The Rise of POJO’s (Plain Old Java Objects)

Nowadays POJO’s are everywhere. The name was initially conceived (I forget who it was) to bring back some spotlight to plain everyday used java objects (away from overhyped java beans or ejb).

Most of our development is done using POJO’s. Yet marketing loves to hear that we use Java Beans or EJB’s as it helps them score marketing points over competitors. Marketing loves acronyms. POJO is YAA (yet another acronym) to keep them happy while we continue doing what we love doing, adopting the best technology and solutions for our customers. POJO is about simplicity over hype.

It is hilarious to see someone actually take the effort to write a book on POJO from Sun (POJO’s in action [aff. link]) and get it published by Manning, no less.

In Chris Richardson’s (author) words -

The simplicity of POJOs is attractive, especially to those working with the older Enterprise Java Beans (EJB) specification. The topic assumes a simple axiom: The simpler a framework’s design, the more extensible it is to programmers. For example, in an open letter to the Java community, Linda DeMichiel and Craig Russell talk briefly about adopting POJOs for both Java Data Objects (JDO) API 2.0 and the new EJB 3.0 specification, pronouncing the need for a single, simple persistence model. As the FAQ notes, this API “is an evolution of the work started in the JSR 220 Expert Group, which has been expanded to include several members of the JSR 243 (JDO 2.0) Expert Group.” JSR 220 covers the creation of the EJB 3.0 specification, with a stated mandate “to improve the EJB architecture by reducing its complexity from the developer’s point of view.”

Consequently, we now have the first of several books on POJOs: Chris Richardson’s POJOs in Action (Manning, January 2006). Manning was nice enough to let me see an advance copy of this book — at my request — and it was a very interesting read. The majority of the book discusses how POJOs work with a number of lightweight technologies, including JDO, Spring, and Hibernate. It also discusses POJOs in conjunction with the upcoming EJB 3.0 specification, which was still progressing through the Java Community Process (JCP) at print time.

Looking forward to read this book.