The binary format, not the actual instructions themselves, follows very closely to Java's binary class format (I think this one is a weak argument, but it is one that Oracle is throwing.)
They're throwing it around because one of their patents is specifically for the.class file format (I don't know what could possibly be patentable there, but there goes)
They could have built on top of IcedTea and have a GPL Android platform sans the lawsuits.
They couldn't, since GPL (v2) is immaterial to Sun/Oracle's patents - it does not have any kind of patent grant.
> Dalvik is a virtual machine that runs the Java language
Dalvik is a virtual machine that runs any language compiled into its bytecode.
Java is a language that can be compiled into multiple bytecodes (eg, JVM or LLVM).
On Android, Java is compiled to JVM bytecode (using either javac, or Eclipse's compiler) and then a Google compiler compiles JVM bytecode into Dalvik bytecode.
Many other languages that compile into JVM bytecode already run on Android. The Java language is one of many source languages that have compilers to the JVM bytecode.
--
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
And the majority of the software folk go "we need a language that's not stewarded by Beelzebub himself"
Java Facts and Figures
by
luizd
·
· Score: 5, Funny
* 97% of enterprise desktops run Java * 1 billion Java downloads each year * 9 million developers worldwide * #1 programming language (TIOBE Programming Community Index) * More than 3 billion devices are powered by Java technology
They forgot one:
* #1 programming language used in judicial patent cases
Re:Java Facts and Figures
by
jonabbey
·
· Score: 2
They're counting Android in that '3 billion', of course.
Project Lambda
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
Project lambda was arguably the most important planned addition to the JDK7, but apparently got dropped in the last few months and pushed back to JDK8. To be honest Project Coin, Fork/Join, and InvokeDynamic are useful, but not much of a big deal as Project Lambda.
Because you already have a large code base in Java, that you intend to develop further, and would like the language to provide better features as you go on?
Because you want to use the existing wealth of Java libraries and frameworks?
Because you have a lot of people who already know Java, and for whom learning lambdas will be much easier than re-learning everything from scratch?
Re:Google must be watching...
by
Baloroth
·
· Score: 2
Ummm, I think you need to look up clean room design, which is supposedly what Dalvik is. New developments can be worked into Dalvik through that process, while definitely keeping Dalvik as "not Java". It's Java in pretty much the same way an AMD processor is an Intel processor. They do the same thing, pretty much, they just do it completely different ways (or at least ways that aren't based on each other). Result: Oracle is being evil, Google not so much.
-- "None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
Isn't this the problem?
by
MrEricSir
·
· Score: 4, Funny
You don't make a good language by smashing a bunch of "projects" together. If you do that, you end up with C++.
-- There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
Yahoo Toolbar - Go away please
by
landoltjp
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
Dear Oracle,
Please turn off the default installation of the Yahoo Toolbar. I don't know why you have it checked on, but I am happy to decide for MYSELF what I Want to install on my machine.
Re:Yahoo Toolbar - Go away please
by
h4rr4r
·
· Score: 5, Funny
Dear landoltjp,
We will not as we make a lot of money from that bundling. We don't care what you want, try to remember that ORACLE is an acronym for One Rich Asshole Called Larry Ellison.
Re:Google must be watching...
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Not quite AMD started with an intel design. When Intel couldnt make enough 386 chips they got AMD to do help them (and a bunch others). That meant 'here are the plans to make it'.
For another year
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 2, Informative
(After which it will still be updated, but on a paid-only basis.)
Actually, probably longer if you have a proprietary Unix OS such as Mac OS X, AIX or HP-UX where the OS vendor ships patches. The OS vendors usually find it easier to just issue patches for the old version rather than adding support for a new one.
Re:Version 6 Update 26 the last of Version 6?
by
francium+goes+boom
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
And we have applications that REQUIRE specific java versions. I wish i could uninstall all the previous versions.
Right now i have: 1.4.2.11 1.6.010 1.6.17 1.6.26
Re:Version 6 Update 26 the last of Version 6?
by
h4rr4r
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
Find the developers and beat the ever living shit out of them. How you can fail at Java that hard I will never understand.
I'm curious how much of an impact the new 'invokedynamic' has - specifically on Ruby and Python - any good performance analysis out there?
-- sic transit gloria mundi
Re:Version 6 Update 26 the last of Version 6?
by
curunir
·
· Score: 3, Informative
According to this page, you've got until July, 2012 before they stop supporting 1.6. When 1.6 was released, they continued to release fixes for 1.5, so I would assume they'll do the same for the 1.6 to 1.7 transition.
