J2SE 1.4.2, how long supported?

[William H]

Hello,

I'm in a project where client wants J2SE 1.4.2 applications.
Sun's Web pages has announced that 1.4.1 and below are "end of life".
Does anyone know how long J2SE 1.4.2 is supported by Sun?

Will

 

[Knute Johnson]

Hello,

I'm in a project where client wants J2SE 1.4.2 applications.
Sun's Web pages has announced that 1.4.1 and below are "end of life".
Does anyone know how long J2SE 1.4.2 is supported by Sun?

Will

I read somewhere that 1.4.2 will be supported until 7.0 is released.
This makes some sense as they EOLd 1.3.1 when 6.0 was released.

There is absolutely no reason not to use modern tools to write the
programs even if you want them to be 1.4.2 compatible.

 

[Lew]

Why?

You mean 1.4.2 is in End of Life. Previous versions are already obsolete.

 

[Knute Johnson]

You mean 1.4.2 is in End of Life. Previous versions are already obsolete.

At least he didn't want to use 1.3 .

 

[Jason Cavett]

I read somewhere that 1.4.2 will be supported until 7.0 is released.
This makes some sense as they EOLd 1.3.1 when 6.0 was released.

There is absolutely no reason not to use modern tools to write the
programs even if you want them to be 1.4.2 compatible.

Yeah. I agree with Knute here. What is your customer's particular
reason for using 1.4? Backwards compatability? Java is pretty good
about that already. (Additionally, you can use a newer JRE but
compile for 1.4 or 1.5 or whatever is supported.) I would try to
convince your customer that they are giving up a lot of good stuff
(enums, templates, etc, etc) by not using newer versions of Java.
Plus, overall, your job will be harder if you have to support older
versions.

 

[EricF]

Yeah. I agree with Knute here. What is your customer's particular
reason for using 1.4? Backwards compatability? Java is pretty good
about that already. (Additionally, you can use a newer JRE but
compile for 1.4 or 1.5 or whatever is supported.) I would try to
convince your customer that they are giving up a lot of good stuff
(enums, templates, etc, etc) by not using newer versions of Java.
Plus, overall, your job will be harder if you have to support older
versions.

One good reason for using 1.4 - If they are using an older version of an app
server that doesn't run on 1.5.

Eric

 

[Lew]

One good reason for using 1.4 - If they are using an older version of an app
server that doesn't run on 1.5.

Is that the case, OP?

Most code that runs on 1.4 will run fine on Java 5 or even better, 6, and gain
advantages thereby. Better optimization, improved GC and safer multithreading
are a few.

In any event, it is extremely common for customers to use Java 1.4, or even
1.3 (from that one they should move), despite the advanced age of these
venerable products and the superiority of contemporary JVMs.

One would be fiduciarially irresponsible not to ensure that a 1.4-based
customer has the latest, security-patched version of 1.4.

 

[William H]

Yeah. I agree with Knute here. What is your customer's particular
reason for using 1.4? Backwards compatability? Java is pretty good
about that already. (Additionally, you can use a newer JRE but
compile for 1.4 or 1.5 or whatever is supported.) I would try to
convince your customer that they are giving up a lot of good stuff
(enums, templates, etc, etc) by not using newer versions of Java.
Plus, overall, your job will be harder if you have to support older
versions.

Thanks for Knute about information.

I heard that the reason is quite simple: customer does not want to
update couple of thousand of PCs to have newer JRE yet because
of one new application.

Simple reason to customer but unpleasant to developer.

Will

 

[Lew]

I heard that the reason is quite simple: customer does not want to
update couple of thousand of PCs to have newer JRE yet because
of one new application.

Simple reason to customer but unpleasant to developer.

How about all the other reasons to upgrade?

 

[Guest]

Most code that runs on 1.4 will run fine on Java 5 or even better, 6,
and gain advantages thereby. Better optimization, improved GC and safer
multithreading are a few.

If the app server vendor does not consider the newer Java version
supported, then it does not matter if it works fine or not.

Arne

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?=]

One good reason for using 1.4 - If they are using an older version of an app
server that doesn't run on 1.5.

Another possible reason is test cost. Checking all apps on a new Java
version cost money.

Arne