Thank you all for the comments,
Just thought I'd make a note that I've finished backporting the
classdepend code that Tim provided to 1.4, still playing around with it,
I'll post it shortly. Just so everyone is clear that Java 1.5 is not
required for this particular task.
However while doing the backport I removed all Generics and replaced
them with unchecked class casts, which motivated me to consider the
benefits of Java 1.5 language constructs, mostly since of the use of
Generics allows additional checking by the compiler which has the
potential to reduce runtime errors. This also led me to ponder the
Backported Concurrency utilities and Annotations.
Considering that the ClassDep code has now added a new library
dependency ASM (3.2MB source), I thought that we could also consider
using Retrotranslator (3.1MB source) in our ant build scripts to build
Java 1.4 compatible bytecode while getting to take advantage of most
Java 1.5 language features.
Comments so far have been
Item
For
Drop Java 1.4 support altogether, migrate to 1.5 allowing us to write
new code in Java 1.5, this negates the need for Retrotranslator
Dennis Reedy, Jim Waldo, Jonathan Costers, Greg Trasuk
Consider small device VM's ( JavaME CDC incl class loading) this
requires supporting JRE 1.4, discuss further, do some research into the
size of bytecode generated by Retrotranslator.
Patrick Wright, Peter Firmstone
If a device is too small to use post 1.4 features use surrogate
instead. I think combined with the point above, we'd need to state the
minimum device requirements for full jini architecture support.
Sean Landis, Peter Firmstone
More consideration required before migrating away from 1.4 platform support.
Tim Blackman
What I'm proposing is a Transition Period, using Retrotranslator in our
build scripts to support Java 1.4 bytecode while allowing us to use 1.5
language constructs.
Best Regards,
Peter Firmstone.
What Java 5.0 features are supported:
* Generics
* Annotations
* Reflection on generics and annotations
* Typesafe enums
* Autoboxing/unboxing
* Enhanced for loop
* Varargs
* Covariant return types
* Formatted output
* Static import
* Concurrency utilities
* Collections framework enhancements
For those interested this is Retrotranslator's source directory /
package structure, its surprisingly small:
bash-3.00$ du -h ./
4K ./conf/retrotranslator-runtime
4K ./conf/retrotranslator-runtime13
5K ./conf/retrotranslator-transformer
14K ./conf
68K ./doc
818K ./lib
1K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/android/extra/java
2K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/android/extra
3K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/android
18K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/registry
6K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/asm/commons
25K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/asm/signature
359K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/asm
65K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/format
127K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/impl
34K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/io
26K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang/annotation
16K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang/instrument
4K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang/management
57K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang/reflect
246K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang
11K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/math
18K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/net
4K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/nio/charset
8K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/nio
7K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/rmi/server
8K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/rmi
12K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/text
6K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/util/concurrent/locks
7K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/util/concurrent
18K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/util/regex
144K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/util
482K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java
4K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/javax/net/ssl
5K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/javax/net
6K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/javax
1.0M ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime
28K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13/v14/java/lang
4K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13/v14/java/util
33K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13/v14/java
34K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13/v14
35K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13
378K ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator/transformer
1.4M ./src/net/sf/retrotranslator
1.4M ./src/net/sf
1.4M ./src/net
1.4M ./src
55K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/format
12K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/impl
31K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/io
17K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang/instrument
4K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang/management
61K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang/reflect
275K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/lang
15K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/math
32K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/net
4K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/nio/charset
9K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/nio
12K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/rmi/server
13K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/rmi
7K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/text
6K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/util/concurrent/locks
7K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/util/concurrent
14K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/util/regex
128K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java/util
511K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/java
8K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/javax/net/ssl
9K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/javax/net
10K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime/javax
589K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime
25K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13/v14/java/lang
4K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13/v14/java/util
30K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13/v14/java
31K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13/v14
32K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/runtime13
6K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/tests/custom
4K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/tests/java/math
6K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/tests/java/util
11K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/tests/java
79K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/tests
15K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/transformer/smart
90K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator/transformer
791K ./test/net/sf/retrotranslator
792K ./test/net/sf
793K ./test/net
794K ./test
3.1M .
