On Jan 4, 2012, at 13:16 PM, Felix Meschberger wrote: > I recently converted the Web Console code to use Generics and added the > target jsr14 flag for the compiler to build Java 1.4 compatible class files. > All fine and well. > > until ... JDK 7 comes along ... > > I just learned that the JDK 7 compiler does not support jsr14 compiled class > files any longer and runs havock... > > So, there are basically three options: > > (a) drop Java 1.4 support completely compiling to Java 5 class files > (b) drop generics (and have Java 1.4 sources again) > (c) have multiple build profiles > > I would like to keep generics. They make a lot of things nicer. But then we > alienate the embedded market ... > > Where shall we go ?
Let's start by concluding that this problem is a lot bigger in scope than just web console. As Holger recently pointed out on this list, the OSGi Alliance relied on an appearantly unsupported and (since Java 7) dead "-target jsr14" option. It would be nice to learn how they intend to solve this issue before we do, because it probably makes sense to align our decision with theirs. If I personally had to make a decision between supporting Java 1.4 or using generics, I would keep support for Java 1.4. In the end we build our software for our users and I know there are quite a few of them that run on embedded platforms that don't yet support Java 5. Greetings, Marcel
