The Java Platform

Platform  is cross-combination of  hardware or software environment in which a program runs. We are already  known with  the most popular platform like Microsoft Windows, Linux, Solaris OS, and Macintoshes OS. The Java platform differs from other platforms, that is only software-only platform which  runs on other hardware-based platforms.

The Java platform has two components:

• The Java Virtual Machine(JVM)
• The Java Application Programming Interface (API)
  The Java Virtual Machine is the root for the Java platform and is integrated into various hardware-based platforms.
  The API is a vast collection of various software components that provide you many useful functionality to the application. It is grouped into logical collection  of related classes and interfaces; these logical collection  are known as packages.

The API and Java Virtual Machine insulate the program from  hardware.

Java work on platform-independent environment, the Java platform is bit slower than native code. However, new changes  in compiler and virtual machine  brings performance close to that of native code without posing any threatening to portability security.
All source code is  written in  text files (Notepad Editor) save with the .java
extension in the Java programming      language.
The source files are compiled into .class files by the java compiler. A .class
file  contains byte codes — the machine     language of the Java Virtual Machine (JVM). The java launcher tool  runs your application with an instance of the Java Virtual    Machine.

Schematic Flow of Java Software Development Life Cycle
JVM works on different Operating System . The  .class files(bytecode)  capable of running on various Operating System. There are some virtual machines, such as the Java Hotspots virtual machine that boost up your application performance at runtime . This include various tasks such as Efficiency of Programme and recompiling (to native code) which is  frequently used sections of code.

Java JVM, the same application is capable to run on multiple platforms.

Posted in: J2SE, Java