Re: GCJ with OpenJDK Java API instead of GNU Classpath

[Andrew Haley <aph@redhat.com>]

Sal wrote:
> Forgive me if this is a silly question - but I wanted to ping the list
> before spending any time/effort here.
> 
> Grabbing GCJ's standard source releases, one can see that GNU classpath
> is integrated.   I've actually used classpath a lot and its a very
> stable API for me.
> 
> However - given recent events, particularly the 'freeing' of Java
> sources by Sun - is it a good idea to attempt to use Sun's 'official'
> Java API sources instead?  This would give the option of maximum Java
> API compatibility but also giving the ability to precompile native code
> using GCJ (which you cant do with OpenJDK afaik)
> 
> So my questions:
> 
> - Has anyone already attempted building the OpenJDK java sources with
> GCJ/and/or tried to swap out classpath for those classes?
> - if not are people interested in going down this path? I am willing to
> put some efforts here.
> - Are there licensing issues with linking OpenJDK to other code via GCJ?
> From what I remember 'linking' is a touchy area with some FOSS licenses.

It's all GPL + exception, so there are no licence difficulties.

This would be an excellent thing to do, but it would be difficult.  In
particular, class loading and class initialization are done in very
different ways, and this would all need to be rewritten.

I'd love someone to do this, but I don't want them to be under any illusion
about how difficult it might be.

Andrew.