Fwd: Increase IzPack minimum JDK requirements

[Patrick Reinhart]

Am Donnerstag, 12. März 2020 11:07:05 UTC+1 schrieb Patrick Reinhart:

Hi everyone,

I wanted to know about your all opinions about to lift up the minimum JDK requirements for IzPack for the new releases to come. Is there a preferred minimum version?

At the moment the minimal version is at 1.6 where it's extremely hard or in the last months impossible to build it on open source based platforms. Should we move to the already no longer supported version 8 in a first step for a coming version 5.2.x version?

Thanks for your comments on that topic.

Patrick

[René Krell]

OK from my point of view.

In this case

• I'd increase the new release version to 5.2.0 (master branch and version tag in JIRA)
• created a Git branch 5.1 to reflect the breaking change and to allow anyone who sits on JRE 6 to maintain the old version.

René

[Adam Retter]

Just out of interest...

Is this for CI? If so would just manually specifying "-source 1.6" be
enough for CI testing?

Or is this more about being able to build releases? If so, there are
older builds of OpenJDK 1.6 available for Linux and Windows here -
https://www.azul.com/downloads/zulu-community/?&version=java-6-lts&architecture=x86-64-bit&package=jdk&show-old-builds=true

> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "izpack-user" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to izpack-user...@googlegroups.com.
> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/f9d0f27a-9475-438f-8b14-0fe626544295%40googlegroups.com.



--
Adam Retter

eXist Core Developer
{ United Kingdom }
ad...@exist-db.org

[Patrick Reinhart]

It could work up and until using JDK 8 for compilation. The main problem is for proper compilation you would also need to specify the boot classpath to a real JDK 6... And if one needs to have JDK prior 8 he could use also an older version of IzPack.

-Patrick

[Ron Wheeler]

Java 8 was released 6 years ago and effectively dies Dec 2020 unless you have paid support
Java 11 is the curent LTS version and was released 2 1/2 years ago. I believe that it still gets free support for few more years.

Java 8 is a great release but if any effort is going to go into a 5.2 version, it would make sense to move to Java 11 at least.
Anyone who is currently using 5.1 will be fine and any new adopter building a serious application will probably be using a Java 11+ if they are doing Java development and will likely have a version of Java higher than 8 if they are already using another tool built on Java.

I don't recall any big issues moving from Java 8 to Java 11 but don't be surprised if Java 11 does require cleaning up any code that breaks some of the Java specs but worked anyway under 1.6 (or 8). I seem to recall that Java 11 revealed code errors that I had been able get away with under 8.

If you promise to support Java 8, then you will have to test with Java 8 as well as more current releases (11, 14 and 15) of the Java Runtime.
Promising 11 eliminates the need to test with 8 and probably simplifies the testing on 14 and 15 since they are much less likely to break running a 5.2 compiled under Java 11 than one compiled under Java 8.

It also marks the project as being modern and actively under development which is a non-technical benefit that is perhaps harder to evaluate.
Issuing a new release done with a 6+ year old Java, implies that it took us sometime between 2.5 and 6.5 years to get an update out.
Might be true but looks bad.

Ron

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "izpack-user" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to izpack-user...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/d301cf6d-e6d6-43c3-a59d-6942eee12520%40googlegroups.com.

[Adam Retter]

I actually disagree with this...

If you look around there is still a vast amount of code out there
built with Java 6 which is used every day (just look in Maven
Central).

I think that building against a relatively old version of Java (e.g.
Java 8) ensures great ease of use for people (as they may have older
JRE/JDK installed)

> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/d09e2b31-d334-25fd-10b8-83f0c0dd1876%40gmail.com.

[Ron Wheeler]

As long as you don't mind testing it against Java 11+ since people will
expect it to run with a currently supported Java runtime.

It is not that big a deal to support both but it is more work to test it
on both.

Getting from Java 6 to a newer version is a big step from a marketing
POV. Java 8 will help show that the project is still viable; Java 11
shows that it is state of the art.


Ron

[René Krell]

I'd rather voted for the conventional way, thus JDK 8, too.

IzPack has always been stuck with minimal system requirements, due to its intention of "installing" even newer software on older systems.

The second point is what Adams says, there are many production systems running many years even after the "official support" on old versions. I made this experience in my previous profession, too. For instance 10 thousands of POS systems in supermarkets can't be easily upgraded to a newer JRE, especially if the old one serves fine.

I think it's worth the work and if someone is willing to do them I wouldn't rather playing the game of quickly increasing version numbers as Oracle does at the moment.

René

pá 13. 3. 2020 v 3:44 odesílatel Ron Wheeler <rwhee...@gmail.com> napsal:

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/b42ec54b-1b75-b79e-58e2-608197c886d7%40gmail.com.

