Why should you care about Java 8?

Why should you care about Java 8? It depends on who you are and what is up in your software environment where you are working. Perhaps your boss has decided to start some projects with the latest Java releases, or maybe you have heard that Java 8 is easier to exploit more of the multiple CPUs on your computers/servers. Or perhaps you believe Java 8 makes cleaner codes. However, whatever it is about, there is just one thing you should know about Java 8: Java 8 new features/changes are in many ways profound than any other changes to Java since elder Java releases. You can compare it with Java 5 releases as a contrast, where lots of new main language futures have been introduced. 

The main keys/futures (as many JSRs) in Java 8 are:

•          Lambda expressions (officially it's called lambda expressions but unofficially is as closures). - Supporting lambda expressions allows to perform functional-style operations on streams of elements, such as MapReduce transformations on collections.

•          Annotations on Java Types for Unsigned Integer Arithmetic

•          Parallel Array Sorting

•          Bulk Data Operations for Collections

•          Define a standard API for Base64 encoding and decoding
•          New Date & Time API
•          JavaScript runtime integration which allows developers to embed JavaScript code within applications
•          Supporting  multicore processors
•          Efficient mixing of classes and functions, how methods can be passed as functional values, and how anonymous functions (lambdas) are written
•          New way to handle Streams, it generalizes many aspects of Collections but allows elements of a stream to be processed in parallel
•          Introducing “default method” in an interface, it provides a method body if an implementing class chooses NOT to implement any one.
•          Many interesting ideas from functional programming such as dealing with null and patternMatching and so on

When Oracle acquired Sun for several years ago, many Java developers and enterprises were worried about what will happen to Java's future development. Some were worried that it would be the end for Java. Some people believed that Oracle would end up with the development of NetBeans and related tools and technologies. But according to me and these facts everyone can see that it has gone well, I think. Slowly but safe, Oracle has taken care of the development in a good way. Much of this success is due to the open-source success where Oracle has carefully followed up and has done lesson learned. Technologies like Hibernate, Spring or new languages ​​such as Scala and Groovy have showed the road and those experts writing JSRs have kept up with and reacted well. Looking forward to see much better Java SE and Java EE releases. I am more hopeful today then before that in future we are going to see more software projects using Java SE and Java EE.

//Hamid Samadi - Javalärare hos Informator

Do you want to know more about the new features of Java 8? Do you want to get help understanding how to apply them in your daily programming tasks? Then you should take a look at Informators 2-day-course "Java 8 - New Features".