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IBM Java Linux

IBM Releases Fastest SDK For Java 6 117

IndioMan writes "IBM is releasing an SDK for Java 6 and is sponsoring an Early Release Program to gather feedback from the Java community. Product binaries and documentation are available for Linux on x86 and 64-bit AMD, and AIX for PPC for 32- and 64-bit systems. In addition to supporting the Java SE 6 Platform specification, IBM's SDK also focuses on platform stability, performance, and diagnostics. It's tops on every benchmark."
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IBM Releases Fastest SDK For Java 6

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  • x86-64 isn't just for AMD anymore you know!
  • Whatever happened to all that "Open Source Java" thingie?
  • Inquiring minds want to know.
    • why do people care so much about licensing? weird.
      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        If you work on commercial software, the type of license may determine whether you can use the code in your product.
        • I guess in my experience, the license is totally irrelevant as I am providing services, and not distributables. I suppose it would be much better for end-user programs... but I find the idea of using Java for end-user programs generally unappealing, not to mention that Sun always provided a freely distributable JRE....
          • I guess in my experience, the license is totally irrelevant as I am providing services, and not distributables. I suppose it would be much better for end-user programs... but I find the idea of using Java for end-user programs generally unappealing, not to mention that Sun always provided a freely distributable JRE....

            You're a little confused. The license that javac and the jvm are to be released under has nothing to do with the JRE.

  • by baptiste ( 256004 ) <mike AT baptiste DOT us> on Tuesday January 23, 2007 @10:42PM (#17733022) Homepage Journal
    If they include a x86_64 browser plugin they'll be heros. It's 2007 and Sun still refuses to release a 64-bit browser JRE plugin because..... why?
    • by bcrowell ( 177657 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2007 @12:54AM (#17734258) Homepage
      By March, 100% of Java will be available under GPL, right? So at that point, I would think that anybody who has the skills and time will be able to clean up any code that's not 64-bit clean, and compile a 64-bit browser plugin. I'm looking forward to seeing some really good things happen in OSS with Java, now that all the licensing impediments are going away.
      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Jeff DeMaagd ( 2015 )
        Personally, I understand why 64 bit isn't necessarily supported, but then, they support Linux and AIX on 64 bit PPC. I don't know if the 64 bit on PPC is because they've had it working for longer, because of its POWER heritage or just because it's their architecture. I also wonder if there is something about the x86 implementation that makes porting to 64 bit pretty hard.

        With respect to the browser plug-in, I don't really know that many people that are running 64 bit computers, using 64 bit aware operatin
        • by Tim C ( 15259 )
          I don't really know that many people that are running 64 bit computers, using 64 bit aware operating systems and 64 bit software

          In my case, that's because of a lack of support from the vendors. I can have a 64 bit OS *or* wireless networking, for example (thank you, Netgear).
          • indeed, the hardware is here today. software needs to catch up. amd chips have been 64 bit for some time and with the release of core 2 from intel, every desktop/notebook will be 64bit capable within 12 months.

            Alas, while 32bit Windows XP is prevalent, 64bit is a minor concern. :-(
        • I don't know if the 64 bit on PPC is because they've had it working for longer, because of its POWER heritage or just because it's their architecture.

          Wild guess: they have one or two guys on their project and they've ported to the hardware that they have on their desk.
        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by bwt ( 68845 )
          I don't really know that many people that are running 64 bit computers, using 64 bit aware operating systems and 64 bit software./i>

          I do, except I run a 32-bit firefox that I install by hand because I need a java plugin that works. You have to remove the barriers before people will use it, and once you do remove the barriers, they will come.
      • by thsths ( 31372 )
        > to clean up any code that's not 64-bit clean

        Usually that would be sufficient, but for a just in time compiler, 64-bit clean is not enough. It also has to be *rewritten* to produce 64-bit code. So I think there is a long way to go for Java before it catches up with the hype.

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by bcrowell ( 177657 )
          Hmm...interesting...this [onjava.com] article says that there are 64-bit VMs with JIT. And this [devlib.org] one talks about "beta versions for Windows 2000 and Linux on the Itanium platform (the virtual machine being a true 64-bit application)." Now it may be that these JITs are just compiling to x86 code, which then runs on an Itanium, so maybe it wouldn't be quite as fast as code that was specifically generated for the Itanium instruction set, but still I would think the performance would be plenty good enough for running applets
      • Hehe,

        and I'm looking forward that nothing at all is happening.

        The few people having the skills and the need to have the plug in likely have no time to do it.

