On Sat, Apr 5, 2014 at 12:54 PM, Raymie Stata <rst...@altiscale.com> wrote: > To summarize the thread so far: > > a) Java7 is already a supported compile- and runtime environment for > Hadoop branch2 and trunk > b) Java6 must remain a supported compile- and runtime environment for > Hadoop branch2 > c) (b) implies that branch2 must stick to Java6 APIs > > I wonder if point (b) should be revised. We could immediately > deprecate Java6 as a runtime (and thus compile-time) environment for > Hadoop. We could end support for in some published time frame > (perhaps 3Q2014). That is, we'd say that all future 2.x release past > some date would not be guaranteed to run on Java6. This would set us > up for using Java7 APIs into branch2.
IMO we should not drop support for Java 6 in a minor update of a stable release (v2). I don't think the larger Hadoop user base would find it acceptable that upgrading to a minor update caused their systems to stop working because they didn't upgrade Java. There are people still getting support for Java 6. For the same reason, the various distributions will not want to drop support in a minor update of their products also, and since distros are using the Apache v2.x update releases as the basis for their updates it would mean they have to stop shipping v2.x updates, which makes it harder to collaborate upstream. Your point with regard to testing and releasing trunk is valid, though we need to address that anyway, outside the context of Java versions. Thanks, Eli
