This seems like a packaging problem. In Java 9, it's possible to produce a single binary containing the JRE and application code; same way as go producing a single binary containing the Go runtime and application code.

> Python

Then you have to install the right version of python, and you get even more of a nightmare than a Java install. At least the Java ecosystem doesn't suggest a separate tool (eg, virtualenv or similar) to support things like JAVA_HOME.

This applies equally to any non-statically-compiled application distribution; I don't see CMake files + some specially blessed CMake version that you also have to install as coming close to that.

It's not immediately useful, but you might find this interesting:

https://github.com/google/skylark

I may be missing something here, since I've not heard of Skylark (the Python variation itself not Google's Go-based interpreter for Skylark) but my brief searching suggests it's abandoned..?

Skylark is the name of the build language used by Bazel, Google's build system. The main version is written in Java, but isn't available separately from Bazel as far as I know. Definitely not abandoned; most teams at Google use it.

The Go version is new and I don't know what it's used for.

That is so f! Cool!!! I have been looking for this!

Are you on Windows? If so, Bazel now bundles the JDK so you should not have to worry about Java.