An end to classloader nightmares

I have been going through some of the presentations from the Javapolis 2006 conference, and I stumbled upon a talk by Stanley Ho from Sun Microsystems about JSR-277 Java Modules – http://www.bejug.org/confluenceBeJUG/display/PARLEYS/JSR-277+Java+Module+System. The spec finally provides Java programmers the ability to programmatically enforce version dependencies within their code. No more classpath hell!! Woohoo! Once you have tried to work out which one of the 1000 xerces.jar files the classloader is loading a few times, it tends to lose its novelty.

One of the really cool things about it is the ability to instruct the classloader to load different versions of the same library (or module as it is now referred to) programmatically at runtime – loading different versions when you need them! Very powerful. Can’t wait to see an implementation.

It’s about time too…