The Evolution of Java: From JDK 1.0 to OpenJDK

Java, one of the most popular programming languages in the world, has undergone significant changes since its inception. In this article, we'll take a journey through the evolution of Java from JDK 1.0 to OpenJDK.

Introduced by Sun Microsystems in January 1996, JDK 1.0 was originally called Oak, named after the oak tree outside James Gosling's office. This marked the beginning of Java as we know it today. 'macos jdk 1.8'

The subsequent releases of JDK 1.1 (February 1997) and JDK 1.2 (December 1998) introduced significant features such as AWT event model, inner class, JavaBean, JDBC, and RMI in JDK 1.1, and Collection Framework and JIT compiler in JDK 1.2.

JDK 1.2 also marked the rebranding of Java as 'Java 2' and renamed JDK to J2SE (Java 2 Standard Edition). This was followed by the release of JFC (Java Foundation Classes) which included Swing, Accessibility API, Java 2D, Pluggable Look & Feel, and Drag & Drop.

In addition, Sun Microsystems released J2EE (Java 2 Enterprise Edition) and J2ME (Java 2 Micro Edition) in JDK 1.2.

However, the journey of Java didn't stop there. In September 1995, Sun Microsystems announced Java, and Oracle acquired Sun Microsystems in 2010. Oracle JDK requires a commercial license from Oracle since 2019 for businesses to receive software updates.

On the other hand, OpenJDK is completely open source with a GNU General Public License. The main difference between OpenJDK and OracleJDK is licensing.

OracleJDK was free for personal and development use but no longer free for commercial use. Popular OpenJDK builds include Azul Zulu, Red Hat OpenJDK (IcedTea), Amazon Corretto, Eclipse Adoptium's Temurin, SapMachine, Microsoft OpenJDK, and more.

OpenJDK includes the virtual machine (HotSpot), the Java Class Library, and the Java Compiler. It does not include web-browser plugin and Web Start.

Currently, OpenJDK is developed by Oracle, the Java community, Red Hat, Azul Systems, IBM, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, SAP, and provides a free and open-source Java Platform Standard Edition (or Java SE or JDK) official reference implementation.

In conclusion, the evolution of Java from JDK 1.0 to OpenJDK has been marked by significant changes and improvements in each release. Today, OpenJDK is the official reference implementation of Java SE, providing a free and open-source platform for developers to write and run Java programs.

Macos jdk 1.8