Preferring class files to source files in ClassReader.java

[Joel Borggren-Franck]

Hi Jeremy,

On 2013-11-13, Jeremy Manson wrote:
> Hi folks,
> 
> A bit of background:
> 
> - We use a content-addressable storage around here, so to minimize the
> diffs between two JAR files (and get more hits in our content-addressable
> storage), we reset all timestamps in JAR files to the same values.
> - Some of our users include both source and class files in their JAR files.
> - When those users want to put those JAR files on the classpath for javac,
> and use them to compile other files, they may not have included enough on
> the classpath to compile the source files.
> - We've worked around this by favoring classfiles when the two files are of
> the same age.  This has the added benefit of not having to recompile the
> source files when they are found.
> - What do you think?  Too esoteric?  Wait for JDK9?
> 

Thinking out loud here. While I do understand your usecase, don't we
want the opposite to be the default case? If javac finds a source and a
class file and the timestamps are suspect isn't the responsible thing to
do to compile the source again?

cheers
/Joel