JCON Europe 2024

JCON Europe is a four-day Java conference attracting speakers from all over the World and Java developers from all over Germany. The venue is a cinema complex located centrally in Cologne (Köln), Germany.

This year, Eclipse Foundation had a booth at a very prominent location where the Java-related working groups, members, and projects were showcased.

My talk titled Prepare for Jakarta EE 11 – Performance and Developer Productivity was scheduled for Thursday morning. I had a very engaging audience with good comments and questions following the presentation.

On Wednesday morning, we had a refreshing morning run before the conference started. The best way to get energized before a conference day.

Hashtag Jakarta EE #228

Welcome to issue number two hundred and twenty-eight of Hashtag Jakarta EE!

I am speaking at two conferences in the upcoming week. First out is JCON Europe in Cologne, Germany where I am talking about how Jakarta EE 11 can boost your performance and developer productivity. Come to this session to find out everything you need to know about the upcoming Jakarta EE 11 release. This year, the Eclipse Foundation has a booth in the exhibition area. I will be there with my colleague Thomas and a variety of our members. Come and have a chat with us there!

Directly after my talk on Thursday morning, I will relocate to Kraków, Poland for GeeCON where I am speaking on Friday afternoon. This will be an entirely new talk where I will explore the revival of serverside rendering in the JavaScript World, and how it compares to the technologies have been available for decades in Jakarta EE.

I am bringing my running shoes to both of these conferences, so ping me if you’re interested in joining me for a refreshing morning run before the conference days start.

Let’s move on to this week’s update on how the release reviews of the Jakarta EE 11 specifications are coming along. The current state is that seven specifications are done, two are in their release reviews, six are wrapping up the final bits and pieces, and the last one, Jakarta Data will soon be ready.

Done:
– Jakarta Annotations 3.0
– Jakarta Authorization 3.0
– Jakarta Contexts and Dependency Injection 4.1
– Jakarta Expression Language 6.0
– Jakarta Interceptors 2.2
– Jakarta RESTful Web Services 4.0
– Jakarta Validation 3.1

In progress:
– Jakarta Persistence 3.2
– Jakarta WebSocket 2.2

About to start:
Jakarta Authentication 3.1
– Jakarta Concurrency 3.1
Jakarta Faces 4.1
Jakarta Security 4.0
– Jakarta Pages 4.0
– Jakarta Servlet 6.1

Next up:
Jakarta Data 1.0

There is a new conference on the block! The Eclipse Foundation‘s flagship conference, EclipseCon, has morphed into Open Community Experience that will take place from October 22 to October 24 in Mainz, Germany. As a part of this transformation, all the Java-related content will be under the co-located event, or track if you like, called Open Community for Java.

If you are interested in speaking at Open Community for Java, the CFP is open until June 10.

Hashtag Jakarta EE #227

Welcome to issue number two hundred and twenty-seven of Hashtag Jakarta EE!

It is May already! It feels like 2024 is just flying by. Those of you following these updates the last couple of weeks may have noticed a fair amount of specifications lingering in the “About to start” state. There are several reasons for this. Some of them are missing some tiny details requested by the Specification Committee member responsible for starting the review thread (aka “The Mentor“). These tiny details are mostly concerning discrepancies around the checksum of the promoted TCK. It is a puzzle to assemble all the information, and that is exactly why we introduced the mentoring role of the specification committee.

The current state is that six specifications are done, one is in its release review, one will start its release review tomorrow, and the rest is (hopefully) soon to follow.

Done:
– Jakarta Annotations 3.0
– Jakarta Contexts and Dependency Injection 4.1
– Jakarta Expression Language 6.0
– Jakarta Interceptors 2.2
– Jakarta RESTful Web Services 4.0
– Jakarta Validation 3.1

In progress:
– Jakarta Authorization 3.0

About to start:
Jakarta Authentication 3.1
– Jakarta Concurrency 3.1
– Jakarta Pages 4.0
– Jakarta Persistence 3.2 (starting tomorrow)
– Jakarta Servlet 6.1
– Jakarta WebSocket 2.2 (will be restarted shortly)

Next up:
Jakarta Data 1.0
Jakarta Faces 4.1
Jakarta Security 4.0

I am happy to announce that I will go on a JUG Tour in September this year as well. This time, I will be touring the Southern US 🇺🇸 with visits to Triangle JUG, JaxJUG, JavaMUG, and Gateway JUG before winding down with the Jalapeño unconference in Puerto Vallarta 🇲🇽.

Hashtag Jakarta EE #226

Welcome to issue number two hundred and twenty-six of Hashtag Jakarta EE!

Last week I was in India speaking at GIDS. It is a great conference that I keep returning to. For the next month, I will be touring conferences in Europe where I will be speaking at JCON Europe, GeeCON, JPrime, and Spring I/O.