[Andreas Kuhtz]

Hello,

I agree with René to keep JDK 8 as minimum.

Cheers,

Andreas

>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to izpac...@googlegroups.com.

>> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/d301cf6d-e6d6-43c3-a59d-6942eee12520%40googlegroups.com.
>>
>> --
>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "izpack-user" group.

>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to izpac...@googlegroups.com.

>> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/d09e2b31-d334-25fd-10b8-83f0c0dd1876%40gmail.com.
>
>

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "izpack-user" group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to izpac...@googlegroups.com.

[Torsten Stolpmann]

Speaking as a long term user of iZPack (> 15 years) in different
projects I would much appreciate that izPack uses the minimal Java
version which can practically be maintained by the developers.

Not izPack should determine the Java version a user has to install to
install a product using izPack but the version the application itself
requires.

Cheers
Torsten

On 13.03.2020 10:09, Andreas Kuhtz wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I agree with René to keep JDK 8 as minimum.
>
> Cheers,
> Andreas
>
> Am Freitag, 13. März 2020 10:00:22 UTC+1 schrieb René Krell:
>
> I'd rather voted for the conventional way, thus JDK 8, too.
>
> IzPack has always been stuck with minimal system requirements, due
> to its intention of "installing" even newer software on older systems.
>
> The second point is what Adams says, there are many production
> systems running many years even after the "official support" on old
> versions. I made this experience in my previous profession, too. For
> instance 10 thousands of POS systems in supermarkets can't be easily
> upgraded to a newer JRE, especially if the old one serves fine.
>
> I think it's worth the work and if someone is willing to do them I
> wouldn't rather playing the game of quickly increasing version
> numbers as Oracle does at the moment.
>
> René
>
>
> pá 13. 3. 2020 v 3:44 odesílatel Ron Wheeler <rwhee...@gmail.com

> <javascript:>> napsal:

> from it, send an email to izpac...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>.

> >> To view this discussion on the web visit
> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/d301cf6d-e6d6-43c3-a59d-6942eee12520%40googlegroups.com

> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/d301cf6d-e6d6-43c3-a59d-6942eee12520%40googlegroups.com>.

> >>
> >> --
> >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the
> Google Groups "izpack-user" group.
> >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails

> from it, send an email to izpac...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>.

> >> To view this discussion on the web visit

> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/d09e2b31-d334-25fd-10b8-83f0c0dd1876%40gmail.com
> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/d09e2b31-d334-25fd-10b8-83f0c0dd1876%40gmail.com>.

> >
> >
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the
> Google Groups "izpack-user" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from

> it, send an email to izpac...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>.

> To view this discussion on the web visit

> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/b42ec54b-1b75-b79e-58e2-608197c886d7%40gmail.com
> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/b42ec54b-1b75-b79e-58e2-608197c886d7%40gmail.com>.

>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
> Groups "izpack-user" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send

> an email to izpack-user...@googlegroups.com
> <mailto:izpack-user...@googlegroups.com>.

> To view this discussion on the web visit

> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/f45402c8-7337-4e92-baf8-4fe2da19ea2b%40googlegroups.com
> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/f45402c8-7337-4e92-baf8-4fe2da19ea2b%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

[Patrick Reinhart]

That would be what version in your opinion?

As I can see it at the moment, an the tools available for open source development at the moment at least require JDK 8 to work without having to relay on much quirks...

Patrick

[Torsten Stolpmann]

Sorry for the late answer, I missed your reply.

It is not required that you align your development environment with the
code you generate.

You can still create Java 6 code using Java 11 or beyond while using all
the cool tools available therefore. This is what the target java version
argument is for.

Hint: A good tool to check backwards compatibility in your code and JDK
API use is Animal Sniffer:
http://www.mojohaus.org/animal-sniffer/animal-sniffer-maven-plugin/

I think the main question you should ask yourself is what JDK/Language
features you really *need* to implement izPack functionality.

I am personally ok with JDK 8 but others mileage may vary.

Torsten

> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
> Groups "izpack-user" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send
> an email to izpack-user...@googlegroups.com
> <mailto:izpack-user...@googlegroups.com>.
> To view this discussion on the web visit

> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/cce58305-e4ef-4064-bfe1-66f6ffe44469%40googlegroups.com
> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/izpack-user/cce58305-e4ef-4064-bfe1-66f6ffe44469%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

[Patrick Reinhart]

Generating byte code for older versions would be possible, the question is if we would provide of language features to enhance the installer in a easier way.

Java 9-11 supports back to version 6

Java 12-14 supports back to version 7




Also the possibility producing older byte code will be reduced in the future, here's a list of the current Java versions and their supported target release bytecode

- Patrick