OpenBSD Journal

Developer Blog - kurt@: Java Packages Are Here

Contributed by phessler on from the hot-steaming-java-packaged-for-your-pleasure dept.

Kurt Miller (kurt@) writes:

On Wednesday I committed an update to devel/jdk/1.7 that completed the porting effort to make a fully GPLv2 licensed port for OpenBSD. That means JDK and JRE packages will be built and available for download when snapshot packages are updated. All previous versions of the JDK have been released under licenses that didn't allow us to distribute packages, so users have been forced to build them individually. Having packages will save a few headaches for people wanting to use Java on OpenBSD. However, Sun has not yet released the plugin code so users looking for the browser plugin will still need to build 1.5 or 1.6 from source until that happens.

Kurt continues...

Much has occurred in the open source Java world since Sun announced it would be releasing the JDK's under the GPLv2 license. After a long wait Sun began releasing portions of the JDK last year. Eventually nearly all of the source was released under GPLv2 last May. However, the portions not released in source form were released in binary only form but the license for them include defend and indemnify clauses. This meant we had to wait longer for packages. Fortunately the classpath project formed a new project called IcedTea to replace the binary only parts with GPL licensed versions. I was able to utilize the IcedTea GPL code to replace Sun's binary plugs with GPL versions which gives us a fully GPLv2 licensed JDK and JRE to work with now.

Sun has also opened the door for BSD support to be included upstream. "Bringing the BSD port into the OpenJDK Community under the GPL license is something that Sun would very much like to see happen.", wrote Carla Schroer from Sun in her email to the OpenJDK porters-dev list. While progress has been somewhat slow on this, I continue to be hopeful that my work and the work of the BSD Java porting team will be accepted into Sun's tree in the future. Certainly having it included upstream will reduce the work-load of porting and reporting and reporting BSD support to each new version of the JDK.

(Editor's note: of course, this is for -current. the jdk 1.7 packages will not be available for 4.3.)

(Comments are closed)

Comments

  1. By Matthew Szudzik (mszudzik) on

    Excellent! I look forward to using the packages. It will save a lot of time, since compiling Java from source was a lengthy task. I'm sure that novices will appreciate it too, since fetching the sources was an error-prone manual process.

  2. By kamper (76.10.173.95) on

    Awesome, thanks Kurt!

  3. By Bayu Krisnawan (krisna) krisna@infobsd.org on http://www.infobsd.org

    i'll pray for sun if they permit OpenBSD to distribute the binary of JDK :)

    Nice Work kurt@ thanks

    Comments

    1. By Brad (2001:470:8802:3:216:41ff:fe17:6933) brad at comstyle dot com on

      > i'll pray for sun if they permit OpenBSD to distribute the binary of JDK :)

      It is under the GPL, of course we can distribute the binaries.

      Comments

      1. By Lennie (82.75.29.106) on

        > > i'll pray for sun if they permit OpenBSD to distribute the binary of JDK :)
        >
        > It is under the GPL, of course we can distribute the binaries.
        >

        Maybe he was talking about the browser-plugin ?

        Comments

        1. By Brad (2001:470:8802:3:216:41ff:fe17:6933) brad at comstyle dot com on

          > Maybe he was talking about the browser-plugin ?

          He didn't say the browser plugin.

          Comments

          1. By Bayu Krisnawan (krisna) on http://www.infobsd.org

            > > Maybe he was talking about the browser-plugin ?
            >
            > He didn't say the browser plugin.
            Haha.. sorry..
            Yes i'm quoting this statement.
            "However, Sun has not yet released the plugin code so users looking for the browser plugin will still need to build 1.5 or 1.6 from source until that happens."

  4. By Frank DENIS (82.224.188.215) axey@mac.com on http://forum.manucure.info

    Thank you for your awesome work on Java and threading issues, you rock, Kurt.

  5. By Anonymous Coward (84.192.144.75) on

    Excellent Work! OpenBSD rocks!!

  6. Comments

    1. By Kurt Miller (2001:4830:120b:1:212:f0ff:feb5:f46c) kurt@intricatesoftware.com on

      > What about using a browser plugin like gcjwebplugin.

      Sun is planing on releasing the browser plugin code too.
      It just takes them a while to get the code through all the
      legal reviews. I will just be patient and wait on that to
      happen. Hopefully it will be before 4.4 is released.

      I would like to get gcj going at some point so the port
      could be moved over to IcedTea. They have interpreter only
      ports to other archs like powerpc.

      Comments

      1. By mirabilos (2001:6f8:94d:4:2c0:9fff:fe1a:6a01) on http://mirbsd.de/mksh

        Hi Kurt,

        > I would like to get gcj going at some point so the port
        > could be moved over to IcedTea. They have interpreter only
        > ports to other archs like powerpc.

        what are you using now to build sunjdk, the patched Kaffe?
        I've got gcj running, but not much stuff works using it,
        and gij is a segfaulting PITA.

        Do you think gcj could be used to build this beast?

  7. By Anonymous Coward (64.81.246.101) on

    thanks kurt! do you have wish-list somewhere? i don't see that you have anything listed in:
    http://openbsd.org/want.html
    cheers!

    Comments

    1. By Kurt Miller (24.185.244.228) kurt@intricatesoftware.com on

      > thanks kurt! do you have wish-list somewhere? i don't see that you have anything listed in:
      > http://openbsd.org/want.html
      > cheers!

      What I need are server class mp machines for Sparc64 and macppc.
      For sparc64 a Sun Fire V210 or V215 would be ideal (dual or quad).
      For macppc a Xserve G5 Dual would be great.

  8. By Anonymous Coward (24.91.188.72) on

    Does that mean that Java will be available for OpenBSD/PPC (and other architectures)?

    Comments

    1. By Kurt Miller (24.185.244.228) kurt@intricatesoftware.com on

      > Does that mean that Java will be available for OpenBSD/PPC (and other architectures)?

      Not until gcj works well enough to bootstrap the jdk build and the port is converted over to use IcedTea. I can't give you any timeframe for that.

  9. By Rob Sessink (77.249.88.117) on

    Nice work, thanks for the effort

  10. By Anonymous Coward (63.135.134.49) on

    Couldn't find the packages in snapshots. Tried building jdk/1.7 in ports, but it wanted me to fetch the 1.6 stuff. Looks like the packages were built on 23 March. When should we see this?

    Comments

    1. By Kurt Miller (24.185.244.228) kurt@intricatesoftware.com on

      > Couldn't find the packages in snapshots. Tried building jdk/1.7 in ports, but it wanted me to fetch the 1.6 stuff. Looks like the packages were built on 23 March. When should we see this?

      Packages will appear with the next -current snapshot package build. I don't have an exact date for that since the package build machines are building 4.-3-release packages. Just keep an eye out for when snapshot packages start appearing again.

      -Kurt

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