OpenJDK and NetBeans IDE
Large parts of Sun's Java Development Kit have
been open sourced as part of the OpenJDK project. To view the homepage for the OpenJDK project, see
http://openjdk.java.net/. Since
Sun contributes heavily to the NetBeans IDE, it
is natural that these projects work closely together.
So far the following parts of the JDK have been open sourced in the form of NetBeans projects:
- Javac Compiler. This project works with the source
code for the Java programming language compiler, javac, which
compiles Java source code into bytecode class files.
- Javadoc. The sources in this project involve the javadoc tool, which parses the declaration and documentation comments in a set of Java source files and
produces a set of HTML pages describing the classes, interfaces, constructors, methods, and fields.
- JConsole. The sources in this project cover JConsole. JConsole is a GUI monitoring tool that complies to the JMX specification.
The JConsole API provides a programmatic interface to access JConsole.
- JMX. The sources in the JMX project cover the Java Management Extensions (JMX) API, which is a standard Java API for
management and monitoring of resources such as applications, devices, services, and the Java virtual machine.
- Swing. The sources in this project address the all-Java Swing user interface components.
- AWT & Java2d. The sources in this project cover the Abstract Window Toolkit (AWT), which supports
graphical user interface programming, and Java 2D, which is a set of classes for advanced 2D graphics and imaging.
- Jar & Zip. The sources in this project address the ZIP format, supported in the java.lang.zip APIs.
They also cover the JAR APIs and JAR tool.
- J2SE. The sources of this
project build the Java SE workspace, which is, basically,
all of Java SE except Hotspot. The latter is provided
by the "World" project, described below.
- World. The sources in this
project build Hotspot and Java SE.
Why Use NetBeans IDE to Work with the OpenJDK Sources?
The NetBeans team is working closely with the OpenJDK team to provide tight integration
between the source code and the tool. For starters, the OpenJDK sources have
been organized into NetBeans projects. You can just
download the OpenJDK sources, then open them as NetBeans projects via the New Project
wizard.
Look for more integration in the future:
- More OpenJDK projects released as NetBeans projects
- Tighter integration of project build scripts with NetBeans IDE
- Support for accessing sources via version control
Getting and Building the OpenJDK Sources
Check out the quick start tutorials for getting, building, and running the OpenJDK
sources in NetBeans IDE:
