Ted Leung writes that "it may turn out that Eclipse is what locks me in to Java". Carlos Perez writes that "Eclipse demolishes other alternative languages" because "it doesn't matter how nice the syntax of your language is, its just simply not going to be as productive an environment as what you find in the Java world [with refactoring browsers like Eclipse and IDEA]".

Of course, Java's not the first or only language with a refactoring tool, indeed there's a long list of refactoring browsers available on Fowler's site. And Eclipse supports much more than Java. Nevertheless, now that mature refactoring tools are available for Java, the speed and degree to which they've caught on (perhaps even dominate?) is pleasantly surprising.