Spring acquires Groovy and Grails

Rod Johnson has just announced the acquisition of G2One, the company behind the dynamic language Groovy and the framework Grails.

Groovy has unique benefits as a dynamic language on the Java platform. It’s the only dynamic language that can compile directly to Java .class files; it’s the only language that can be used mixed seamlessly with Java; it’s currently the only language that can process Java annotations, which are becoming central to modern use of Java; and it has a natural migration path from Java, rather than calling for a big, risky leap of faith. It’s also a promising language for implementing DSLs — an increasingly important issue.

Like Spring, Grails is a technology that simplifies the lives of developers and makes them more productive. As our new tagline, Weapons for the war on Java complexity, reflects, simplification has always been core to what we’ve done as a company and as technologists. The values behind Grails are the values behind Spring and SpringSource.

Great news for everyone who uses these technologies. As Johnson also noted, SpringSource can provide specialists to help support tools such as Eclipse. Since the Spring Framework already integrated with Groovy and Grails integrated with Spring in turn, we can expect that integration to deepen.

Related links

• The blog of Graeme Rocher, one of the founders of G2One: Groovy and Grails join the Spring family
• An interview with Graeme Rocher and Rod Johnson about the acquisition: A Different Road To Springness: SpringSource Acquires G2One