Jikes RVM 2.9.0 is now available

[David P Grove]

We're very happy to announce a new release of Jikes RVM: version 2.9.0.  Quite a bit has changed since 2.4.6 and we'd welcome feedback on the changes as we head towards a 3.0 release later this year. Thanks again to everyone who has pitched in to make this one of the most exciting Jikes RVM releases since our initial open source release in 2001!

The release is available at http://downloads.sourceforge.net/jikesrvm/jikesrvm-2.9.0.tar.bz2.  The release notes are appended below:



*Jikes RVM 2.9.0 Release Notes (March 15, 2007)
** Highlights

*** The five months since the release of 2.4.6 have been one of the most
    active periods in the open source history of the project.  A number
    of significant changes have been made to clean up and modernize the
    code base to enable future evolution.

*** We have made large scale changes to the structure of the source code
    to prepare for development of Jikes RVM from within standard Java IDEs.

*** There is a new, ant-based, build and test system that have replaced
    jconfigure and RunSanityTests.

*** We now use ecj (the Eclipse Java compiler) instead of jikes to compile
    our Java source files and have eliminated the preprocessor.

*** The userguide has been moved from latex into a wiki.  It has been updated
    to describe the new build and test systems.
    The release tarball contains a pdf and html version of the userguide.

*** We now support Java5, we have switched to using the generics branch
    of GNU Classpath, and much of Jikes RVM has been rewritten to use
    Java 5 language features and generic types.

*** We have switched to using Java5 annotations for pragmas/magic.

*** The recommended version of GNU classpath is 0.93-generics.
    Earlier versions of GNU classpath are not supported.

*** Support in the PPC baseline compiler for storing local variables in
    registers.

*** Refactor of type system and JTOC.

*** Support for packing subword sized fields in objects. Removal of hand
    packed fields. Various memory savings.

*** System calls now supported in any file using SysCall annotation on a
    native method. VM_SysCall now generates implementation from annotation.
    VMMath now implemented using system calls.

*** Support for chasing final fields reached from literal or static final
    fields. Greater optimization of object constant operands.

*** Greater support for 387 constants. Simplification of 387 BURS rules.

** Bug fixes

*** Yes...many :)  For details: svn log -r10915:11866

** Other Notes

*** The Quick compiler has been deleted.  It is now available as a
    patch on the research tracker, or via older releases (2.3.4
    through 2.4.6).

*** The HPM (Hardware Performance Monitor) code has been deleted.
    It is now available on the research tracker (item 1613215),
    by svn diff -r11162:11161, or in releases through 2.4.6.

*** This release is known to not work on OS X.  We would like to get this
    platform working again;  if you use Jikes RVM on OS X and are willing to
    help fix it, please let us know.



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