SableVM 1.1.8 (Free Java Virtual Machine) Released

[Grzegorz B. Prokopski]

The developers of the SableVM Project are proud to announce the
official release of SableVM 1.1.8.  SableVM is a liberally licensed
Free Java virtual machine.  See the "About SableVM" section below for
more informations about SableVM.

Here is a list of the most important changes and new features.  In
this version, we:

- Added the necessary support to run both Eclipse 2 and Eclipse 3
  (using the xerces and xalan libraries).  Instructions are available
  at http://sablevm.org/wiki/Eclipse .

- Added -Xgnuclasspath:/dir/ectory option to java-sablevm
  wrapper. This allows for running SableVM with an unmodified GNU
  Classpath out-of-the-box using an override .jar provided daily at
  http://sablevm.org/download/snapshot/ .

- Imported a new GNU Classpath CVS snapshot as of December 28, 2004.

- Implemented some missing JNI functions needed by qt/java.

- Set BOOTCLASSPATH in java-sablevm to help jikes find our libs.

- Wrapped the exception thrown by a constructor or a method invoked
  through reflection in an InvocationTargetException instance.

- Added ProtectionDomain handling for classes loaded via
  j.l.ClassLoader.

- Started to use URLClassLoader instead of gnu.j.l.SystemClassLoader,
  which apparently was used by us exclusively.

- Added sablevm.verbose.exit bootstrap property to dump stack trace on
  System.exit().

- Added sablevm.verbose.exceptions bootstrap property to dump stack
  trace on every thrown exception.

- Enabled GCC unused and long-long warnings, then fixed tons of
  warnings.

- Implemented [Get|Release]PrimitiveArrayCritical.

- Solved a class loading related deadlock.

- Fixed a VMThread.sleep bug.

- Passed the class name as a parameter to LinkageError and
  ClassCircularityError in java.lang.ClassLoader.

- Added function name as message to UnsatisfiedLinkError for missing
  native functions.

- Implemented various other improvements.

- Fixed various other bugs.


=== ABOUT SABLEVM ===

SableVM is a robust, extremely portable, efficient, and
specifications-compliant Java Virtual Machine that aims to be easy to
maintain and to extend.  It features a state-of-the-art and efficient
interpreter engine.  Its source code is very accessible and easy to
understand.  It also has many robustness features that have been the
object of careful design.

SableVM is a clean-room implementation of the publicly available
specifications.

SableVM is licensed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public
License (LGPL).  It also uses a modified version of GNU Classpath
called sablevm-classpath which is licensed under the terms of the GNU
General Public License (GPL) with a linking exception.

The license of SableVM (LGPL) was specifically chosen as to maximize
your ability to legally link and run popular applications, such as
Eclipse (http://eclipse.org) and Ant (http://ant.apache.org), which
are licensed in ways which might conflict with the terms of the GNU
General Public License (GPL).  See the the following link for more
information:

  http://sablevm.org/wiki/License_FAQ

The SableVM web site is located at:

  http://sablevm.org


=== INSTALLATION ===

SableVM is available to download from the following locations:

- http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=5523
- (alternate) http://sablevm.org/download/release/

You must download both:

- sablevm-1.1.8.tar.gz
- sablevm-classpath-1.1.8.tar.gz.

See the INSTALL file included in the sablevm-1.1.8.tar.gz archive for
build environment requirements and installation procedures.

We make frequent releases, but we also provide daily snapshots of our
"staging" development branch at:

  http://sablevm.org/download/snapshot/

Note that the code of the staging branch is more robust than the code
usually found in the CVS trunk of many other free software projects.
The staging branch only contains code that has been first tested by
developers within their own sandbox.  A detailed explanation of the
different development branches is available at:

  http://sablevm.org/wiki/Development_Branches


=== NOTES ===

We appreciate your feedback.  Please feel invited to contact us.  See:

  http://sablevm.org/support.html

You can also join us in real-time on the #sablevm IRC channel on
irc.sablevm.org (alias: irc.freenode.net, irc.debian.org).


=== BINARY PACKAGES ===

Binary packages of new SableVM versions are usually available in the
GNU/Linux Debian "unstable" distribution shortly after the official
release.  These packages normally migrate to the "testing"
distribution a few weeks later.

Some other GNU/Linux distributions (Gentoo, etc.) and other operating
systems (*BSD, etc.) also provide binary packages or a convenient
build environment to compile and install sablevm.


=== DEVELOPMENT OF SABLEVM AND CLASSPATH ===

If you would like to help developing SableVM or its class libraries,
please join us!  We do provide a very comfortable environment:

* Subversion accounts

  We provide accounts in our Subversion repository for developers who
  want to work collaboratively on improving SableVM or its class
  libraries.  If you want to join, you should simply ask us for a
  subversion account on the development mailing list
  <address@hidden>.

  Subversion is an improved CVS than takes approximately 10 minutes to
  learn for a person familiar with CVS.

* Very frequent updates from upstream GNU Classpath CVS repository

  The "staging" development branch of sablevm-classpath is
  synchronized with the GNU Classpath CVS trunk every few days.

* Private sandbox for each developer

  Each developer is given full access to his own "sandbox" where he
  can have several private development branches (as they're nearly
  0-cost to create in Subversion).  So each developer's development
  doesn't interfere with other developers.  Each developer can also
  create private "tags" on any code in Subversion.  These tags are
  publicly available via the Web interface at:

  http://sablevm.org/svn/developers/

* No copyright assignment requirement

  We accept contributions without asking for copyright assignment for
  developers.  Our contribution policy is available at:


http://devel.sablevm.org/svn/repository/sablevm/branches/staging/doc/contribution_policy.txt


=== Additional Information ===

You will find a wealth of additional information in SableVM's wiki
pages at:

  http://sablevm.org/wiki/



=== CONCLUSION ===

We wish you great fun using SableVM.

Enjoy!


        The SableVM Project developers

-- 
Grzegorz B. Prokopski           <address@hidden>
SableVM - Free, LGPL'ed Java VM  http://sablevm.org
Why SableVM ?!?                  http://sablevm.org/wiki/Features
Debian GNU/Linux - the Free OS   http://www.debian.org