Milestone 3 of Jakarta EE 11 will be staged this week, and the component specifications are in, or entering their release reviews. Check out the status here.

Done:
– Jakarta Annotations 3.0
– Jakarta Contexts and Dependency Injection 4.1
– Jakarta Expression Language 6.0
– Jakarta Interceptors 2.2
– Jakarta RESTful Web Services 4.0

In progress:
– Jakarta Authorization 3.0
– Jakarta Validation 3.1

About to start:
– Jakarta Concurrency 3.1
– Jakarta Pages 4.0
– Jakarta Persistence 3.2 (starting shortly)
– Jakarta Servlet 6.1
– Jakarta WebSocket 2.2 (will be restarted shortly)

Next up:
Jakarta Authentication 3.1
Jakarta Data 1.0
Jakarta Faces 4.1
Jakarta Security 4.0

There is a new conference on the block! The Eclipse Foundation‘s flagship conference, EclipseCon, has morphed into Open Community Experience that will take place from October 22 to October 24 in Mainz, Germany. As a part of this transformation, all the Java-related content will be under the co-located event, or track if you like, called Open Community for Java.

If you are interested in speaking at Open Community for Java, the CFP is open until June 10.

GIDS 2024

My fifth time speaking at GIDS was just as good as the previous ones. The conference has an amazing lineup of high-profile speakers, so it is a great honor to be among them. This year, the conference had 5400 attendees spread over four days with five parallel tracks.

I had a packed room for my talk titled From Spring Boot 2 to Spring Boot 3 with Java 21 and Jakarta EE. One of the great things about this conference, and maybe the main reason why I keep coming back to it, is that the audience is so engaged. They are not afraid to ask relevant questions during as well as after the talk. I am also very often approached while roaming the exhibition hall by attendees that want to talk about the talk or other topics of interest.

In one of the breaks, I was interviewed by Cassandra Chin for Techstrong TV. We chatted about open source and how getting involved in open source can be a game changer for your career as a developer. The interview should air on their website within a couple of days or so.

Bangalore is known as the Garden City of India with green areas spread around everywhere between the buildings. It can be very hot in Bangalore in April. This year, the temperature was in the high thirties (celsius). Luckily the hotel had a pool to soak in after the conference days.

Hashtag Jakarta EE #225

Welcome to issue number two hundred and twenty-five of Hashtag Jakarta EE!

I will be in the air on my way to India for my fifth appearance at GIDS when this post is published. I look forward to meeting the Indian Java community again!

Milestone 2 of Jakarta EE 11 has been published. Take a look at the specification documents on the Jakarta EE 11 Specification pages:
Jakarta EE Platform 11
Jakarta EE Web Profile 11
Jakarta EE Core Profile 11

The API artifacts are available in Maven Central with the following coordinates:

Jakarta EE Platform 11 Milestone 2

<dependency>
    <groupId>jakarta.platform</groupId>
    <artifactId>jakarta.jakartaee-api</artifactId>
    <version>11.0.0-M2</version>
</dependency>

Jakarta EE Web Profile 11 Milestone 2

<dependency>
    <groupId>jakarta.platform</groupId>
    <artifactId>jakarta.jakartaee-web-api</artifactId>
    <version>11.0.0-M2</version>
</dependency>

Jakarta EE Core Profile 11 Milestone 2

<dependency>
    <groupId>jakarta.platform</groupId>
    <artifactId>jakarta.jakartaee-core-api</artifactId>
    <version>11.0.0-M2</version>
</dependency>

The component specifications of Jakarta EE 11 are steadily moving through the release reviews and here is the current status. As you can see, there are quite a few that will have their release review started next week.

Done:
– Jakarta Annotations 3.0
– Jakarta Contexts and Dependency Injection 4.1
– Jakarta Expression Language 6.0
– Jakarta Interceptors 2.2

In progress:
– Jakarta RESTful Web Services 4.0
– Jakarta Validation 3.1

About to start:
– Jakarta Authorization 3.0
Jakarta Data 1.0
– Jakarta Pages 4.0
– Jakarta Persistence 3.2 (starting on Monday)
– Jakarta Servlet 6.1
– Jakarta WebSocket 2.2 (will be restarted shortly)

One of the most exciting features of Jakarta EE 11 is the new Jakarta Data specification. Gavin King has written a two-part article series titled A Preview of Jakarta Data 1.0 about it. Check out Part 1 and Part 2 to understand the rationale of the specification and learn what it is all about.

Hashtag Jakarta EE #224

Welcome to issue number two hundred and twenty-four of Hashtag Jakarta EE!

