Newsgroups: comp.os.plan9
From: oauvinen@cc.HUt.FI (Olli-Pekka Auvinen)
Subject: NOW AVAILABLE: Kaffe for Plan 9
Reply-To: gutu@iki.fi
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology
Date: Tue, 19 May 1998 18:05:46 JST

NOW AVAILABLE: Kaffe for Plan 9
===============================

A famous Java interpreter implementation Kaffe has now been ported to
Plan 9 operating system. For the first time in the history of Plan 9, a
proper execution engine for Sun Microsystems Java (tm) bytecode has been
ported to Plan 9. This enables all the numerous Plan 9 developers to use
Java as a programming environment in Plan 9. This is because porting the
interpreter allows various Java developer's tools like Sun's Java
compiler to be used in Plan 9 environment. Kaffe for Plan 9 is
programmed for Intel 0x86 architecture.

Java API version supported in Kaffe is 1.1.3 but it is not fully
complete. The supported API is a subset of the API in Kaffe version
0.9.2. A few parts of the API are missing like AWT. The biggest
difference between the original Kaffe version 0.9.2 API and the ported
API lies in network API. The lack of socket abstraction in Plan 9 caused
the ported TCP and UDP implementations to have a bit limited
functionality as socket options are missing. The biggest implication of
this is that multicast sockets can not be used.

In addition to the java interpreter, original Kaffe distribution package
contains a just-in-time compiler implementation that makes Java bytecode
execution very fast. Our separate package for Plan 9 contains an
incomplete JIT compiler because there are a few bugs concerning e.g.
nested exceptions. The JIT part of the package can be freely developed
and fixed.

Notice that we take no responsibility for any consequences of using this
software package.


Package can be found at least from this URL:

http://www.iki.fi/gutu/plan9/plan9.html


All questions regarding Kaffe for Plan9 are adviced to be directed via
e-mail to: gutu@iki.fi