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Java is still available at zero-cost

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Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#71

Post by greglindahl »

euske wrote: post #43

Honest question: How often do people upgrade their production language? Me: once in a decade, maybe. I'm still perfectly happy (and productive) with C# 3.5, Java 7 and Python 2. I'm grudgingly moving forward because the old toolchains are being deprecated now, but my codes aren't significantly improved because of a few fancy idioms available in a new language, and it barely affects the design decisions. Upgrading you…

I don't know about "people", but I know that the companies and organizations that I've worked for and with for stay reasonably close to the leading edge for security and feature reasons.

And if you have a reasonable testing environment, it's not rocket surgery to figure out how much of a problem a new version might be.

Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#72

Post by MBCook »

adamson wrote: post #50

> Build OpenJDK yourself. [...] I suspect this not a very realistic choice for most companies. Are they saying that most firms don't have the ability to build software themselves, or is this a situation particular to Java where they don't backport security patches and most firms aren't on the latest major?

Right now I would expect that basically every company using Java is using the official Oracle version. They’ve never had to worry that they can’t get security patches for the version released 14 months ago.

Practically everyone can use OpenJDK as a drop in replacement. But right now we don’t know how long security patches will continue for each release.

I would hope most firms are on Java 8 now. It wouldn’t surprise me to see people who are still on six or seven.

Nine/ten had a compatibility break (by removing access to internal packages that no one was supposed to be using). Many companies haven’t upgraded because of that. Lots of very popular Java libraries weren’t ready or depended on other libraries that weren’t ready, so upgrading may have been difficult even if you wanted to.

That seems to be a one time thing though. At this point I don’t see why companies shouldn’t be able to upgrade relatively frequently to the latest major release.

Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#74

Post by MBCook »

agibsonccc wrote: post #41
sleepychu wrote: post #24

What does this mean for me as an engineer who writes Java every day?

Use openjdk instead. By default on linux, that's what will continue to happen. You won't really be impacted by this.

There’s no need to use Open JDK.

If that’s your preference or you have some other reason (like the fact it’s probably pre-installed in a Linux distribution) there’s nothing wrong with it.

But there’s absolutely no need for a developer to switch off of Oracle unless you absolutely cannot move to Java 9 or newer.

Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#75

Post by MBCook »

didip wrote: post #15

I am not well-verse in Java world and curious about one thing. The valuable part of Oracle JDK is the GC. For example G1 is only going to be available on OpenJDK 9. What if there's a new GC being developed, will OpenJDK have the new GC?

My understanding is that Open JDK is where all Java language development takes place now.

It’s only some special enterprise features that aren’t part of the language itself that are restricted to the paid version of the Oracle JDK.

Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#76

Post by scarface74 »

MBCook wrote: post #64
scarface74 wrote: post #9

Just for comparison.... Microsoft supports .Net Core LTS releases for three years.... https://www.microsoft.com/net/support/policy

How frequently do they release LTS releases? The six months security patch limit would be a DISASTER in Java world if releases still happened every 2 to 3 years like they used to. Everyone would be stuck with large periods were no security patches were available without paying. But that’s not happening here. Yes you’re limited to six months of free security patches, but a new version comes out every six months. So yo…

How frequently do they release LTS releases?

It’s in the link.

Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#77

Post by MBCook »

flukus wrote: post #58
bradleyjg wrote: post #14

The TL;DR is that Red Hat and IBM are going to take over from Oracle as primary maintainers of java 8 (in the form of openjdk) after January 2019. That is likely to last through at least 2022. Going forward Oracle will be primary maintainers of openjdk for each new version of java for six months. Every third version (starting with 11) the hope and expectation is that RH, IBM, et al will take over after those six mont…

That sounds like a disaster, the developers at oracle no longer have any personal incentive when it comes to producing quality, maintainable software because it is no longer a problem they have to deal with. Because they're not feeling any personal pain from bad decisions they will no longer learn from them. This is close to the consultancy business model that's been at the root of so much bad software.

What makes you say that? The Oracle JDK IS the Open JDK, only with a few extra features. At least that’s my understanding. A shared code base.

If they do a terrible job of sticking a feature in they’re going to have to keep handling it until it’s cleaned up or removed.

Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#78

Post by wiradikusuma »

agibsonccc wrote: post #41
sleepychu wrote: post #24

What does this mean for me as an engineer who writes Java every day?

Use openjdk instead. By default on linux, that's what will continue to happen. You won't really be impacted by this.

how's the performance compared to Oracle's (in Linux)?

Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#79

Post by MBCook »

spydum wrote: post #59
kjeetgill wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then read the article you're commenting on?

I did. Here is the money quote: Firstly, it is not clear that there will be an Oracle JDK that is $free to download. Despite my best attempts, I could not get 100% clarity on this point, but see also this tweet.

Oracle has never announced that they’re charging for their JDK. In all the talk over this stuff over the last few years they’ve never said that. They’ve been quite clear that it will still be free to download.

The only change is that free security patches will now be limited to six months after a release.

Re: Java is still available at zero-cost

#80

Post by facorreia »

euske wrote: post #43

Honest question: How often do people upgrade their production language? Me: once in a decade, maybe. I'm still perfectly happy (and productive) with C# 3.5, Java 7 and Python 2. I'm grudgingly moving forward because the old toolchains are being deprecated now, but my codes aren't significantly improved because of a few fancy idioms available in a new language, and it barely affects the design decisions. Upgrading you…

My company runs its Scala apps on Java 8. That's the version officially recommended by the Scala project:

> For most users, we still recommend using Java 8 for compiling (and running) Scala code.

https://docs.scala-lang.org/overviews/jdk-compatibility/over...

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