Funny enough, I just set up an Ubuntu box and decided to grab JDK 7 without knowing that today would be the day it was "released". As such, I downloaded it directly from Oracle/Sun/Java/Whatever..
Note, I then installed Eclipse Indigo, which was having some problems with some of the plugins. I added the following line to the eclipse.ini file and the problems went away:
-Djava.util.Arrays.useLegacyMergeSort=true
Everything's working fine now.
If anyone's interested in what's new in Java 7
by
euroq
·
· Score: 2
-- Just because the U.S. is a republic does not mean it is not a democracy. Democracy/republic are not mutually exclusive.
Re:Java 7 not supported under VMware or MS Hypervi
by
slack_justyb
·
· Score: 2
Well many in my circle have noted that an immediate roll out of Java7 is not warranted at this time, in fact discouraged. The update 26 of 6 is good enough for most customers now and Java7 should be used in small installations and test beds.
Not dissing what you have here, VMWare support is a biggie in my book, but this is the x.0 release. Maybe we should give Oracle the benefit of the doubt (OMG I'm really saying this?) and wait for them to provide the support later.
switch statements can now use strings (more efficient than if/else chain)
some new concurrency features (fork/join) to better handle multiprocessor setups
try with resources (so you don't always have to set a finally block to make sure your i/o object gets closed)
Did you ever imagine?
by
voss
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
There would be someone out there that would make Bill Gates seem like a nice guy.
List of features in Java 7
by
Necroman
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Oracle has a detailed list of the additions in Java 7. OpenJDK has relatively the same information listed in a different way.
While it took forever to get JDK7 out the door, it's finally out and they can work toward JDK8, which is currently scheduled for release a year from now. The Oracle takeover is said and done and they are able to keep pushing new features into the language now. For all of us that use Java daily, this is a nice change.
I recommend looking over the feature list if you are a java dev. There are some really nice changes to make your day-to-day code just a little easier.
that's the truth, for the language itself warmed over 1980s c++ concepts, then the promise of right-once - run anywhere in practice just a pile of B.S., the typical libraries used make business apps bloated hardware hogs.....now add to that the Oracle ogre.....fuck java, the jvm and j2ee. Superior lightweight alternatives are being embraced except for those companies with time and money to burn. And if you want to descend to an even deeper level of Hell, than sign IBM up for websphere project and watch the con-slut-ants descend like vampires
Before, these situations were silently ignored, now an IllegalArgumentException is thrown, unless you use the option to use the legacy sorting algo.
What are the alternatives?
by
Paul+Fernhout
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
"Superior lightweight alternatives are being embraced except for those companies with time and money to burn."
Please list them with pros and cons.
BTW, Java was a stupid idea (VisualWorks Smalltalk was better then and might still be), but after fifteen years or so of suffering, there is a lot of good stuff about the Java platform IMHO, both code libraries and including the use of the JVM for other languages. Android is based around a version of Java. Everything has its problems. Java could use a lot more attention on the desktop, and I prefer a message passing model over a function calling model myself. Too bad Java has not been free-as-in-freedom from the start or it would have gone much further.
Anyway, I'd be curious what you thought the alternatives were.
-- A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Re:What are the alternatives?
by
rubycodez
·
· Score: 2
hours of typing for pros and cons, but I'll agree the JVM can be all right for running other languages with slimmer libraries.
It breaks things that improperly implement the Comparable interface then try to sort objects that implement that interface.
*sigh*... I've seen more invalid implementations of Comparable than valid ones.
However, the reason for the change is that there's a new implementation of the default merge sort that is much faster for partially sorted input and small collections so if we get over the adoption phase it will speed up a lot of legacy code.
-- XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
Re:Google must be watching...
by
Tomato42
·
· Score: 2
Around Athlon AMD started to use completely different microarchitecture than Intel.
Re:Google must be watching...
by
Waffle+Iron
·
· Score: 3, Informative
Not quite AMD started with an intel design. When Intel couldnt make enough 386 chips they got AMD to do help them (and a bunch others). That meant 'here are the plans to make it'.
Wrong. If 8086 chips were going to be put in the PC, IBM required that Intel have a second source manufacturer for the parts. So Intel contracted with AMD to also crank out the chips.
Intel tried to cancel this arrangement when the 80386 was introduced, and a long legal battle followed. In the mean time, AMD started a clean room design of a 386 clone. AMD has had their own distinct designs since then, and I'm sure that there's just about nothing from pre-386 chip internals that is in any way relevant to current CPU designs.
