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commit 2c7d2c5fafec71f3cb65dd2ccd446e9ee8f78f52 Author: Markus Koschany <[email protected]> Date: Sun Jun 12 21:56:36 2016 +0200 Add initial draft wheezy-lts-and-the-switch-to-openjdk7.md --- .../2016/wheezy-lts-and-the-switch-to-openjdk7.md | 66 ++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 66 insertions(+) diff --git a/content/2016/wheezy-lts-and-the-switch-to-openjdk7.md b/content/2016/wheezy-lts-and-the-switch-to-openjdk7.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6778888 --- /dev/null +++ b/content/2016/wheezy-lts-and-the-switch-to-openjdk7.md @@ -0,0 +1,66 @@ +Title: Wheezy LTS and the switch to OpenJDK 7 +Date: 2016-06-12 +Authors: Markus Koschany +Status: draft + +Wheezy's LTS period started a few weeks ago and the LTS team had to make an +early support decision concerning the Java eco-system since Wheezy ships two Java +runtime environments [OpenJDK 6](https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/openjdk-6) and +[OpenJDK 7](https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/openjdk-7). (To be fair, there are +actually three but [gcj](https://packages.debian.org/oldstable/gcj-4.6-jre) has +been superseded by OpenJDK a long time ago and the latter should be preferred +whenever possible.) + +OpenJDK 6 is currently maintained by Red Hat and we mostly rely on their +upstream work as well as on package updates from Debian's maintainer Matthias Klose and +Tiago Stürmer Daitx from Ubuntu. We already knew that both intend +to support OpenJDK 6 until April 2017 when Ubuntu 12.04 will reach its +end-of-life. Thus we had basically two options, supporting OpenJDK 6 for another +twelve months or dropping support right from the start. One of my first steps +has been to ask for feedback and advice on +[debian-java](https://lists.debian.org/debian-java/2016/03/msg00044.html) for +the more likely choice of supporting only one JDK. We agreed on warning users +via various channels about the intended change, +especially about [possible +incompatibilities](http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/compatibility-417013.html) +with OpenJDK 7. Even Andrew Haley, OpenJDK 6 project lead, [participated](https://lists.debian.org/debian-java/2016/03/msg00055.html) in the +discussion and confirmed that, while still supported, OpenJDK 6 security +releases are "always the last in the queue when there is urgent work to be +done". + +I informed [debian-lts](https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts/2016/03/msg00098.html) about +my findings and issued a [call for tests](https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts/2016/04/msg00070.html) later. + +Eventually we decided to [concentrate our efforts on OpenJDK +7](https://www.debian.org/News/2016/20160425) because we could be sure that for the +majority of our users one Java implementation is sufficient during a stable +release cycle. An immediate positive effect in making OpenJDK 7 the default is that +resources can be relocated to more pressing issues. On the other hand we were +also forced to make compromises. The switch to a newer default implementation +usually triggers a major transition with dozens of FTBFS bugs and the [OpenJDK 7 +transition](https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?tag=openjdk-7-transition;[email protected]) +was no exception. I pondered about the usefulness of fixing all these bugs for +Wheezy LTS again and focussing on runtime issues instead and finally decided +that the latter was both more reasonable and more economic. + +Different from regular default Java changes, users will still be able to use OpenJDK 6 to +compile their packages and then the security impact is in general neglectable. More important +was to avoid the runtime installation of OpenJDK 6. I identified eighteen +packages that strictly depended on the now obsolete JRE and [fixed those +issues](https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2016/05/msg00007.html) +on 4 May together with an update of +[java-common](https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/java-common) to announce the switch to +OpenJDK 7 with a Debian NEWS file. + +If you are not a regular reader of [Debian +news](https://www.debian.org/News/news) and also not subscribed to +[debian-lts](https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts/), +[debian-lts-announce](https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/) or +[debian-java](https://lists.debian.org/debian-java/), remember **26 June +2016** is the day when OpenJDK 7 will be made the default Java implementation in +Wheezy LTS. Of course there is no need to wait. Remove OpenJDK 6 and switch now: + +''' +sudo update-alternatives --config java +''' + -- Alioth's /usr/local/bin/git-commit-notice on /srv/git.debian.org/git/pkg-java/pkg-java-blog.git _______________________________________________ pkg-java-commits mailing list [email protected] http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/pkg-java-commits
