[nestmates] validation of ClassFile for hidden classes

[John Rose]

On Nov 13, 2019, at 6:10 PM, David Holmes <david.holmes at oracle.com> wrote:
> 
> This ties into the notion of "runtime nest host" which has to be introduced into the spec in 5.4.4 to support dynamic nestmates - as outlined in other emails. That formulation previously assumed we were ignoring a NH/NM attribute in a HC, so now we are not ignoring them we just need to be sure that the formulation handles that case okay - which I think it does.

Right, that makes sense, and now I see where you are coming from about ignoring
those attributes.  If the dynamic host is consulted *instead* of the NestHost and
NestMembers attributes, for both link resolution and for reflection, *and* if there is
no other use of those attributes, then they can truly be said to be “ignored”.

In my view the statement that NH/NMs are ignored is explanatory, not normative,
because it is a corollary of the normative rules which pertain to NH and NMs and
the preferential use of the dynamic host property when performing link resolution
and reflection.

My next question:  Where is the most recent draft of the specification of link
resolution and reflection of hidden classes which are injected into nests?
Does the JVMS get a tweak, since it only talks about the attributes?

— John

P.S. I also dumped some thoughts about classData on
https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8171335
some of which relate to nestmate considerations.