New informational JEP: 14: The Tip & Tail Model of Library Development

[Ron Pressler]

> On 4 Nov 2024, at 19:16, Alan Snyder <javalists at cbfiddle.com> wrote:
> 
> 
>> On Nov 4, 2024, at 9:52 AM, Alex Buckley <alex.buckley at oracle.com> wrote:
>> 
>> In asking about "must", I think you're viewing JEP 14 as a specification that can be tested, leading to conformance badges being given, etc -- but it's not. 
> 
> Perhaps the confusion stems from calling the document a JEP instead of a white paper, which to me would be more accurate.

If you look at the JEP's header you’ll see that it, like all other JEPs, has a “Type” field.

JEP 14 is an *informational* JEP because it offers background information that is useful to understanding decisions made in the process of developing the JDK as well as advice that should be taken into consideration when writing software that interacts with the JDK.

It is not a feature JEP as it does not describe a new feature, nor is it a process JEP as it does not prescribe a process that is followed in the development of the JDK (although I suppose a process JEP could be derived from this informational JEP).

Informational JEPs (you can identify those that aren’t yet “active” by the leading `I` in their respective rows of the JEP list) are not nearly as common as feature JEPs, and we use them to communicate important background information or information that doesn’t neatly fit in one feature JEP.

— Ron