What are the advantages of using Virtual Machine compilation (eg. JVM) over natively compiled languages?

Question

I\'ve heard that the advantage of java is that people can write code, compile it for the JVM, and run it anywhere. Each person just needs a JVM app for their platform.

Answer 1

Portability mostly. The same Java binary can run on Linux/Mac/Windows. Plus SPARC/PPC/x86/x86-64/ARM/MIPS etc. Read: same binary. No recompilation needed. :)