Somewhere along the line, the two companies also did a patent cross-licensing agreement, which allows them to freely copy each other's concepts.
All you people who hate Oracle...
by
Ossifer
·
· Score: 2
... are Johnny-come-latelies. My company got sued by Oracle in 1984.
Lose the Yahoo toolbar installation on your installer. It's unprofessional and it makes you look desperate. It makes you look like you're selling screen savers or clipart. In the 90's. So stop it.
Re:Version 6 Update 26 the last of Version 6?
by
Lothsahn
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
Or how about this:
I'm a developer on an enterprise application suite that exercises critical bugs in Java 6 Update 18-24 (we haven't yet tested 25 and 26). Oracle introduced a regression in 6u18 that they fixed in 6u21, but in 6u20 or 6u21 they introduced yet another regression. Both regressions cause a complete crash of the JDK that, on busy production systems, causes a complete crash, usually 1+ times a day.
Therefore, we can only recommend 6u17 as the stable version of the software, because 6u18+ isn't. I would strongly prefer that you not "beat the ever living shit out of me" for Oracle not being able to create a stable JVM for an enterprise product.
We'd get an Oracle support agreement to get these problems resolved, but you wouldn't BELIEVE how much money they want for such support. And even if we did pay Oracle a BOATLOAD of money, there's no guarantee that they'd even fix our issues--just that they would listen.
on busy production systems, causes a complete crash, usually 1+ times a day.
Java7 doesn't appear to be much better for stability. I just got this email today:
Hello Apache Lucene & Apache Solr users,
Hello users of other Java-based Apache projects,
Oracle released Java 7 today. Unfortunately it contains hotspot compiler
optimizations, which miscompile some loops. This can affect code of several
Apache projects. Sometimes JVMs only crash, but in several cases, results
calculated can be incorrect, leading to bugs in applications (see Hotspot
bugs 7070134 [1], 7044738 [2], 7068051 [3]).
-- -=Lothsahn=-
Re:Annnnd?
by
Ramin_HAL9001
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
At least the HotSpot JVM is GPL'd, that alone makes it better than.NET. LLVM is open source (though not GPL), so it may make a viable alternative to Java some day.
Other lightweight open source alternatives are Mozilla SpiderMonkey, GHCI (interactive Haskell interpreter), the Python VM, and the Perl VM, the Ruby VM, Parrot (does Perl, Python, and Ruby bytecode) and Emacs. Unfortunately, I don't see people writing web applications using Python or Perl (except for the back-end maybe). Emacs was once great, but lack of proper graphical interface programming means it is forever stuck in its niche as a text editor. Everything is changing over to JavaScript, so that leaves us with SpiderMonkey as the only hope for an open source VM (Google's V8 is not open source) that is both widely used and specially tuned for executing a popular programming language. But you can't really call JavaScript an alternative to Java, because the two technologies are so different.
The advantage of a virtual machine is that it isolates execution into a safe environment, but this advantage is superficial: since the VM increase the complexity of the application, it actually makes the attack surface larger and less secure. The only real advantage of using a VM is that it allows you to essentially outsource the job of porting the platform-specific implementation details of your software to the company that provides your virtual machine. And since Java is provided by Oracle, IBM, and Google (through Android), there is enough competition to keep Java technology fresh and modern (unless the patent wars wreck everything). And that is the best thing about Java: its popular, mature, and implemented by several huge and competing corporations. It's a shame that Java never integrated with browsers too well, and that's why Java lost out to JavaScript in the cloud computing world. Java is still an essential part of the enterprise though.
Slashdot Mirror
Will they sue me if I install it?
And the majority of the software folk go "we need a language that's not stewarded by Beelzebub himself"
* 97% of enterprise desktops run Java
* 1 billion Java downloads each year
* 9 million developers worldwide
* #1 programming language (TIOBE Programming Community Index)
* More than 3 billion devices are powered by Java technology
They forgot one:
* #1 programming language used in judicial patent cases
Project lambda was arguably the most important planned addition to the JDK7, but apparently got dropped in the last few months and pushed back to JDK8. To be honest Project Coin, Fork/Join, and InvokeDynamic are useful, but not much of a big deal as Project Lambda.
