Hi,
I have doubt on the version naming of J2SDK.
In what does _11
represent in J2SDK 1.5.0_11
Is that a part of version number or any update pack number.
If I compile my code in J2SDK 1.5.0_11
can I run that code in any of the lower _<numbers>
Example J2SDK 1.5.0_04
Thanks
_11 means it is Update 11.
These releases are bug fix and/or security fix releases. There are no API changes at all in these releases.
The only problem that could happen is that an application targeted for JDK5.0 doesn't run on Update 5 because of a bug which was fixed in update 6.
> Thanks Gabriel
>
> So, I can be sure that if I compile my code in
> J2SDK 1.5.0_11
I can run them with any
> lower _numbers
right?
Not necessarily. There could be a bug that was fixed in 11, but still alive in the previous version. It's not likely to cause problems, but you should check the release notes to see if any of the bug fixes between the older version and 11 affect your code.
Yeah you should be worried that your code doesn't execute on lower versions. Stuff you compile on release _11 will always compile on smaller version numbers such as _06 and _02. As I said, there are absolutely no API changes.
On the other hand, the bug fixes mainly target the Runtime. So stuff which runs properly on _11 will not necessarily run on _06 and _02. Of course, encouraging people to update to the last version is always a good thing, but some IT environments are quite slow on updating so it is also pretty user friendly to make sure your application is compatible on smaller versions.
Like Dalzhim said, it's possible for conflicts to exist between any two versions, update or major release, so you should always do testing if you plan to run the code with a different version than it was compiled on. That said, the chances of a bug fix breaking your code are pretty slim, so most people don't bother with it. Most of the time, bug fixes actually fix problems with your code, unless you had specifically coded a work-around. Yikes.
This is part of the reason why many people bundle their apps with it's own jre, so they don't have to worry about the user updating to the correct version. They just run off of the one in the app's directory. Which is nice for developers, but not so nice for users that end up with 8 different 250 meg jres on their drive, some of which are identical. </rant>
