Re: Dependeny on javax.swing

Well, it will be a PITA for others too, not just FreeMarker users. I sent an e-mail to someone I know within Sun who's one of key Java figures. We are clearly not strong enough to get Google to do anything, but Sun is fairly strict about defending the Java trademark against abuse. Sun *can* get Google to fix this.

Attila.

On 2009.12.27., at 11:13, Daniel Dekany wrote:

> I agree that what GAE provides isn't a JRE, but the important question
> is if we want FreeMarker to run on GAE (imagine it as a new target if
> you want), regardless if it can be called "Java" or not. And of course
> we do since Google is a really big dog, right? Surely the whole issue
> is a PITA to fix but... do you really belive Google will eventually
> fix these? /-:
> 
> -- 
> Best regards,
> Daniel Dekany
> 
> 
> Friday, December 25, 2009, 6:03:50 PM, Attila Szegedi wrote:
> 
>> Alright, FWIW here’s my opinion… I’m one of primary developers of
>> FreeMarker, even if it wasn’t me who created the dependency.
>> 
>> Jonathan (who introduced it) thought of it as the easiest way to
>> expose template AST to IDE tooling. Also, note that there’s no
>> standard tree representation API in java.util.* and
>> javax.swing.tree.* is the closest to it; lots of classes and
>> interfaces in it are applicable to any tree data representation, not
>> just ones suitable for a GUI. As Sun mandates the presence of
>> “javax.swing” package in every SE runtime engine that wishes to use
>> the name “Java” it didn’t seem to be a problem.
>> 
>> Anyway, GAE is not a “Java Runtime Environment, Standard Edition”
>> if it doesn’t have javax.swing.*. I just sent an e-mail to some of
>> my contacts at Sun to clarify the matters, and maybe contact the
>> Google to either stop using the “Java” trademark, or alternatively get their JRE right.
>> 
>> Google’s decision to not include this package/classes into its App
>> Engine makes that runtime environment into not being a JRE.
>> FreeMarker is developed for running on a JRE.
>> 
>> GAE has other problems as well. I.e. it interjects its own
>> reflection replacement classes defined in the
>> “com.google.apphosting.runtime.security.shared.intercept.java.lang.reflect”
>> package, that unfortunately run with less privileges than the real
>> “java.lang.reflect” package, so when we use them to, say,
>> reflectively invoke package-private constructors from within the
>> same package – something that works nicely in a real JRE – GAE will
>> throw an exception, since classes in package
>> “com.google.apphosting.runtime.security.shared.intercept.java.lang.reflect”
>> have no access to our package private constructor – the classes in
>> “java.lang.reflect” of course don’t have this limitation as they are subject to no access control.
>> 
>> I consider all of these to be JRE compliance bugs in the GAE
>> implementation of the Java-like runtime.
>> 
>> As I said, I fired off an e-mail to Sun so that they can
>> investigate whether Google can use the name "Java" for what they
>> provide in GAE. FreeMarker is made to run in a compliant Java Runtime Environment.
>> 
>> Attila.
>> 
>> On 2009.12.25., at 17:02, [email protected] wrote:
>> 
>>> See this 
>>> 
>>> http://solveme.wordpress.com/2009/12/25/freemarker-sucks-it-has-dependency-on-javax-swing/
>>> 
>>> Devs, will this be fixed ?
>>> 
>>> Thanks
>>> SN
>>> 
>>> Personally I'm always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught

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