A few months ago I started looking around at the JVM alternative languages, Clojure, Groovy, the J’s (jython, jruby, ect.) and eventually Scala. I have somewhat of a classical computer science background. I started at a Java school, then moved over to a college that taught C in it’s first year courses. When I found my first job after school, I started developing in PHP and for good or bad that’s what I’ve been doing the last 4 years or so.

I like PHP. It’s everything and the kitchen sink mentality makes developers tend toward hodge podge code mostly, but there can be some really beautiful creations when you start using PHP version of reflection. But ever since I started working with Java again for projects at work, PHP feels like it’s missing the power of a systems language. Having to bolt on opcode cachers to deal with compiled code and the tacked on nature of using php as a command line language felt somewhat odd. Using pure Java is always an option, and Sun has done a good job of keeping the JVM up to date with new features and enhancements, but after enjoying the lose structure of a scripting language, it’s hard to go back to verbose development.

That’s where Scala comes in. David talks about how it’s somewhat difficult getting Java programmers to switch to something functional, and maybe that’s true. I don’t think that hard core Java programmers are Scala’s potential audience. Those crazy scripting guys from Ruby, Python, and PHP will feel right at home with Scala’s half functional / half object-oriented syntax. They’ve been dealing with choice and somewhat functional constructs for years, show these guys that you won’t need to start redeveloping in a another language when your app approaches a certain level of success and you’ll get them hooked.

Couple that with the hack that is Comet becoming the norm for web based apps that need push notifications and Scala’s actors become really attractive.