[ANN] Apache Karaf 4.0.0.M2 Technology Preview Released!

["Jamie G." <ja...@gmail.com>]

The Karaf team is pleased to announce the release of Karaf version 4.0.0.M2.

Apache Karaf is a small OSGi distribution which provides a ready to
use container for server side applications.

!! This is a technology preview release of Apache Karaf, and should
NOT be considered production ready !!

Apache Karaf 4.0.0.M2 represents a major refactoring of the project,
and includes numerous new features. We ask that users provide the
community with their feed back so that the full Apache Karaf 4.0.0
release can be as feature complete and stable as possible.


The 4.0.x line will ship with OSGi Rev5 support via Felix 4.4.1 and
Equinox 3.9.1-v20140110-1610, and a completely refactored internal
framework without Blueprint for internal usage. From a users point of
view these changes will yield a smaller, more efficient Karaf core.
There will be a Blueprint feature present in Karaf so that you can
easily install Blueprint based applications. You will always be
capable of using Blueprint in Karaf. So the main difference from a
user perspective is that you’d need to depend on the Blueprint service
if you need it. New features since the M1 release include: Support for
custom command parsers, a verify-features goal to validate the feature
with a real OSGi resolution, and a backing engine serivce for
org.apache.karaf.jaas.modules.publickey.PublickeyLoginModule.

http://karaf.apache.org/

This release is available from
http://karaf.apache.org/index/community/download.html#Karaf4.0.0.M2 and

Maven:

 <dependency>
 <groupId>org.apache.karaf</groupId>
 <artifactId>apache-karaf</artifactId>
 <version>4.0.0.M2</version>
 </dependency>

Download Note:
Our mirrors are still syncing the new kits, if your primary mirror
does not have the kit please try another from the server mirror list.

Apache Karaf manuals will appear soon to the website, updates are underway.

Release Notes:

There are 196 resolved issues included in this release, best reviewed
via our Jira.
As this is a milestone release we've included a short set of release notes:
http://karaf.apache.org/index/community/download/karaf-4.0.0.M2-release.html

Enjoy!