Re: Stallman lamenting that GCJ and ClassPath are still (read: eternally)catching up ...

[Dalibor Topic <robilad at kaffe dot org>]

Erik Poupaert wrote:
> The "Java Trap" is otherwise an interesting read:
>
> http://programming.newsforge.com/programming/04/04/07/2021242.shtml?tid=105&tid=54
>
> He's lamenting about "GCJ and ClassPath still catching up".
>
> GCJ eternally catching up is otherwise a self-inflicted condition. I mean, we all
> know very well that it never pays to play copycat. There's no way to be *and*
> compatible with Sun *and* to let things drift there where the users want to take them
> -- and that's eventually the only strategy that guarantees success.
>
> Let's recap the GCJ successes from 1998 till this very day? None. What will be the
> GCJ successes in 2007? None again. It doesn't take a degree in advanced econometrics
> to see this coming.
>
> It all just sounds as if there were no niches -- at all -- in which GCJ could be
> successful and start building strength. Of course there are.

It is *still* catching up in some areas, unfortunately. How much that 
matters depends on your interests, but in some areas there is quite some 
way to go [1], till GNU Classpath can claim to have a complete 
implementation of JDK 1.4 libraries. In others, GNU Classpath is already 
100% there. But that's O.K., in my opinion, the missing bits will be 
covered as well eventually. And then Sun will release 1.5 and we'll play 
catchup again.

I see Richard's post as a way [2] of introducing a new audience how far 
GNU Classpath has come, inviting them to try it out for their apps, and 
dip into the pool of free software java runtimes. If more people from 
the Java open source world read the article and try out their 
applications and libraries with GNU Classpath based runtimes, report the 
bugs they find, and eventually submit bug-fixes and become GNU Classpath 
developers themselves, then we're all in for the better.

And the next catch-up session after 1.5 is released might go faster if 
there are more GNU Classpath developers around from the start :)

cheers,
dalibor topic

[1] http://www.kaffe.org/~stuart/japi/htmlout/h-jdk14-classpath.html
[2] I'm not saying it's the best possible marketing pitch, but hey, it's 
a honest message. It's not leading people to believe that GNU Classpath 
is the same as the JDK. There are pointy, sharp bits, and you should 
know what you're doing(TM) when you use gcj, sablevm or kaffe :)