Following advice I received on this list, the Log4j API jar is defined as a multi-release jar with the module-info.java file placed in META-INF/versions/9. This should work fine, yet we continue to have users who are complaining about various tools, such as Javadoc and Eclipse, that can’t handle it properly. One user has gone so far as to suggest we include the automatic module name in MANIFEST.MF in addition to the module-info.java file. When I look at https://docs.oracle.com/javase/9/docs/api/java/lang/module/ModuleFinder.html#of-java.nio.file.Path…- <https://docs.oracle.com/javase/9/docs/api/java/lang/module/ModuleFinder.html#of-java.nio.file.Path%E2%80%A6-> I can clearly see that what we are doing should be working.
My question is, if I follow this user’s suggestion it will mean that applications that correctly support multi-release jars will treat Log4j API as an explicit module while applications that don’t will treat it as an automatic module. I haven’t seen any documentation on what the consequences of this would be. To me it seems like a bad idea but I have nothing I can point to as to why it would be. Does anyone have any pointers? FWIW, it seems like the bug I created for Javadoc is marked as fixed for Java 12, so I would assume when Eclipse fixes its problems this would cease to be an issue. Ralph
