OpenJDK 6 and 6u10 features

[Joseph D. Darcy]

Mark Wielaard wrote:
> Hi Martin,
>
> On Wed, 2008-11-05 at 15:53 -0800, Martin Buchholz wrote:
>   
>> The historical reality is that *small* spec changes were handled in much
>> the same way as bug fixes - a Sun sponsor shepherded the changes
>> through the Sun-internal approval process.  At the end of a release,
>> all the small changes were incorporated into the umbrella JSR for the release,
>> and approved en masse.  So you didn't need a final JDK spec to do work;
>> ratification by the JCP has typically been an after-the-fact formality.
>>
>> Today you can do the same.  The hard part is finding the Sun sponsor
>> to do the (non-trivial) shepherding work.
>>     
>
> Thanks for this, I didn't know that.
> Would it make sense to make this a more open and formal process for the
> whole OpenJDK community? 

Yes, opening these kinds of processes up is a known outstanding to-do 
item from Sun for the OpenJDK project.
> What steps are there in the shepherding work
> that are tied to private Sun internal processes that cannot be done out
> in the open?
>   
Many of the process can (and should!) be done in the open, they just 
aren't done in the open yet.  For example, when changing an API there is 
a review of the suitability of the change to the platform distinct from 
the actual code review.

-Joe