[jacorb-developer] Java 9 heads up

[Russell Gold]

Not sure if anybody here is on the committees tracking the changes to Java, but Java 9 looks as though it’s going to have major impacts, due to adoption of the Jigsaw module system <http://openjdk.java.net/jeps/261>. For ORB developers, I think the big change will be treatment of the CORBA-related classes under org.omg.* and javax.rmi.*.

In the current version of Java, if you define a class that matches one in the JDK, the latter will be used, unless you specify the -Xbootclasspath switch on the command line. A class which has no JDK equivalent is loaded without problem. That goes away in Java 9. Instead, code is organized into modules, and by default, those modules own their packages. That is, even if a class has no JDK equivalent, it will not be loaded if it is in a package controlled by an existing module. To load it, you must replace the entire module.

In the current plan, the java.corba module will include the embedded ORB and all of the current org.omg.* and javax.rmi.* classes. That means that it is no longer possible to add standard OMG classes that the JDK lacks without also replacing both the orb, and classes such as javax.rmi.PortableRemoteObject, as well as the entire OMG API.

- Regards,
Russ

(I am not involved in the JDK, just trying to prepare for Java 9 myself)