I have never successfully deployed a Java application with defaults on the GC, etc.

I'd love it if I could compile those options into a binary.

Yeah you can't do that, and I don't necessarily agree with that design decision. But for the sake of the comparison it's worth saying that these "simple" compile-to-binary languages simply don't let you set those parameters at all - it's ridiculous to argue that Go (say) is better than Java because something that's impossible in Go requires fiddling with parameters in Java.

I didn't actually say Go is better than Java. I said that binaries were something I realized I missed because of those languages. That is, it's something I appreciate about Go and Rust.

But what's the advantage of a binary over a (shaded) jar? "java -jar myapp.jar" is a little more typing than "myapp", but only a little (and you can avoid that by prepending a launch script if you want); having the JVM installed on all your servers is a one-time cost.

See my above comment about GC and other runtime options. I always need a script to specify all the options to the JVM. It is never just as easy as a single jar with no options. That makes it better, no doubt, but it still sucks.

I don't understand how you need those other options in Java and avoid needing them with a binary? What's the difference that means you can get by with not passing any options in go or what have you?

(I've used "java -jar myapp.jar" in production and it's been fine; the Java mainstream may favour using lots of -Dblah but it's entirely possible to replace that with code)

Maybe some apps do not have classpath. Here is what I see of running kafka instance on one of my server. And it does not looks like as simple as it gets.

java -Xmx512M -Xms512M -server -XX:+UseG1GC -XX:MaxGCPauseMillis=20 -XX:InitiatingHeapOccupancyPercent=35 -XX:+DisableExplicitGC -Djava.awt.headless=true -Xloggc:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../logs/zookeeper-gc.log -verbose:gc -XX:+PrintGCDetails -XX:+PrintGCDateStamps -XX:+PrintGCTimeStamps -Dcom.sun.management.jmxremote -Dcom.sun.management.jmxremote.authenticate=false -Dcom.sun.management.jmxremote.ssl=false -Dkafka.logs.dir=/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../logs -Dlog4j.configuration=file:bin/../config/log4j.properties -cp :/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/aopalliance-repackaged-2.4.0-b34.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/argparse4j-0.5.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/connect-api-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/connect-file-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/connect-json-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/connect-runtime-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/guava-18.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/hk2-api-2.4.0-b34.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/hk2-locator-2.4.0-b34.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/hk2-utils-2.4.0-b34.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jackson-annotations-2.6.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jackson-core-2.6.3.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jackson-databind-2.6.3.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jackson-jaxrs-base-2.6.3.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jackson-jaxrs-json-provider-2.6.3.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jackson-module-jaxb-annotations-2.6.3.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/javassist-3.18.2-GA.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/javax.annotation-api-1.2.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/javax.inject-1.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/javax.inject-2.4.0-b34.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/javax.servlet-api-3.1.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/javax.ws.rs-api-2.0.1.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jersey-client-2.22.2.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jersey-common-2.22.2.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jersey-container-servlet-2.22.2.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jersey-container-servlet-core-2.22.2.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jersey-guava-2.22.2.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jersey-media-jaxb-2.22.2.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jersey-server-2.22.2.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jetty-continuation-9.2.15.v20160210.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jetty-http-9.2.15.v20160210.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jetty-io-9.2.15.v20160210.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jetty-security-9.2.15.v20160210.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jetty-server-9.2.15.v20160210.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jetty-servlet-9.2.15.v20160210.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jetty-servlets-9.2.15.v20160210.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jetty-util-9.2.15.v20160210.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/jopt-simple-4.9.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0-sources.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0-test-sources.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/kafka-clients-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/kafka-log4j-appender-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/kafka-streams-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/kafka-streams-examples-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/kafka-tools-0.10.0.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/log4j-1.2.17.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/lz4-1.3.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/metrics-core-2.2.0.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/osgi-resource-locator-1.0.1.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/reflections-0.9.10.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/rocksdbjni-4.4.1.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/scala-library-2.11.8.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../libs/scala-parser-combinators_2.11-1.0.4.jar:/opt/kafka_2.11-0.10.0.0/bin/../lib

If you use the maven shade plugin (or similar) you can replace the whole "-cp ..." stanza with a "-jar myfile.jar". The "-D" arguments can be set in code instead (though I'd ask why you are allowing remote management without authentication and without SSL?).

The rest of the arguments are about GC tuning and logging. How would you do those things in a language that gives you a "simple" static binary? Either you can't at all, or they'd require an equally complex series of arguments.

It's a few lines of code to get sbt to combine everything into a single jar. Do other languages not requiring including libraries?

Statically compiled languages like Go do not.

Well, there are two separate questions here:

1. What should the default be? Java build systems default to building dynamically linked, though it's a few lines to change. IMO dynamic is a better default for large projects, as you usually have more library modules than executable modules. On the other hand a large project is likely to already involve a fair bit of build config, so maybe the defaults should be optimized for small projects.

2. Whether you allow dynamic at all. To my mind it's always worth having the option, and I think Go will come to regret not having it if and when it ever gets used for large projects.

There are plenty of large projects like kubernetes/docker/rkt/influxdb/tidb/cockroachdb and so on. Go is providing quite large memory efficiency and sub-millisec GC as compared to Java.

As of Go 1.8 it also provide plugin support though I am not sure if they are any where near Java in term of dynamic libraries loading support.

Only works on Linux as of now.