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JDK 7 is Feature Complete

33 points by Garbage 16y ago

orangechicken 16y ago
I hear Netscape is coming out with a new version soon, too.
yuvadam 16y ago
Too bad all the good stuff got deferred to JDK 8. * good stuff - Project Lambda, langauge support for collections, reified generics (TBD?)...
- motxilo 16y ago
  Not all the good stuff. Project Coin is a much needed feature, more specifically multi-catch, switch over strings and resource management.
  - riffraff 16y ago
    if they really got JMX to work fine over firewalls without me spending half an hour every time, that is enough for a major release tailored to me :)
- Roboprog 16y ago
  Yes (lambda/closures - NOT), and (NOT) the "modularization" change where they were going to separately bundle groups of packages. The modularization/bundling features also sound like/related-to the maven-ish extension discussed (somewhere) to put versions on these bundles and "even more public than public" specifiers on things to be exported from the modules themselves, as opposed to merely "public", but only between packages within the module. These changes sounded like they would relieve some of the DLL^H^H^Hjar hell with code needing different versions of 3rd party libs (e.g. - Axis-of-evil). So, yeah, some corporate exec checklist features, but little for developer productivity / sanity added. Sadness.
batterseapower 16y ago
Most interesting features: * Added an invokedynamic instruction for faster execution of dynamic languages on the JVM * Small language changes (e.g. strings in switch). See http://openjdk.java.net/projects/coin/ http://openjdk.java.net/projects/coin/
- rbanffy 16y ago
  > * Added an invokedynamic instruction for faster execution of dynamic languages on the JVM IMHO, this is worth the upgrade. I only hope it doesn't come with a Larry Ellison action-figure...
Stormbringer 16y ago
I mourn the golden years of Java, when it was nice and simple, the weapon of a Java Knight, not as clumsy or as random as VB, an elegant language for a more civilized age... for over a thousand successful projects the Java Knights were the guardians of readability and sanity in the old code repository... before the dark times... before the complexifiers took over.
- epochwolf 16y ago
  > an elegant language for a more civilized age I do believe you mean lisp, not java. http://xkcd.com/297/ http://xkcd.com/297/
- mark_l_watson 16y ago
  Actually, Java has been getting better with annotations, etc. Java EE 6 is also a huge improvement over Java2EE. That said, I still use Ruby, Lisp, Clojure much more often, but Java is good also for some types of applications.
mindcrime 16y ago
I'll be happy to have Java 7 just for the new VM with InvokeDynamic. I've pretty much moved on from writing "plain old Java" and am using Groovy heavily, while also learning Scala and Clojure. One of the biggest knocks against Groovy has always been performance, so if InvokeDynamic helps the Groovy team amp up Groovy's performance, that'll be a big win in my book. And if it helps JRuby, Scala, Jython, Clojure, or any other JVM languages (which it should... I think the JRuby guys are really excited about this), then so much the better.
jbondeson 16y ago
JDK7 - If at first you don't succeed, redefine success.

33 points by Garbage 16y ago

I hear Netscape is coming out with a new version soon, too.

Too bad all the good stuff got deferred to JDK 8. * good stuff - Project Lambda, langauge support for collections, reified generics (TBD?)...

motxilo 16y ago
Not all the good stuff. Project Coin is a much needed feature, more specifically multi-catch, switch over strings and resource management.
- riffraff 16y ago
  if they really got JMX to work fine over firewalls without me spending half an hour every time, that is enough for a major release tailored to me :)
Roboprog 16y ago
Yes (lambda/closures - NOT), and (NOT) the "modularization" change where they were going to separately bundle groups of packages. The modularization/bundling features also sound like/related-to the maven-ish extension discussed (somewhere) to put versions on these bundles and "even more public than public" specifiers on things to be exported from the modules themselves, as opposed to merely "public", but only between packages within the module. These changes sounded like they would relieve some of the DLL^H^H^Hjar hell with code needing different versions of 3rd party libs (e.g. - Axis-of-evil). So, yeah, some corporate exec checklist features, but little for developer productivity / sanity added. Sadness.

batterseapower 16y ago

Most interesting features: * Added an invokedynamic instruction for faster execution of dynamic languages on the JVM * Small language changes (e.g. strings in switch). See http://openjdk.java.net/projects/coin/ http://openjdk.java.net/projects/coin/

rbanffy 16y ago
> * Added an invokedynamic instruction for faster execution of dynamic languages on the JVM IMHO, this is worth the upgrade. I only hope it doesn't come with a Larry Ellison action-figure...

Stormbringer 16y ago

I mourn the golden years of Java, when it was nice and simple, the weapon of a Java Knight, not as clumsy or as random as VB, an elegant language for a more civilized age... for over a thousand successful projects the Java Knights were the guardians of readability and sanity in the old code repository... before the dark times... before the complexifiers took over.

epochwolf 16y ago
> an elegant language for a more civilized age I do believe you mean lisp, not java. http://xkcd.com/297/ http://xkcd.com/297/
mark_l_watson 16y ago
Actually, Java has been getting better with annotations, etc. Java EE 6 is also a huge improvement over Java2EE. That said, I still use Ruby, Lisp, Clojure much more often, but Java is good also for some types of applications.

mindcrime 16y ago

I'll be happy to have Java 7 just for the new VM with InvokeDynamic. I've pretty much moved on from writing "plain old Java" and am using Groovy heavily, while also learning Scala and Clojure. One of the biggest knocks against Groovy has always been performance, so if InvokeDynamic helps the Groovy team amp up Groovy's performance, that'll be a big win in my book. And if it helps JRuby, Scala, Jython, Clojure, or any other JVM languages (which it should... I think the JRuby guys are really excited about this), then so much the better.

jbondeson 16y ago

JDK7 - If at first you don't succeed, redefine success.