5.2.2 Portability

As discussed earlier, many types of computers and operating systems are in use throughout the world—and many are connected to the Internet. For programs to be dynamically downloaded to all the various types of platforms connected to the Internet, some means of generating portable executable code is needed. As you will soon see, the same mechanism that helps ensure security also helps create portability. Indeed, Java’s solution to these two problems is both elegant and efficient.