Hello everybody.
What is the planned minimal JRE version this year? Will it be 1.5 as before, or we can move to 1.6? I guess that 1.6 is acceptable.
JRE 1.5?
Why not 1.6? It’s not really too important but in 1.6 there are some nice improvements like radial gradients. Besides, it’s the latest stable version. Why use 1.5 then? 
Mac?
1.6 exists for the Mac? No?
http://support.apple.com/downloads/Java_for_Mac_OS_X_10_5_Update_2
Java for Mac OS X 10.5 Update 2 delivers improved reliability and compatibility for Java SE 6, J2SE 5.0 and J2SE 1.4.2 on Mac OS X 10.5.4 and later.
64Bit only
About a quarter of Macs are stuck on 1.4.2 as well.
Cas
I use and will continue using 1.4.2 for the development of J4K games.
1.6 released more than a year ago!! What’s the problem? Sun? Apple? Ridiculous that developers have to wait this long.
It’s tempting just to say “screw mac” and allow 1.6, but recommend that 1.5 be used for better compatibility.
Do you have some metrics that prove that 1.4.2 gives smaller output then 1.5? Or it’s just a matter of personal preference?
I think I tried compiling with 1.4.2 and 1.5 and comparing the results a few contest ago. If I remember correctly, there was not much of a difference.
That being said, I usually target 1.4.2 but using some 1.5 syntax that gets lost in compilation (generics, for one). On occasion I target 1.5, but usually not. I don’t think targetting 1.6 is such a good idea, since many users apparently do not run JRE6.
It’s personal preference.
For one, is the JDK that I use in my work, so for those slow moments, I open my projects… and since is source in the screen, bosses cannot tell If I’m working in the company’s projects or mine.
In my home I have 1.6, but I configured my projects to be compiled with target 1.4.
True. That’s the bad thing about Java. You can use “latest hot” features of new version only after two years. I guess we’ll finally move to 1.6 when Sun release stable 1.7.
[quote]bosses cannot tell If I’m working in the company’s projects or mine.
[/quote]
True, that’s why I often give “strange” names to classes: “Feature” instead of “Game” or “ActiveEntity” instead of “Enemy”
Classes? More than 1?! And why would you use a class name longer than one character? 