Java Champion

In September 2005, Dr Heinz Kabutz was honored by being awarded the coveted title Java Champion by an international panel of Java leaders for his work in writing The Java Specialists' Newsletter.

There are currently less than four hundred Java Champions, out of a pool of over 10 000 000 Java developers worldwide. Dr Kabutz is the only South African Java Champion. He is now a Greek citizen living on the Island of Crete in Greece.

Matt Thompson, director of Sun Developer Network, says in an article on Java Developer's Journal, the idea is to build "a community of Java Champions that reflects the top echelon of contributors to the Java Community." And he goes further: "I look at these folks as the heroes of the Java platform ... These folks are truly both a wealth of knowledge for us to tap into, as well as a great resource to work with in making the Java platform easier to adopt worldwide."