Java JDK 9 Finally Reaches General Availability

[bug77]

The system can be adapted to include modules if that's what you want.
With containers alone, you still have to package all those runtimes. You saved nothing.
You only increased overhead compared to having the launcher take care of this.
Note that the launcher, or whatever application would manage the connection between apps, version request and runtimes would be able to minimize the amount of runtimes and modules. By both trying to use only minor and major version bundling to the latest version and choose to use a different runtime by user configuration as well. This achieves a minimal amount of runtimes with the added benefit of no container overhead.
I'm also not suggesting making Java into .NET only using a similar but not identical way of managing runtime versions like .NET.

Then by all means, go to JCP ad suggest a JEP for this.

[plonoma]

Then by all means, go to JCP ad suggest a JEP for this.

That sounds interesting, I don't know if I can find a long enough block of time to make a decent shot at this though.
I also can not write a proof of concept or technical specification anytime soon because I lack the very specific technical information about the involved components.
I'm afraid I don't have enough expertise to write a well architecture d JRE management API that can be presented to JCP and suggested as a JEP.

Some Java functionality and pieces about versioning are interesting though:
From: https://www.rankred.com/whats-new-in...tures-changes/
With Java using SemVer (http://semver.org/):

18. New Version String Scheme

And it being possible to compile for previous platforms:

16. Compile For Previous Platforms

bug77
Thanks for the encouraging words.

[caligula]

Doesn't matter now, with modules you can create your own runtime and include only what you use (more or less).
Also, the idea of making Java like .Net is dumb. First because I already need to keep a handful of .net runtimes (and countless more Visual C runtimes), I don't need Java to join them. Second, because of modules, it's clear this issue has just been resolved in another way.

In case you didn't notice, I was in favor of this modularization (and jlink). Never said anything about .NET.

[bug77]

In case you didn't notice, I was in favor of this modularization (and jlink). Never said anything about .NET.

The second paragraph wasn't aimed strictly at your comment, it was more aimed at plonoma's proposal

[DanLamb]

Phoronix: Java JDK 9 Finally Reaches General Availability

Java 9 (JDK 9) has finally reached general availability! Following setbacks, Java 9 is officially available as well as Java EE 8...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...DK9-GA-Release

Standalone binaries, produced by JDK9 jlink, are important for mobile/dekstop/workstation apps; everything except server software. For server software, container packaging such as Docker is the most useful mode of packaging; there your container image is your standalone binary.

JDK9 has official, "early access" support for Alpine Linux which is the container-friendly micro-Linux: http://jdk.java.net/9/ea

But the official open-jdk images only offer alpine images for JDK 7/8 and not 9, which seems weird. http://hub.docker.com/_/openjdk/

It looks like as-is, Jigsaw isn't impacting regular developers or users at all, for better or for worse. The major build tools like Maven and Gradle are fully compatible with JDK 9 in that they work with JDK 9 just like they did with JDK 8, but they don't offer polished Jigsaw integration or support, and there's no real benefit to JDK 9 yet.

[DanLamb]

If only Java apps are made in such a way they request a specific main version (with optional minor and bugfix version and SE/EE/ME/other as well). Maybe with some sort of Java JRE Semantic Versioning (SemVer): http://semver.org/.
And if only the JRE was made in such a way you could install multiple main versions next to each other.

Docker already provides this for server apps.

You can specify a specific version like openjdk:9-b181 that pretty much if fixed or a more general version openjdk:9 that will automatically update to newer builds in the same major release or openjdk:latest that will automatically upgrade across major versions.

And, of course, different Docker images normally use different versions of Java or other languages and can run next to each other on the same server or VM.

[plonoma]

Docker already provides this for server apps.

You can specify a specific version like openjdk:9-b181 that pretty much if fixed or a more general version openjdk:9 that will automatically update to newer builds in the same major release or openjdk:latest that will automatically upgrade across major versions.

And, of course, different Docker images normally use different versions of Java or other languages and can run next to each other on the same server or VM.

Pretty neat functionality.
Such a useful way of using versions is however not an official part of the Java specification and Java application launcher.