descent Canadian people of Scottish descent Canadian people of Welsh descent Carnegie Mellon University alumni Emacs 2013 fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery Free software programmers Java (programming language) Living people Officers of the Order of Canada Open source people Scientists from Calgary Programming language designers Solaris people Sun Microsystems people University of Calgary alumni Winners of The Economist innovation awards Foreign associates of the National Academy of Engineering