I am home from Devnexus 2024 just in time for writing this post. Since most of last week was dedicated to the Jakarta EE track at Devnexus which I covered in the blog post from the event, I will keep this Hashtag fairly short. The upcoming week will be spent at home before I travel eastward to India for GIDS.

The Jakarta EE 11 specifications are steadily moving through the release reviews and here is the current status:

Done:
– Jakarta Annotations 3.0
– Jakarta Contexts and Dependency Injection 4.1
– Jakarta Expression Language 6.0
– Jakarta Interceptors 2.2

In progress:
– Jakarta RESTful Web Services 4.0
– Jakarta WebSocket 2.2

About to start:
– Jakarta Authorization 3.0
– Jakarta Pages 4.0
– Jakarta Persistence 3.2
– Jakarta Servlet 6.1
– Jakarta Validation 3.1

Devnexus 2024

One notable thing about Devnexus is that you are dragged into a whirlwind of activities and fun from the minute you disembark your plane at the beginning of the week until you board again at the end. It is exhausting, but so much fun!

It all started with the JUG Leaders Summit and the Java Champions Summit on Tuesday followed by two full conference days on Wednesday and Thursday. To top it up at the end, on Friday all speakers were invited to hang out and socialize in a Park with volleyball, football (both the real kind where you kick the ball and the American version with the oval ball), or just hanging out in the sun and talk with fellow community members. Later that evening we went Duckpin bowling. I’ll leave out the details here. It turns out that Java developers are not necessarily great bowlers…but we have fun doing it!

Just as last year, we had a dedicated Jakarta EE track on both days of the conference. I think this is a valuable thing to do for the community. It is good for visibility as it gathers all the content related to Jakarta EE in one room, so it doesn’t drown in the rest of the 13 parallel tracks.

I had the pleasure of opening up the Jakarta EE track with a talk on Wednesday morning directly after the keynote ended. I gave an overview of how to prepare for Jakarta EE 11 and what it means for your productivity as a developer and your applications’ performance.

I promised to go for a morning run every day during the conference and invited everyone awake to join me. It started slightly under par with skipping the Tuesday morning run due to heavy rain, but the rest of the week eager runners met up by the Olympic Rings for a 5K awakening run.

Hashtag Jakarta EE #223

Welcome to issue number two hundred and twenty-three of Hashtag Jakarta EE!

A busy week for the Java Community is coming up. One of the finest Java conferences in Europe is happening at the same time as the premier Java conference in the US. JavaLand and Devnexus in the same week! I am usually a regular at both of these events, so this year I had to choose. It will be the first edition of JavaLand that I am not present at having been speaking there at every one of the nine previous ones. A bummer, but that’s the way it is.

We are repeating the success from last year with a dedicated Jakarta EE track at Devnexus. We will also have a booth where you can come and have a chat with us and maybe even pick up some swag.

The best way to get the most out of the conference days is to get some exercise in before it all starts. An excellent option is a quick trip to the hotel gym, but if you are into running a little, come join me and run With Jakarta EE at Devnexus. We will start at 6:30 am every morning from the Olympic Rings on the corner of Centennial Olympic Park (across the street from the Ferris wheel).

Jakarta EE 11 continues to move forward. We are just waiting for the release review of Jakarta Interceptors to be completed before we can release Milestone 2 to Maven Central. The release reviews for the next milestone have started, or are being prepared. Hopefully, most of them will be underway shortly.

Done:
– Jakarta Annotations 3.0
– Jakarta Contexts and Dependency Injection 4.1
– Jakarta Expression Language 6.0

In progress:
– Jakarta Interceptors 2.2
– Jakarta WebSocket 2.2

About to start:
– Jakarta Authorization 3.0
Jakarta Pages 4.0
– Jakarta Persistence 3.2
– Jakarta Servlet 6.1
Jakarta RESTful Web Services 4.0
– Jakarta Validation 3.1

One of my most popular talks last year was the talk about migrating from Spring Boot 2 to Spring Boot 3 with Java 21 and Jakarta EE. In this list of most viewed talks on YouTube, the one I did at Devoxx Belgium is currently in 71st place. It is still a popular talk, and it keeps getting accepted at conferences even in 2024.

JDevSummitIL 2024

I rarely give online talks nowadays after getting an overflow of it during the pandemic. But sometimes, circumstances prevent travel, so online is the only option. That was the case with my talk at JDevSummitIL 2024. With reports of 250 attendees watching the talk, it must be deemed a success even if online talks are not optimal, neither for the speaker nor the audience.

I did the From Spring Boot 2 to Spring Boot 3 with Java 2122 and Jakarta EE talk, which has been incredibly popular throughout 2023 and 2024. I guess I will keep submitting it to CFPs as long as it keeps getting accepted to conferences and user groups.