Ummm, I think you need to look up clean room design, which is supposedly what Dalvik is. New developments can be worked into Dalvik through that process, while definitely keeping Dalvik as "not Java". It's Java in pretty much the same way an AMD processor is an Intel processor. They do the same thing, pretty much, they just do it completely different ways (or at least ways that aren't based on each other). Result: Oracle is being evil, Google not so much.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
You don't make a good language by smashing a bunch of "projects" together. If you do that, you end up with C++.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
Dear Oracle,
Please turn off the default installation of the Yahoo Toolbar. I don't know why you have it checked on, but I am happy to decide for MYSELF what I Want to install on my machine.
Not quite AMD started with an intel design. When Intel couldnt make enough 386 chips they got AMD to do help them (and a bunch others). That meant 'here are the plans to make it'.
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/eol-135779.html
Java 6 will be updated through July 2012
(After which it will still be updated, but on a paid-only basis.)
Actually, probably longer if you have a proprietary Unix OS such as Mac OS X, AIX or HP-UX where the OS vendor ships patches. The OS vendors usually find it easier to just issue patches for the old version rather than adding support for a new one.
And we have applications that REQUIRE specific java versions. I wish i could uninstall all the previous versions.
Right now i have:
1.4.2.11
1.6.010
1.6.17
1.6.26
Find the developers and beat the ever living shit out of them. How you can fail at Java that hard I will never understand.
I'm curious how much of an impact the new 'invokedynamic' has - specifically on Ruby and Python - any good performance analysis out there?
sic transit gloria mundi
According to this page, you've got until July, 2012 before they stop supporting 1.6. When 1.6 was released, they continued to release fixes for 1.5, so I would assume they'll do the same for the 1.6 to 1.7 transition.
"Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!"
Funny enough, I just set up an Ubuntu box and decided to grab JDK 7 without knowing that today would be the day it was "released". As such, I downloaded it directly from Oracle/Sun/Java/Whatever..
Note, I then installed Eclipse Indigo, which was having some problems with some of the plugins. I added the following line to the eclipse.ini file and the problems went away:
-Djava.util.Arrays.useLegacyMergeSort=true
Everything's working fine now.
This page has all the details: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/jdk7-relnotes-418459.html
Just because the U.S. is a republic does not mean it is not a democracy. Democracy/republic are not mutually exclusive.
Well many in my circle have noted that an immediate roll out of Java7 is not warranted at this time, in fact discouraged. The update 26 of 6 is good enough for most customers now and Java7 should be used in small installations and test beds.
Not dissing what you have here, VMWare support is a biggie in my book, but this is the x.0 release. Maybe we should give Oracle the benefit of the doubt (OMG I'm really saying this?) and wait for them to provide the support later.
There would be someone out there that would make Bill Gates seem like a nice guy.
Oracle has a detailed list of the additions in Java 7. OpenJDK has relatively the same information listed in a different way.
While it took forever to get JDK7 out the door, it's finally out and they can work toward JDK8, which is currently scheduled for release a year from now. The Oracle takeover is said and done and they are able to keep pushing new features into the language now. For all of us that use Java daily, this is a nice change.
I recommend looking over the feature list if you are a java dev. There are some really nice changes to make your day-to-day code just a little easier.
Its not what it is, its something else.
that's the truth, for the language itself warmed over 1980s c++ concepts, then the promise of right-once - run anywhere in practice just a pile of B.S., the typical libraries used make business apps bloated hardware hogs.....now add to that the Oracle ogre.....fuck java, the jvm and j2ee. Superior lightweight alternatives are being embraced except for those companies with time and money to burn. And if you want to descend to an even deeper level of Hell, than sign IBM up for websphere project and watch the con-slut-ants descend like vampires
And the majority of the software folk go "we need a language that's not stewarded by Beelzebub himself"
Will these be the same developers using Visual Studio?
Bearded Dragon
It breaks things that improperly implement the Comparable interface then try to sort objects that implement that interface.
See the incompatibilities list
Before, these situations were silently ignored, now an IllegalArgumentException is thrown, unless you use the option to use the legacy sorting algo.
"Superior lightweight alternatives are being embraced except for those companies with time and money to burn."
Please list them with pros and cons.
BTW, Java was a stupid idea (VisualWorks Smalltalk was better then and might still be), but after fifteen years or so of suffering, there is a lot of good stuff about the Java platform IMHO, both code libraries and including the use of the JVM for other languages. Android is based around a version of Java. Everything has its problems. Java could use a lot more attention on the desktop, and I prefer a message passing model over a function calling model myself. Too bad Java has not been free-as-in-freedom from the start or it would have gone much further.
Anyway, I'd be curious what you thought the alternatives were.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
keep the cobol, run in MIcrofocus Server Express on Linux, wrap with its c to cobol api, and access with your favorite web language.
