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Re: Java policy and ABI changes



Quoting Andrew Haley <aph@littlepinkcloud.COM>:

Mike Hommey writes:

 > I have a java library package, called libmozillainterfaces-java,
 > that is provided by xulrunner. I'm currently working on a new
 > upstream release of xulrunner which changed the java interfaces:
 > some interfaces changed namespaces, so you have to do changes to
 > your source code, and xpcom initialization is not handled the same
 > way (you have to initialize the Mozilla instance before
 > initializing xpcom).
 >
 > Which means classes built with the older version won't build nor run
 > as is with the newer version.
 >
 > What should be done in such case, package-wise ? Change name ? Change
 > jar name ? Both ? Other ?

Shoot the maintainers?  Well, OK, that would be a little extreme, but
urge the maintainers not to break binary compatibility.

In my opinion, Java libraries without stable interfaces shouldn't be
deployed in free OSes.  If they are to be used, you're going to have
to change the jar name, but even that may not work: if you use such a
library Mozilla, some other version of the same package might be used
by some other Java application running in the same process, and unless
it's firewalled by some ClassLoader trickery it'll break.  If that
happens, some trickery like Jar Jar Links may be your only hope.

Hm. All this is a bit extreme. Even the Linux kernel changes its API all the time and things are working okay. Especially with the use of the java classloaders the whole binary compatibility is a bit overrated IMHO.

In Maven you can have all sorts of versions of the same jar in parallel and each application can use whichever it needs.

I think one way or another it will be necessary to have different versions of various libraries in Debian in parallel. I do not think it will be possible to force all upstreams to always use the latest version (or most secure one or whatever.. how would you select anyway).

Just my 2c (and definitely not more..)

manfred



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