As some of you may know, sun.reflect.Reflection#getCallerClass(int) was removed 
in Java 8 (it was replaced with no-arg Reflection#getCallerClass(), which uses 
non-public @CallerSensitive). This resulted in LOG4J2-245 [1] 
(EmptyStackException on Java 8), which was resolved with using a backup option 
(SecurityManager#getClassContext()) in the hopes that a replacement would be 
found. I have been actively involved in discussions on the Java 8 Core 
Libraries mailing list to replace this behavior with a public API in Java 8 
[2,3].

It has now come to my attention that the changes to 
Reflection#getCallerClass(...) have been back-ported to Java 7 now [4,5] 
(effective 1.7.0_25, released in the last week or so). Since it's a non-public 
API, they're free to do this any time they want, but it will cause a nightmare 
for Log4j users using 1.7.0_25 and higher. Here are the exact changes that were 
made:

1) Added no-arg Reflection#getCallerClass() that uses back-ported 
@CollerSensitive.
2) Left Reflection#getCallerClass(int) in place, but it now THROWS an 
UnsupportedOperationException (which is even worse ... the fix for LOG4J2-245 
won't pick this up and make it work for 1.7.0_25+ users).
3) In Java 7 _only_ (won't work for Java 8) users can specify 
jdk.reflect.allowGetCallerClass system property to enable 
Reflection#getCallerClass(int). I submit this will not be an option our users 
are willing to accept, but it is a temporary workaround.

Here's hoping they add a public API in Java 8 to make what we're using this for 
easier (I'm pushing as hard as I can), but it looks like Java 7 is broke for 
good. We should probably add in a check so that getCallerClass is not used 
unless Java major version is 6.

I do not know how this change will impact Log4j 1.x. Hopefully it won't.

Nick

[1] https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/LOG4J2-245
[2] http://mail.openjdk.java.net/pipermail/core-libs-dev/2013-June/018049.html
[3] http://mail.openjdk.java.net/pipermail/core-libs-dev/2013-June/018353.html
[4] http://mail.openjdk.java.net/pipermail/jdk7u-dev/2013-June/006791.html
[5] http://mail.openjdk.java.net/pipermail/core-libs-dev/2013-June/018349.html
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