[Update: March 24th: welcome JavaBlogs readers! Note that this blog entry is a month old. I changed my archive format, changing the permalink for my blog entries, and this caused JavaBlogs to pick up and list a bunch of old entries. Sorry!]
The umbrella JSR for Java 6.0 ("Mustang") has just been released. It provides some preliminary details about what we can expect to see in the next major release of Java. Overall, it looks like we've been spoiled by all the great usability features of Java 5.0. This next release is going to be much less dramatic (unless you love XML). These are the "themes" for the release:
Compatibility and Stability Diagnosability, Monitoring, and Management Ease of Development Enterprise Desktop XML & Web Services Transparency
Its all important stuff, I suppose, but a lot of behind the scenes stuff, rather than exciting new features. On the postive side, a boring release makes it easier for me to update my books!
The JSR also tells us someting about the release schedule for Java 6.0:
Early Draft - April 2005
Public Review - Late 2005
Final Release - Mid 2006
It seems reasonable to assume that the final release of the JSR will be around the same time as the release of Java 6.0 itself.
Finally, and this is the real substance of umbrella JSRs like this, here is the preliminary list of JSRs being considered for includsion in Java 6.0:
JSR 105: XML Digital Signature
JSR 199: Java Compiler API
JSR 202: Java Class File Specification Update
JSR 221: JDBC 4.0
JSR 222: JAXB 2.0
JSR 223: Scripting for the Java Platform
JSR 224: JAX-RPC 2.0
JSR 260: Javadoc Tag Update
JSR 268: Java Smart Card I/O API
JSR 269: Pluggable Annotation Processing API
JSR TBD: JAXP.next
Nothing too dramatic on this list. The class file spec. update and the compiiler API are JSRs that were originally targeted at Tiger, but weren't ready in time. The scripting language API sounds the most interesting to me. Note, however, that this is not the Groovy JSR, but one that lays groundwork for scripting languages in general.
That was expected, it is a first release under a new, shorter, release cycle.
However, there are some dramatic things in that draft. Transparency, with all that talk about "informal expert group" and "J2SE contributor community", and, for the first time, a pretty clear statement in license terms:
7. Nothing in the licensing terms will prevent open source projects from creating and distributing their own compatible open source implementations of J2SE 6.0, using standard open source licenses. (Yes, you can create your own open source implementation of J2SE 6.0 if you really want to. But we're also doing everything we can to make it easy for you to use the original RI sources! See http://j2se.dev.java.net.)
This looks like a first in a series of releases in which Sun will try to work much closer with the Java community and much more open, concentrating less on new features in core J2SE, and more on fixing and polishing what is in there now.
I had a look at each of the JSR's that are being looked at for inclusion (see my post here: http://www.magpiebrain.com/archives/2005/02/16/mustang), and the only kind of overall focus for 6.0 seemed to plug gaps in functionality that are shipping already with .NET - for example firming up the webservices support, inclusion of JAXB etc.