        The people having the time, likely lack the skills or the motivation. I really doubt that there are programmers out there who have the feeling: Wow, today java is GPL, lets hack it better, I start immediately! Ma! Coffee!! Fast!

        angel'o'sphere
    • by this great guy ( 922511 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2007 @01:13AM (#17734410)

      There are 2 ways to get a 32-bit Java plugin running under a Linux/AMD64 environment (BTW, AMD64 is the official arch name implemented by AMD and Intel, x86-64 has been officially abandonned):

      • Use the Blackdown Java plugin, they provide a 64-bit version (it works ok, but I have come across at least 1 applet able to crash it).
      • Use nspluginwrapper [beauchesne.info] that allows you to load 32-bit plugins in 64-bit browsers.

      Of course, since Sun has open sourced Java, a 64-bit Java plugin is likely to appear soon.

      • Do you have a reliable citation for Intel adopting the AMD64 arch name?
      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        BTW, AMD64 is the official arch name implemented by AMD and Intel, x86-64 has been officially abandonned

        Yes, x86-64 has been abandoned by both parties. However, Intel according to this FAQ article [intel.com], and this article [intel.com] is using the name Intel64, which according to the second article is just the EMT64 stuff renamed and enhanced by Intel. EMT64 was basically Intel's rip-off of AMD64; and according to the second article Intel64 is EMT64 with the SSE3, HT, and other Intel specific technologies. (I could be wron

        • It doesn't matter what Intel chooses to call it (they have changed their mind 3 times: IA-32e, EM64T, Intel64). The fact is, Intel cloned the AMD64 architecture. AMD wrote the architecture specs [amd.com] and they gave it the name AMD64. When you install NetBSD or OpenBSD on a 64-bit Intel processor, you install NetBSD/amd64 or OpenBSD/amd64, these guys adopted the proper architecture name.

          Other vendors use other names, Microsoft and Sun use x64, some use x86-64. Should you use these names ? No. Just stick to the

    • by Builder ( 103701 )
      Amen brother!
  • Looks like it could run, not only on AIX/PPC but on a Playstation as well:

            * Linux® on x86
            * Linux® on PowerPC® 32-bit #!
            * Linux® on PowerPC® 64-bit
            * Linux® on AMD64/EM64T
            * IBM AIX® on PowerPC 32-bit
            * IBM AIX® on PowerPC 64-bit
  • What benchmarks? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 23, 2007 @11:31PM (#17733484)
    It would be nice to see a few links uphold that claim.
    • It seems like ./ eds or submitters making up crap to spice up headlines again. That's the nth time this week and I want my money back. I read TFA and couldn't see any claim to it being the fastest, although looking at the features there's plenty to make it interesting without additional ./ marketing spin.

      By the way, is it "fastest" as in it's stuck fast and not going anywhere, or did you mean quickest?

      • by Decaff ( 42676 )
        It seems like ./ eds or submitters making up crap to spice up headlines again.

        Actually, IBM's JVMs have always had a reputation for very good performance. Years ago, I found IBM's Java 1.3 routinely beat equivalent code in gcc for many numeric algorithm benchmarsks.
        • Which doesn't change the fact that I can't find the claim in TFA. The assumption, however good or bad it may be, was used as a headline when there are plenty of good things that could be used for ligit headlines _and_ there are other high performance jvms. At the risk of starting a religious war, how does this stack up to BEA/JRockit on various architectures?

          ...then again "Fastest Ever" does sound catchier than "IBM adds OS Level Stack Traces". Nice marketing ./

          I'm sure I will download and use this jvm, b

      • by Haeleth ( 414428 )

        By the way, is it "fastest" as in it's stuck fast and not going anywhere, or did you mean quickest?
        Er, what? Fastest and quickest mean the same thing in this context.

        Unless you meant "quickest" as in "most alive"? :P
  • by Anonymous Coward
    This was originally released back in the middle of November 2006!

    http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/forums/dw_th read.jsp?forum=367&thread=142364&cat=10 [ibm.com]

  • by greg_barton ( 5551 ) * <greg_barton@REDHATyahoo.com minus distro> on Wednesday January 24, 2007 @02:00AM (#17734710) Homepage Journal
    Scimark [nist.gov] wasn't even close:

    IBM java6:
    Composite Score: 482.8282568762099
    FFT (1024): 551.8002634079949
    SOR (100x100): 568.7588552216857
    Monte Carlo : 64.62096017621073
    Sparse matmult (N=1000, nz=5000): 219.84569330460474
    LU (100x100): 1009.1155122705532

    Sun java6:
    Composite Score: 617.5119705454583
    FFT (1024): 510.7586118547276
    SOR (100x100): 829.8686416193439
    Monte Carlo : 118.25350583943022
    Sparse matmult (N=1000, nz=5000): 470.6355733620428
    LU (100x100): 1158.0435200517468

    Higher scores are better. Both run on AMD X2 5000+

    Sun VM stomped on IBM's. That wasn't true with earlier VM's. IBM used to smoke Sun on scimark. Maybe there's more development to be done.
    • It still makes me wonder. Sun has been known to do crass benchmarketting before.

