Yes, Absolutely. I am on the Java + Groovy side of the isle, and JDK8 is a huge improvements with pretty much no downsides.
On Thursday, February 13, 2014 3:46:16 PM UTC-5, clay wrote: > > I'm disappointed there is not a peep about JDK 8 in this forum. > > IMO, the main features are: > > - Cleaner lambda expression syntax than the anonymous inner class route > from Java 1.1 > - Functional collections in the standard JDK as opposed to relying on > somewhat obscure add-on libraries like FunctionalJava or Clojure. > - Standard Optional type which actually includes map and flatMap unlike > the philistines from Guava. OptionalInt doesn't include these for some odd > reason. > - Lots of VM improvements. No permgen! Some of my microbenchmarks saw 10% > speedups on old code, which is completely unexpected. > - New date/time library. Successor to Joda as a standard library. If you > have to deal with calendar date/times and can afford JDK8+ runtime > requirement, this is a super elegant library. > > Downsides: > > - Still way, way behind Scala. Scala is basically Java 8 + a ton of syntax > clean up and fixing legacy problems inherited from its C origins + pattern > matching system + for comprehensions designed for flatMap-able types > (Monads) + better designed library. Typesafe's ecosystem is also really > attractive with SBT,Akka,Slick,Play. Most of those support Java, but Scala > is clearly preferred. > - My employer will likely not approve any JDK 8 work for three years or > so. If there is a shred of a possibility we will have to ship code to > someone who expects JDK7 compatibility, we can't upgrade. > - Major features are mostly catch up with everyone else. There are more > exciting new developments elsewhere. > - Android has pinned much of the Java programming community to legacy JDK > 6. Even new Android 4.4 has this pathetic support for the trivial syntax > additions, but doesn't support the major JDK7 features like InvokeDynamic > byte code and the NIO.2 library. > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Java Posse" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
