[Biojava-dev] Re: [Biojava-l] Java 1.5 (final chance to object)

[Thomas Down]

On 6 Oct 2005, at 08:47, Marcus Breese wrote:

> You may want to think a bit more about converting completely over  
> to 1.5...
> There are still a number of platforms that don't have a compatible  
> 1.5 JDK.
> Mac OS X still comes with 1.42 standard (1.5 is available, but not
> standard). Also, the last time I checked there wasn't an IBM PPC  
> 1.5 JVM,
> which means that a number of HPC platforms / clusters will not be  
> supported.

IBM do have something out now:

             http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/java/jdk/java5beta/

Beta software on a time-limited licence, so probably not what people  
really want to run -- but it does suggest there should be a release  
version in the not-too-distant future.

Perhaps we should wait until the end of the year then look at how the  
transition is coming along.  I know there's a new release of Mac OS  
10.4 coming in the next few weeks, and it sounds like that will  
include a big pile of bug-fixed (I know the dreaded Eclipse-running- 
progressively-slower bug has been looked at).  That might well  
encourage more Mac users (who seem to be the biggest group stuck on  
Java 1.4) to upgrade.

             Thomas.