It breaks things that improperly implement the Comparable interface then try to sort objects that implement that interface.
*sigh* ... I've seen more invalid implementations of Comparable than valid ones.
However, the reason for the change is that there's a new implementation of the default merge sort that is much faster for partially sorted input and small collections so if we get over the adoption phase it will speed up a lot of legacy code.
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
Around Athlon AMD started to use completely different microarchitecture than Intel.
Not quite AMD started with an intel design. When Intel couldnt make enough 386 chips they got AMD to do help them (and a bunch others). That meant 'here are the plans to make it'.
Wrong. If 8086 chips were going to be put in the PC, IBM required that Intel have a second source manufacturer for the parts. So Intel contracted with AMD to also crank out the chips.
Intel tried to cancel this arrangement when the 80386 was introduced, and a long legal battle followed. In the mean time, AMD started a clean room design of a 386 clone. AMD has had their own distinct designs since then, and I'm sure that there's just about nothing from pre-386 chip internals that is in any way relevant to current CPU designs.
Somewhere along the line, the two companies also did a patent cross-licensing agreement, which allows them to freely copy each other's concepts.
... are Johnny-come-latelies. My company got sued by Oracle in 1984.
Lose the Yahoo toolbar installation on your installer. It's unprofessional and it makes you look desperate. It makes you look like you're selling screen savers or clipart. In the 90's. So stop it.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Yes it did, JSR 292 added the InvokeDynamic instruction to the bytecode.
Dilbert RSS feed
Or how about this: I'm a developer on an enterprise application suite that exercises critical bugs in Java 6 Update 18-24 (we haven't yet tested 25 and 26). Oracle introduced a regression in 6u18 that they fixed in 6u21, but in 6u20 or 6u21 they introduced yet another regression. Both regressions cause a complete crash of the JDK that, on busy production systems, causes a complete crash, usually 1+ times a day.
Therefore, we can only recommend 6u17 as the stable version of the software, because 6u18+ isn't. I would strongly prefer that you not "beat the ever living shit out of me" for Oracle not being able to create a stable JVM for an enterprise product.
We'd get an Oracle support agreement to get these problems resolved, but you wouldn't BELIEVE how much money they want for such support. And even if we did pay Oracle a BOATLOAD of money, there's no guarantee that they'd even fix our issues--just that they would listen. on busy production systems, causes a complete crash, usually 1+ times a day.
Java7 doesn't appear to be much better for stability. I just got this email today:
Hello Apache Lucene & Apache Solr users, Hello users of other Java-based Apache projects,
Oracle released Java 7 today. Unfortunately it contains hotspot compiler optimizations, which miscompile some loops. This can affect code of several Apache projects. Sometimes JVMs only crash, but in several cases, results calculated can be incorrect, leading to bugs in applications (see Hotspot bugs 7070134 [1], 7044738 [2], 7068051 [3]).
-=Lothsahn=-
At least the HotSpot JVM is GPL'd, that alone makes it better than .NET. LLVM is open source (though not GPL), so it may make a viable alternative to Java some day.
Other lightweight open source alternatives are Mozilla SpiderMonkey, GHCI (interactive Haskell interpreter), the Python VM, and the Perl VM, the Ruby VM, Parrot (does Perl, Python, and Ruby bytecode) and Emacs. Unfortunately, I don't see people writing web applications using Python or Perl (except for the back-end maybe). Emacs was once great, but lack of proper graphical interface programming means it is forever stuck in its niche as a text editor. Everything is changing over to JavaScript, so that leaves us with SpiderMonkey as the only hope for an open source VM (Google's V8 is not open source) that is both widely used and specially tuned for executing a popular programming language. But you can't really call JavaScript an alternative to Java, because the two technologies are so different.
The advantage of a virtual machine is that it isolates execution into a safe environment, but this advantage is superficial: since the VM increase the complexity of the application, it actually makes the attack surface larger and less secure. The only real advantage of using a VM is that it allows you to essentially outsource the job of porting the platform-specific implementation details of your software to the company that provides your virtual machine. And since Java is provided by Oracle, IBM, and Google (through Android), there is enough competition to keep Java technology fresh and modern (unless the patent wars wreck everything). And that is the best thing about Java: its popular, mature, and implemented by several huge and competing corporations. It's a shame that Java never integrated with browsers too well, and that's why Java lost out to JavaScript in the cloud computing world. Java is still an essential part of the enterprise though.