Java is an object-oriented programming language developed in the 1990s by a team of programmers led by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems. Unlike conventional languages, which are compiled into native code, Java is compiled into bytecode, which is executed by a virtual machine. The Java programming language is the conventional language of the Java Platform, though it is not its only language.

In 1991, the Green Project was launched at Sun Microsystems—the birthplace of Java, an object-oriented programming language. The project leaders were Patrick Naughton, Mike Sheridan, and James Gosling. They believed that, in time, computers would converge with the appliances commonly used in people’s daily lives.

To prove this idea’s viability, 13 people worked hard for 18 months. In the summer of 1992, they emerged from their office on Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park with a functional demonstration of their concept. The prototype was called *7 (read as “StarSeven”), a remote control with a touchscreen graphical interface. Duke, the now widely recognized Java mascot, was created for *7 to serve as a virtual guide, helping and teaching users how to use the device. The *7 could control various devices and applications. James Gosling developed a new programming language for *7 and named it "Oak," inspired by an oak tree he could see from his window.

The next step was to find a market for *7. The team believed a promising idea was to control televisions and video-on-demand systems with the device. They built a demo called MovieWood, but unfortunately, it was too early for both video-on-demand and cable companies to support such a business model. The concept that *7 tried to introduce, today realized in interactive programs and digital television, was ahead of its time. Allowing viewers to interact with broadcasters and programming over a large network was visionary but far beyond what cable companies were ready to comprehend or adopt.

However, with the internet boom, a massive interactive network was quickly established. This type of interactive network was exactly what the *7 team had envisioned for cable companies. Suddenly, it was no longer necessary to build infrastructure—the network was simply there. Gosling was tasked with adapting Oak for the internet, and in January 1995, a new version of Oak was launched under the name Java. Java technology was designed to move across networks of heterogeneous devices, like the internet. Applications could now run within browsers as Java Applets, instantly available over the internet. The static HTML of browsers promoted the rapid spread of Java’s dynamic technology. The speed of subsequent events was overwhelming, the user base grew rapidly, and major technology providers, like IBM, announced support for Java technology.