1.5: No support for StringBuilder

[Timo Nentwig]

Hi!

SimpleDateFormat.parse() does not support StringBuilder in 1.5-beta1 and
I assume there are plenty of other methods to which the same applies as
well.

Did sun forget that?!

Timo

P.S. Why doesn't StringBuffer no more compile with current versions of
jikes?

 

[Neal Gafter]

SimpleDateFormat.parse() does not support StringBuilder in 1.5-beta1 and
I assume there are plenty of other methods to which the same applies as
well.

Did sun forget that?!

Yes and no. We did not do a survey of existing methods that could be retrofit
with support for StringBuilder except in some core libraries, and although we
expect to do that, probably not in time for 1.5. We would not want to slip the
release for something like this.

P.S. Why doesn't StringBuffer no more compile with current versions of
jikes?

StringBuffer now uses covariant returns, which are not implemented by jikes.

 

[Timo Nentwig]

StringBuffer now uses covariant returns, which are not implemented by
jikes.

What are convariant returns?

 

[Neal Gafter]

What are covariant returns?

covariant returns are part of jsr14. Essentially, the covariant returns
language extension allows a method overrider to return a subtype of the type
returned by the overridden method. For example:

class A implements Cloneable {
public A clone() { // allowed
return (A) super.clone();
}
}