Incident Report 9079511: Java Language Enhancement: Disallow access to static members via object references

[Archie Cobbs]

There are two ways to look at OpenJDK with its zoo of components,
sub-groups, CSR's, processes, hierarchies, etc: (a) It's the most
bureaucratic open source project in the world (b) it's the most incredible,
productive, and reliable open source project in the world*. I think both
are true. Moveover I don't think it would be possible to have (b) without
(a). So yes, it's unfortunate but unavoidable that it's rarely as easy as
filing a PR, which is what most people familiar with "open source" people
are used to (including me until I joined this project). That means more
effort is required, which means that often one just doesn't have the time
to deal with it. Nothing wrong with that.

-Archie

* One could argue that Linux shows the "benevolent overlord" model works
too, but remember "Linux" only refers to the kernel; everything else is
spread across many other organizations, whereas OpenJDK is a one-stop shop
for the JVM, the Java language, and all the various JDK modules.

On Sat, Jan 24, 2026 at 8:47 AM Attila Kelemen <attila.kelemen85 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Well, thank you, I guess. I should maybe contribute instead of just
> complaining, and things might happen earlier :). I'm just not so great with
> long bureaucratic processes, and generally lost how to start if I believe a
> feature (even if small) should be implemented in the JDK (or related
> tools). That is, my general expectation would be that if I just send a PR,
> then it would be ignored and lost within the many things of the JDK (at
> least as far as I have seen, actually implementing it is usually secondary
> to having it discussed with relevant people).
>
-- 
Archie L. Cobbs
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