JEP-118: Why are parameter names not mandatory?

[Jesper Steen Møller]

Hi experts

I'm currently examining these two JEPs, and was curious: Why not make the ParameterNames attribute mandatory at least for non-private methods. I don't quite get why it makes sense to add this info which will be useful for introspection, IDE's and annotation processing, but only make it optional - even defaulting to 'off'?

I apologise if this has been discussed before, I'm new to these two JEPs, but currently investigating them for support in the Ecliipse Java Compiler and tools.

Kind regards,
Jesper