@Supported design issues

[Joseph Darcy]

On 9/5/2013 2:20 AM, Alan Bateman wrote:
> On 20/03/2013 01:32, Joseph Darcy wrote:
>>
>> Following up in the same thread, the JEP for this work is now 
>> available for your reading pleasure at:
>>
>>     JEP 179: Document JDK API Support and Stability
>>     http://openjdk.java.net/jeps/179
> Joe - do you want to reboot this discussion? With the deadline for API 
> changes looming then it would be good to get agreement on whether we 
> are going to do anything on this. I still have the patch to add this 
> to the APIs that we generate javadoc for in the build - this is the 
> same set of APIs that I understand to be stable APIs and okay for 
> applications/libraries to make direct use of.
>
> Given the previous discussion then getting agreement on whether this 
> is a boolean or something more seems important. Clearly there are 
> corner cases (a few of these came up in the original discussion) but a 
> simple label to convey that an API is stable seems a good start. The 
> other problematic issue was the naming, clearly "Supported" results in 
> too many questions, "by who?" in particular. Have you considered 
> alternative names? I realize this is open to bikeshedding. Personally 
> I wouldn't have a problem with jdk.Stable if appropriately defined.
>

IMO, the high order goal here should be getting the "is this API okay to 
use" information encoded into the source code and class files. Given 
that you've already compiled that information, I think there is great 
value in going forward with this effort for JDK 8 even given the 
relatively late point in the schedule.

Perhaps instead of "Supported", the adjective "Sanctioned" better 
conveys what is intended: this API is explicitly part of the JDK's 
contract and fine to use.

I'm open to other suggestions too.

Cheers,

-Joe