ACADEMIA

Year's Line-up Mirrors Community's Accomplishments and Direction for the Future -- The Java Community Process (JCP) Program Management Office and the Executive Committees announced the nominations for the 2006 JCP Program Annual Awards. The Executive Committees selected JCP members, specification leads and Java Specifications Requests (JSRs) in five categories: Member of the Year, Most Outstanding Spec Lead for Java Standard Edition/Enterprise Edition, Most Outstanding Spec Lead for Java Micro Edition, Most Innovative JSR for Java Standard Edition/Enterprise Edition, and Most Innovative JSR for Java Micro Edition. This year's nominations map out the areas of the most significant advances in the development of Java technology standards since the last JavaOne Conference – the next release of the Java Platform, Enterprise Edition and the next generation of the Java Platform, Micro Edition profiles. "I am very pleased with the selections by the Executive Committee members and the well-deserved recognition these give to top contributions to both recently completed JSR work and new proposals", said Onno Kluyt, senior director, JCP Program at Sun Microsystems, Inc. and chair of the JCP. "Congratulations to all nominees, they are this year's best examples of how standards development and innovation work hand in hand to advance Java technology." Among the leading international honors for Java technology, the JCP Program Annual Awards recognize excellence in Java standards development and innovation. Winners of the 4th JCP Program Annual Awards will be announced on May, 17, 2006 at the JCP Community event at the 2006 JavaOne Conference. For details about the event and the awards ceremony please go to its Web site. Milestone JSRs Nominated Among the JCP Program Annual Awards nominations are key JSRs including JSR 244, Java Platform, Enterprise Edition 5 (Java EE 5) and JSR 220, Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) 3.0. JSR 244 standardizes the Java EE platform capabilities to support a wider range of developers and make the development of web service applications easier, while JSR 220 improves the EJB architecture by reducing its complexity. On the Java Platform, Micro Edition side, nominations include JSR 272, Mobile Broadcast Service API for Handheld Terminal which defines an optional package in Java ME/MIDP/CLDC environment enabling interactive TV and rich media applications on mobile phones. Another nomination is JSR 248, Mobile Service Architecture, which aims at making Java mobile phone implementations more uniform, increasing the platform's appeal to ISVs, service providers and consumers alike. New Submissions In The Race JSR 292, Supporting Dynamically Typed Languages on the Java Platform, is among the newly submitted projects selected by the Executives Committees for the annual awards. The JSR meets the growing developer interest in running a variety of programming languages including scripting languages on the Java platform. It proposes to add support for such languages at the virtual machine level. One of the Java ME specifications running in the race for Most Innovative Java ME JSR is IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) Services API, JSR 281. The specification is intended to enable programmers to easily write applications that can integrate with IMS and provide high-level access to IMS functionality for the development of innovative applications. Whether just finalized, recently advanced to a new development stage, or newly proposed, these JSRs and many others are indicative of the steady flow of innovation and consistent standards delivery by the JCP community members. Since the last JavaOne Conference, 33 new projects were submitted to the JCP to be developed as JSRs and 19 JSRs were submitted for final ballot. To see all the nominations for the 4th JCP Program Annual Awards, please visit its web site. To view the previous three editions' honorees, go to its Web site. The Growing Community Behind The Success To date the JCP program has 1048 members, a 15 percent increase from the last reporting at the 2005 JavaOne Conference. Over 100 new members join the existing ones in their belief that the development of Java technology standards through the JCP program is key for the creation of Java compatible implementations. Among the newest members to join the community are AMD, EMC Corporation, NVIDIA, RSA Security, Inc., and not-for-profit organizations including the Open Source Application Foundation and the Institute for Information Industry (III). To find out more about the JCP program events at the JavaOne 2006 Conference, go to its web site. To build your JSRs itinerary and preview the sessions featuring the nominated JSRs and specification leads, visit the home site of the 2006 JavaOne Conference at its Web site and explore the Sessions Catalog.