Java News from Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Sun has officially released Java 6, Mustang for the usual platforms: Solaris, Windows, and Linux. This is not nearly as major a release as Java 5 is but there's a lot of cool stuff here including:

• A needlessly generic compiler API
• A rather complex API for modal dialogs (though perhaps in this case the complexity is necessary)
• A built-in SQL database
• A built-in HTTP server
• Scripting language support
• Lots of revised and expanded Web Services APIs. (In this case, maybe the problem isn't the APIs they're using to hide the stench. Maybe what's stinking is the underlying technology. )

According to the "umbrella" JSR 270, the following JSRs are included:

• JSR 105 XML Digital-Signature APIs
• JSR 173 Streaming API for XML (StAX)
• JSR 181 Web-Services Metadata >
• JSR 199 Java Compiler API Final Draft
• JSR 202 Java Class-File Specification Update
• JSR 221 JDBC 4.0
• JSR 222 Java Architecture for XML Binding (JAXB) 2.0
• JSR 223 Scripting for the Java Platform
• JSR 224 Java API for XML-Based Web Services (JAX-WS) 2.0
• JSR 250 Common Annotations
• JSR 269 Pluggable Annotation-Processing API

All of these JSRs are now officially released in final form, as well. However,

The original submission of this umbrella JSR mentioned three potential component JSRs that will not, as it turns out, be part of Java SE 6.

• JSR 260, the Javadoc Tag Update, will not be included because the JSR 260 Expert Group was unable to reach consensus on a number of critical issues in time for this release.
• JSR 268, the Java Smart-Card I/O API, will not be included because the JSR 270 Expert Group concluded that it would not be of sufficiently wide interest in the Java SE 6 time frame.
• The “JAXP.next” JSR will not be included because it was never submitted. Minor changes to the JAXP 1.3 API will be handled in a maintenance review of JSR 206.

What strikes me about most of the changes this time around is that, unlike Java 5, it's almost all stuff that could easily be added as 3rd party libraries in earlier releases. The core language is pretty much the same.

I've done some Java 6 work, but mostly I try to keep to Java 1.4 (or even 1.2) for anything major. I suspect most people take their time about upgrading these days.