On Thu, Mar 22, 2018 at 8:13 AM, Jonathan Gibbons < jonathan.gibb...@oracle.com> wrote:
> > The interim JDK relies on javac and related tools being compilable by the > boot JDK. This imposes a restriction that the source code of those tools > must be conformant to the source version supported by the boot JDK, meaning > no use of any newer features. The javac team have always lived with and > accepted the N-1 restriction that this imposes. With a more rapid cadence, > it might be appropriate to revisit the N-1 rule. But since a "last LTS" > rule may imply N-5 or N-6 or so, that seems like too much. > Historically, major java releases came out about once every 3 years, which aligns pretty well with a "last LTS" rule. Non-LTS releases such as jdk9 see cascading lack of support and hence lack of adoption - your OS vendor may be reluctant to ship such a jdk.
