[evla-sw-discuss] Java 7 on EVLA

[Daniel Lyons]

On 10/24/2012 12:47 PM, Kevin Ryan wrote:
> I just found out today that the EVLA will be switching to Java 7 soon.  As in a week or two.  While Java for the Mac OS X is moving away from Apple and to Oracle control, it is still not ready for prime time and OS X software updates still use Apple versions that do not include Java 7 (as far as I know).
>
> Java 7 can be fetched from Oracle as a stand-alone download (as opposed to a software update) but will only work on OS X 10.7 (Lion) or later.
>
> Josh Malone if you know anything about the near future of Java on Macs please feel free to chime in.
>
> With this in mind, the issue I see with the EVLA moving to Java 7 is with its client (GUI) applications.  There are a significant number of Macs used (or perhaps better to say a number of significant people using Macs) in the development and testing of the EVLA now (at least on WIDAR); compiling client applications under Java 7 would alienate them.

I don't think that's true. You can compile with Java 7 but targeting the 
Java 6 JVM and the users shouldn't need to do anything. Provided you 
don't use Java 7-only APIs such as nio2, of course.

You may need to make a few code changes; Keith has the details, but 
essentially the generics type checking is more strict. But this only 
affects the developer, not the hapless user.

-- 
Daniel Lyons
Software Engineer, Database Administrator
dlyons at nrao.edu
(575) 835-7245