Oracle's plans to contribute to OpenJDK 6 after November 2012

[Dalibor Topic]

On 6/6/12 3:05 PM, Andrew Hughes wrote:
> That doesn't seem fair to me.  This is stopping other members of the
> OpenJDK community from working on OpenJDK6, just because Oracle doesn't 
> want to.

If someone wanted to step up and continue to work on OpenJDK 6 after November,
they could either:

 a) propose a new Project, or 
 b) arrange for a succession of Project Leads on this Project.

Which way this ends going isn't up to me. People vote with their feet in open 
source communities for their own reasons. So please don't assume that what I 
say in this thread is a statement of direction from Oracle - IANAS (I am not 
a spokesperson).

In either case a or b, I would see a few challenges for someone pursing either 
option:

i)   Supported platforms for OpenJDK 6 are Windows, Solaris & Linux
ii)  Development process requires active Reviewers, which are a rare commodity
iii) Version drift between 7u and OpenJDK 6 should continue to increase
iv)  Decreasing utility of OpenJDK 6 after November

Option a) may provide a way to address i) and ii). The other two are inherent
challenges. Taken together, they are why I believe that 

 c) nothing happens and forests close

is the most likely thing to happen in November. But like I said, it's not my call, 
and I'd be glad to be wrong on this one.

cheers,
dalibor topic


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