      E.g., when Hotspot first came around, it claimed to accelerate some benchmarks thousands of times, which was already suspect. It turns out that in one popular benchmark at the time, it completely elliminated the loop. Which in and by itself would be a valid optimization, if it were on the general case. But it turned out that as little as changing an "if (A == B)" to "if (B == A)" was enough to disable that optimization. Sun's sm
      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by greg_barton ( 5551 ) *
        It still makes me wonder. Sun has been known to do crass benchmarketting before.

        Doesn't seem to be the case here. I'm doing some pretty heavy numerical stuff with java these days. The Sun java6 VM definitely outshines others at the moment. That used to be the case with the IBM VM. Maybe once it comes out of early release it'll be back to it's former glory.
    • Composite Score: 482.8282568762099

      Do you think they reported enough precision on those numbers? They lost me after 482.8...
  • That'd be nice. At the moment, eclipse has this sluggish performance when it comes to swt on linux. The VE project on my ubuntu box is much slower than in windows, and if this new jvm can perform better in this aspect, then I'm happy to read this. (there are alternatives to ve, and overall performance is fine, but again, faster is better...)
    • by owlstead ( 636356 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2007 @06:46AM (#17736118)
      The slow performance of Eclipse is not due to the JVM, it's about the SWT library and it's bindings with the native libraries. There was an SWT port called SWT Fox [sourceforge.net] that quickened things up a bit. It doesn't seem to be maintained anymore, but the performance speedup was very noticable. Changing the VM probably won't make the slightest of difference.

      That cost me two moderations. Why aren't moderations in a discussion depended on the *branch* of the discussion? Oh well...
      • Bindings (Score:2, Interesting)

        This isn't to prove, per se, that the fox toolkit is any faster than gtk but that the corresponding translation to Java is.

        The SWT binding directly accesses gtk through JNI. This may have suited IBMs purposes of accessing gtk through the SWT API but might not be the most optimal binding of gtk to Java.

        The java-gnome [sourceforge.net] project produces java bindings for gtk. They are in the process of being re-written from scratch using 2007 best practice JNI binding techniques. I suspect that an SWT implementation using t

      • That cost me two moderations. Why aren't moderations in a discussion depended on the *branch* of the discussion? Oh well...

        Tip: open comments that you want to moderate in a new tab. Mod them after you're done reading the discussion.

        (yeah, I've been in that boat before)
  • by mritunjai ( 518932 ) on Wednesday January 24, 2007 @09:25AM (#17737158) Homepage

    SUN has released the sources to it's compiler and JDK.

    IBM where are thou the benefactor and promoter of Open Source ? Show us the GPL sources to your JDK and compiler!
  • When started on Debian unstable it terminates immediately with:

    Could not create the Java virtual machine.

    This is probably caused by NPTL-less glibc. Anyone with suggestions how to fix it?
  • Now if they could only port Websphere to it! Seriously, I tried to install a web service on a new Websphere server, just upgraded to Websphere 6.0. It wouldn't run, because 6.0 only supports Java 1.4.2! The new V6.1 runs 1.5, but doesn't support web services unless you install an extension, and even then doesn't fully support the spec (only the @WebService and @WebMethod annotations). I find it odd that IBM supposedly has such cutting-edge JVM technology, but it just trickles down to their actual money-
    • by ghoul ( 157158 )
      For IBM JVM writers Websphere is the main paying customer while all the rest are the test customers. They will no doubt port it ot Websphere once it is stable. I have run WAS 6.1 with JDK 6 but not with webservices so maybe the SOA portion needs to be ported. What exact problem did you get with Webservices?
      • I didn't write down the exact errors, but I do know that it didn't recognize the @WebService and @WebMethod annotations, and ISTR it didn't support JAXB 2.0 (none of the javax.xml.bind.annotation classes). It also had some issues with my WSDL file, I think it didn't like the "RPC/document" (as opposed to "RPC/encoded") endpoint definition.
  • Why is IBM even bothering to write their own JDKs? Don't they know that WebSphere and WSAD are dead? JBoss and Eclipse have murdered them in their sleep. Having had to deploy on WebSphere and develop on WSAD, I would say it was a mercy killing. I would be curious to see the sources to see how they did it. See the compromises. Java Lectures for Free - Free Java Lectures [googlepages.com]
  • In this url, http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/java// [microsoft.com] , it is stated,
    The MSJVM will reach its end of life on December 31, 2007. Customers are encouraged to take
    proactive measures to stay informed about obsolete software and move away from the MSJVM
    in a timely fashion. The MSJVM is no longer available for distribution from Microsoft and
    there will be no enhancements to the MSJVM. Microsoft products and SKUs currently
    including the MSJVM will continue to be retired or replaced by versions not containing
    the

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