Feature request: aliasing classes at import

[Serge Boulay]

"Personally, I would certainly like to see collections literals in the
language at some point; "

I was under the impression that this was already voted on in the Java 8 JSR
337.

To quote JSR 337

"Java SE 8 will further reduce boilerplate code by adding productivity
features to the Java language and the Java SE APIs. These features will
increase the abstraction level of most applications in a pragmatic way, with
no significant impact on existing code and a minimal learning curve for all
developers. We propose to make it easier for developers to work with the
existing, *widely-used Collections Framework, for example, by extending the
language with literal expressions for immutable lists, sets, and maps*."





On Tue, Aug 2, 2011 at 7:44 PM, <joe.darcy at oracle.com> wrote:

> On 7/14/2011 11:17 PM, Ben Evans wrote:
>
> On Fri, Jul 15, 2011 at 1:52 AM, Kelly O'Hair <kelly.ohair at oracle.com<mailto:
>> kelly.ohair at oracle.com**>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>    Kind of looks like C macros:
>>
>>    #define UDate java.util.Date
>>    #define SDate  java.sql.Date
>>
>>    Oh, that would be bad right?  Did someone say Java shall not have
>>    macros? ;^)
>>
>>
>> Well, in this case, I think the OP's intention was that these import
>> aliases would be scoped to a single file, rather than global textual
>> replacement.
>>
>> I think that it would be fine if all it does is provide an alternative,
>> non-clashing short name for a class.
>>  This is very similar to a feature of Scala's import statement, by the
>> way.
>>
>> Joe: What's the process for Java 8 Coin changes? Are we at a stage where
>> you want actual proposals and strawman prototypes yet (assuming you're going
>> to be carrying on the work you did for 7 in the JDK8 project)?
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Ben
>>
>
> Catching up on email, given the scope of language changes coming with
> Lambda, I would not expect JDK 8 to be able to accommodate another full set
> of Coin changes as done in JDK 7.  Personally, I would certainly like to see
> collections literals in the language at some point; I think they would help
> declutter common code patterns.
>
> For JDK 8 planning in general, JEPs will be involved [1].  However,
> independent of the particulars of JDK 8 planning, I would certainly
> encourage interested parties to develop prototypes of Java language changes,
> paying mind to all the possible interactions [2] and expected test
> development [3].
>
> Cheers,
>
> -Joe
>
> [1] http://mail.openjdk.java.net/**pipermail/discuss/2011-June/**
> 001962.html<http://mail.openjdk.java.net/pipermail/discuss/2011-June/001962.html>
> [2] http://blogs.oracle.com/darcy/**entry/so_you_want_to_change<http://blogs.oracle.com/darcy/entry/so_you_want_to_change>
> [3] http://blogs.oracle.com/darcy/**entry/javac_regression_tests<http://blogs.oracle.com/darcy/entry/javac_regression_tests>
>