platform support proposal

[Rick Hillegas <Ri...@Sun.COM>]

Hi Derby users,

Sun will stop supporting jdk1.3 at the end of March, 2006 (see 
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.3/index.jsp) and is encouraging customers to 
migrate their applications to supported platforms. Would anyone object 
if the next release of Derby (release 10.2) is the last release which 
runs on jdk1.3? Note that Derby 10.2 will still run on jdk1.4.x and 
jdk1.5.x and, I hope, on some flavor of the upcoming 1.6 jdk. Note also 
that long after jdk1.3 officially sunsets, users will still be able to 
download Derby 10.2 for use on that unsupported platform.

Is this acceptable? If not, how would you like to see Derby handle the 
sunsetting of jdk1.3 support?

Thanks,
-Rick

Re: platform support proposal

[Daniel John Debrunner <dj...@debrunners.com>]

Michael J. Segel wrote:

> Also to your point, there are other JVMs that exist. Which ones should Derby 
> support? You have to draw a line in the sand somewhere ... ;-) My suggestion 
> would be to use Sun's version as a benchmark on which version levels to 
> support. 

Well Derby is coded against the Java api's, not any implementation of
them. I would expect Derby to work on any JVM which correctly implements
those apis, which traditionally has meant any Java Certified VM.

The line in the sand is really drawn by what any individual user,
contributor and/or committer does. If someone tests Derby on some VM and
provides the results to the Derby community then they have shown that
Derby works on that VM. If they found problems then they or anyone else
can provide patches to get Derby running on that VM. (See DERBY-488 :-)

The community can show that Derby runs on many JVMs, by reporting test
results.

See http://db.apache.org/derby/derby_tests.html for a great start by
Sun. We are hoping these scripts can be open sourced by Sun to allow
others the ability to share any nightly testing, IBM runs the derby
tests against a number of platforms across the week.

I think any official release should have a table of the platforms that
it has been tested against, again provided by the community.

On the other hand "support" in the traditional sense is another kettle
of fish. Paid-for support for Cloudscape has always been that Cloudscape
was supported on any Java Certified VM (at the correct JDK 1.x levels).
Anyone else that offers support on Derby can pick their own rules for
platform support.

Dan.

Re: platform support proposal

["Michael J. Segel" <ms...@segel.com>]

On Wednesday 03 August 2005 13:54, Daniel John Debrunner wrote:
> Michael J. Segel wrote:
> > On Tuesday 02 August 2005 23:39, Daniel John Debrunner wrote:
> >>Rick Hillegas wrote:
> >>>Is this acceptable? If not, how would you like to see Derby handle the
> >>>sunsetting of jdk1.3 support?
>
> [Sun,IBM,Blackdown dates & comments omitted]
>
> > Sigh, not to start a flame war....
>
> Not a flame war, but the end-of-service dates of VMs are a piece of the
> information for deciding on continuing 1.3 support. I work for IBM but
> was not suggesting that Derby follow IBM service dates for 1.3 support,
> only pointing out there there are other VMs aside from Sun's, with
> different end-of-service dates.
>
True.  
To your point there are others. This is why I was suggesting a policy of n and 
n-1 version support, where n is the current GA release. 

Lets say that version 1.5 of the JVM hits the streets prior to the next Derby 
release. I would suggest supporting 1.5 and 1.4. 

If the next release of Derby hits prior to 1.5, then using n-1 as our guide, 
version 1.3 should be supported.

Also to your point, there are other JVMs that exist. Which ones should Derby 
support? You have to draw a line in the sand somewhere ... ;-) My suggestion 
would be to use Sun's version as a benchmark on which version levels to 
support. 

-- 
Michael Segel
Principal
MSCC
(312) 952-8175

Re: platform support proposal

[Daniel John Debrunner <dj...@debrunners.com>]

Michael J. Segel wrote:

> On Tuesday 02 August 2005 23:39, Daniel John Debrunner wrote:
> 
>>Rick Hillegas wrote:

>>>Is this acceptable? If not, how would you like to see Derby handle the
>>>sunsetting of jdk1.3 support?

