It is my opinion that NetBeans should support JDK 8 for as long as JDK 8 is supported. Extended support is provided by Oracle till 2030. Other groups (Azul) also support JDK 8 till 2030. It's hard for me to imagine what the rush to move off of 8 is.
Blake McBride On Mon, Apr 3, 2023 at 4:39 AM Neil C Smith <neilcsm...@apache.org> wrote: > As mentioned elsewhere, I'm kicking off a process to bring this issue > to a decision. For various reasons, having a decision before we > branch off NB18 is desirable. I've drawn up a draft proposal (below) > that tries to encompass most of what has been expressed, and hopefully > achieves that - thanks to those who have already given feedback in its > iteration. > > This thread will be active for 7 days. Expressions of support and > disagreement welcomed. In particular, if you -1 please offer an > alternative to all or part of this proposal that you're able to help > implement. We should try and reach a consensus position that removes > any block. If after the 7 days we cannot do this, then we move to a > vote on this with any agreed amendments. > > See also the page at > https://community.apache.org/committers/consensusBuilding.html > > Thanks, Neil > > ==================================================================== > > # Proposed policy > > * Apache NetBeans 18 will be the last release to support running the > platform on JDK 8. > > * From Apache NetBeans 19, the minimum JDK required to build and run > the IDE or platform will be JDK 11. > > * Future releases will take an "LTS-1" strategy for building and > running (and CI testing) of the IDE and platform. Three JDKs will be > supported at any one time - the current JDK, plus the previous two LTS > releases. eg. NetBeans 20 and 21 (Nov 2023 / Feb 2024) will support > JDK 11, 17 and 21. NetBeans 22 (May 2024) will support JDK 17, 21 and > 22. > > ## Background > > The Apache NetBeans IDE has officially required JDK 11 to build and > run since NetBeans 13 in March 2022. The platform (and unofficially > the IDE) have continued to support running on JDK 8 - all modules > requiring a higher JDK must currently be optional. Various tests have > continued on JDK 8. > > This situation is causing issues as workarounds must be found for > currently non-optional features that have dependencies or other > requirements for running on a higher JDK (eg. Maven indexing / Lucene > [1]). It's causing delays, complications and missed testing time in > integration of new features (eg. problems merging support for EE 10 > [2]). Supporting an increasing range of JDKs is causing increasing > workload, both for people and CI. Meeting the challenges of deprecated > (for removal) features in the JDK is also complicated by the > additional JDK requirements. > > ## Notes > > * Apache NetBeans users will continue to be recommended to use the > current or latest LTS JDK to run the IDE. The IDE will continue to > support users developing projects for/with JDK 8, for as long as > nb-javac and other dependencies allow. > > * This proposal specifically doesn't address when the default bytecode > level across the codebase is increased. This can happen when required, > but non-optional modules would be free to adopt the minimum JDK as > they need to. > > * Optional modules may continue to require a runtime JDK higher than > the minimum. Should it become necessary, build time optional modules > might be considered - eg. a build on the minimum JDK may exclude > modules that will not run on that JDK at runtime. > > * Some modules that are of independent use (eg. lookup, utilities, > etc.) might be nominated and advertised to continue JDK 8 support for > the time being. This is not expected to cover the runtime container as > a whole - https://netbeans.apache.org/tutorials/nbm-runtime-container.html > > * Once NetBeans 19 is released, the NetBeans 18 release branch could > be used to backport and release JDK 8 supporting fixes, subject to any > PMC members wanting to manage those releases. > > * The term "platform" is used in reference to the whole framework of > modules that we release (eg. via Maven), not just the platform > cluster. > > [1] https://github.com/apache/netbeans/pull/4999 > [2] https://github.com/apache/netbeans/pull/4692 > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@netbeans.apache.org > For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@netbeans.apache.org > > For further information about the NetBeans mailing lists, visit: > https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/NETBEANS/Mailing+lists > > > >