Java compatibility? (was Re: Not a bash, just the facts)

[Alan McKinnon]

On Sunday 26 March 2006 00:35, Daniel Carrera wrote:
> Matthew R. Dempsky wrote:
> >>The viability of Java depends 100% on the expectation that any
> >> JRE will have a certain set of features that will work in
> >> certain ways.
> >
> > The last programming competition I went to, I remember there
> > being *four* versions of Java available.  Seems really ironic for
> > a language with compatibility as a core goal.
>
> Where they compatible? Could a program written for one version run
> on a later version? Were versions from different vendors
> compatible?

Java is backwards-compatible. Like all languages it's not always 
forwards-compatible (the only way to guarantee that is to never 
extend the language)

One exception: deprecated features.

-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan at linuxholdings dot co dot za
+27 82, double three seven, one nine three five