[Sun,IBM,Blackdown dates & comments omitted]

> Sigh, not to start a flame war....

Not a flame war, but the end-of-service dates of VMs are a piece of the
information for deciding on continuing 1.3 support. I work for IBM but
was not suggesting that Derby follow IBM service dates for 1.3 support,
only pointing out there there are other VMs aside from Sun's, with
different end-of-service dates.

Other, more important factors for 1.3 support (or indeed any version) are:

  - is there demand for Derby support on 1.3?

  - are there people willing contribute effort to keep Derby running on
1.3 (e.g. testing etc.)?

Hopefully if there are people who still want Derby to run on 1.3, a
subset of them are willing to help out on that effort.

I do think a reasonable approach is for the next release to be the last
Derby release to support 1.3.

Dan.

Re: platform support proposal

["Michael J. Segel" <ms...@segel.com>]

On Tuesday 02 August 2005 23:39, Daniel John Debrunner wrote:
> Rick Hillegas wrote:
> > Hi Derby users,
> >
> > Sun will stop supporting jdk1.3 at the end of March, 2006 (see
> > http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.3/index.jsp) and is encouraging customers to
> > migrate their applications to supported platforms. Would anyone object
> > if the next release of Derby (release 10.2) is the last release which
> > runs on jdk1.3? Note that Derby 10.2 will still run on jdk1.4.x and
> > jdk1.5.x and, I hope, on some flavor of the upcoming 1.6 jdk. Note also
> > that long after jdk1.3 officially sunsets, users will still be able to
> > download Derby 10.2 for use on that unsupported platform.
> >
> > Is this acceptable? If not, how would you like to see Derby handle the
> > sunsetting of jdk1.3 support?
>
> FYI - some of the end of service dates for IBM's 1.3 vms go out to Sep
> 2007.
>
Sigh, not to start a flame war....

IBM is notoriously slow when it comes to staying up to date with changes.
(Hint: Type 4 JDBC drivers for DB2, anyone. ;-) 

No disrespect to IBM, but I would suggest that we keep track/pace with Sun's 
sunset plans.  I would hope that with the recent re-org in ISSD that IBM will 
make some changes to their End of Service Dates so that IBM keeps in synch.
[Note to Dan: We should take this discussion offline. (gumby@segel.com)]

While it is important to maintain some backwards compatibility, it doesn't 
make sense to keep support for sunset'd versions of a jdk in the current 
release.  

I don't want to say that this is an IBM centric issue, but that anyone using 
an older jdk release should expect indefinite support. For every new feature, 
you have to now test it against JDK 1.3, 1.4, 1.5 ...  I would hope that n-1 
support, where n = current latest GA'd release, should suffice.

As it has been pointed out, they can always use a prior version of Derby if 
they need to use an older jdk...

-Mikey

-- 
Michael Segel
Chief Peon in Charge
MSCC
(312) 952-8175 [M]

Re: platform support proposal

[Daniel John Debrunner <dj...@debrunners.com>]

Rick Hillegas wrote:

> Hi Derby users,
> 
> Sun will stop supporting jdk1.3 at the end of March, 2006 (see
> http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.3/index.jsp) and is encouraging customers to
> migrate their applications to supported platforms. Would anyone object
> if the next release of Derby (release 10.2) is the last release which
> runs on jdk1.3? Note that Derby 10.2 will still run on jdk1.4.x and
> jdk1.5.x and, I hope, on some flavor of the upcoming 1.6 jdk. Note also
> that long after jdk1.3 officially sunsets, users will still be able to
> download Derby 10.2 for use on that unsupported platform.
> 
> Is this acceptable? If not, how would you like to see Derby handle the
> sunsetting of jdk1.3 support?

FYI - some of the end of service dates for IBM's 1.3 vms go out to Sep 2007.

blackdown.org seemed to release a 1.3 in Jan 2005
http://www.blackdown.org/java-linux/java2-status/index.html

Note sure these would change any 10.2 Derby plan, but it's more data points.

Dan.