Learning Java, 5th Edition

Chapter 13. Expanding Java

The Java language is now over 25 years old. It has grown and changed a great deal in that time. Some of the growth has been quiet and incremental. Other changes can feel abrupt. Even the process for how changes are introduced into the language has evolved.

In this chapter we’ll be looking at where those changes start and how they end up in an actual release of Java. We’ll recap the release process we discussed in “A Java Road Map” and take a peek at some of the topics being discussed for future releases. We’ll also return to the present and go over updating your existing code with a new feature—and when that makes sense. Not every new feature in Java will be of interest to every Java developer. On the flip side, almost every developer will find something of interest somewhere in the vast catalog of capabilities present directly in Java or in its many, many third-party libraries.

Java Releases

As we write this fifth edition, Java 14 is available as a preview release. We’ve been working with the open source version of the developer kit, the OpenJDK. You can see recent and upcoming releases at the JDK Project page. Again, Oracle maintains the official JDK, which may be appropriate for large, corporate customers looking for paid support. You can follow the progress of the official releases at Oracle’s landing page: Java Standard Edition overview. If you’re curious about exactly what features and changes come with each version, check out Oracle’s JDK Release ...