Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Features and differences between JDK 1.4, 1.5, 1.6

Hi all.
before couple of days i encountered a question that what are the differences between all versions of Java. I was knowing some features but was not able to explain exact to my team members. Then try googling and gathered some information . I think it will be helpful to all. Correct me if something goes wrong.


JDK 1.0 (january 23, 1996) oak
- Initial release


JDK 1.1 (february 19, 1997)
- Retooling of the AWT event model
- Inner classes added to the language
- JavaBeans
- JDBC
- RMI


J2SE 1.2 (December 8, 1998) playground
This and subsequent releases through J2SE 5.0 were rebranded retrospectively Java 2 & version name "J2SE"
(Java 2 platform, Standard edition) replaced JDK to distinguish the base platform from
J2EE (java 2 platform, enterprise edition) and J2ME (java 2 platform, micro edition).

- Strictfp keyword
- Reflection
- Swing api integration into the core classes
- JVM equipped with a jit compiler
- Java plug-in
- Java IDL
- An IDL implementation for corba interoperability
- Collections Framework


J2SE 1.3 (may 8, 2000) kestrel
- Hotspot jvm included
- JavaSound
- JNDI included in core libraries
- Java platform debugger architecture (jpda)
- RMI was modified to support optional compatibility with corba


J2SE 1.4 (february 6, 2002) merlin
- assert keyword
- Regular expressions
- Exception chaining (allows an exception to encapsulate original lower-level exception)
- Internet protocol version 6 (IPV6) support
- Non-blocking nio (new input/output)
- Logging API
- Image i/o api for reading and writing images in formats like jpeg and png
- Integrated XML parser and XSLT processor (JAXP)
- Integrated security and cryptography extensions (JCE, JSSE, JAAS)
- Java web start


J2SE 5.0 (september 30, 2004) tiger [originally numbered 1.5]
- Generics: provides compile-time (static) type safety for collections and eliminates the need for most typecasts (type conversion).
- Metadata: also called annotations; allows language constructs such as classes and methods to be tagged with additional data, which can then be processed by metadata-aware utilities.
- Autoboxing/unboxing: automatic conversions between primitive types (such as int) and primitive wrapper classes (such as integer).
- Enumerations: the enum keyword creates a typesafe, ordered list of values (such as day.monday, day.tuesday, etc.). Previously this could only be achieved by non-typesafe constant integers or manually constructed classes (typesafe enum pattern).
- Swing: new skinnable look and feel, called synth.
- Var args: the last parameter of a method can now be declared using a type name followed by three dots (e.g. Void drawtext(string... Lines)). In the calling code any number of parameters of that type can be used and they are then placed in an array to be passed to the method, or alternatively the calling code can pass an array of that type.
- Enhanced for each loop: the for loop syntax is extended with special syntax for iterating over each member of either an array or any iterable, such as the standard collection classesfix the previously broken semantics of the java memory model, which defines how threads interact through memory.
- Automatic stub generation for rmi objects.
- Static imports concurrency utilities in package java.util.concurrent.
- Scanner class for parsing data from various input streams and buffers.
- Assertions
- StringBuilder class (in java.lang package)
- Annotations



Java SE 6 (december 11, 2006) mustang
sun replaced the name "J2SE" with java se and dropped the ".0" from the version number.
Beta versions were released in february and june 2006, leading up to a final release that occurred on december 11, 2006.
The current revision is update 14 which was released in may 2009.

- Support for older win9x versions dropped.
- Scripting lang support: Generic API for integration with scripting languages, & built-in mozilla javascript rhino integration
- Dramatic performance improvements for the core platform, and swing.
- Improved web service support through JAX-WS JDBC 4.0 support
- Java compiler API: an API allowing a java program to select and invoke a java compiler programmatically.
- Upgrade of JAXB to version 2.0: including integration of a stax parser.
- Support for pluggable annotations
- Many GUI improvements, such as integration of swingworker in the API, table sorting and filtering, and true swing double-buffering (eliminating the gray-area effect).


Java se 6 update 10
A major enhancement in terms of end-user usability.
- Java Deployment Toolkit, a set of javascript functions to ease the deployment of applets and java web start applications.
- Java Kernel, a small installer including only the most commonly used jre classes. Enhanced updater.
- Enhanced versioning and pack200 support: server-side support is no longer required.
- Java quick starter, to improve cold start-up time.
- Improved performance of java2D graphics primitives on windows, using direct3D and hardware acceleration.
- A new Swing look and feel called NIMBUS and based on synth.
- Next-generation java plug-in: applets now run in a separate process and support many features of web start applications.


Java se 6 update 12
This release includes the highly anticipated 64-bit java plug-in (for 64-bit browsers only), windows server 2008 support,
and performance improvements of java and JAVAFX applications.