Java Latest Version and its Features

In this section we are tracking all the versions of Java/JDK framework. We are also providing the summary of Java Language.

JDK/Java - Java Latest Version and Features

In this section we have listed down all the released versions and Java/JDK with its major features. Java was first released as JDK 1.0 (Oak) in January 1996. Since then its programming language has gone through lots of development and major changes. The current version of Java is Java SE 20 which is released on March, 21st 2023. In this section we are providing you the information about all the versions of Java/JDK with the summary of major features.

Java is a well known framework for creating many different types of applications, simple projects, enterprise applications and mission critical applications. Java is well capable of helping developers in developing and deploying such applications with ease. You can start learning Java from our well written and extensive tutorials at Java Tutorials section.

Being one of the most used and popular programming languages in the world, Java is growing fast with latest updates and new releases. Java is one of most used programming languages for general and commercial application development of any size. Developers are using Java for developing desktop, web, server-side, mobile and embedded devices applications. Java is a versatile language and can be used to develop applications to solve various use cases of businesses. In this section we are tracking each and every release of Java programming Language. You will find the latest information about the releases of Java Programming Language here.

History of Java Programming Language

Now let's have a look at the history of one of the most popular programming languages, Java. In the beginning Java was not the original name but this programming language started taking shape in early 1990s with the name "Oak". A Team of engineers started working on the Java project in the early 1990s. The main goal was to design a programming language for the digital cable television industry. But at that time programmers were not able to use it for the digital cable television industry as the hardware for this industry was not capable of running this software.

Later on the Oak programming language was renamed to Java after the name of coffee from Indonesia. Java was designed as an Internet language that could run on the Internet. Applet was developed to run in the Internet web browsers. Java was designed to remove the complexity of C++ and make a programming language which is simple, secure, portable on different platforms. Java can be on multiple platforms such as Windows, Linux, Unix, MacOS and even on mobile devices.

Java/JDK release history and major features

Java is one of most popular and widely used programming language in the world. Java is running on the millions of devices around the world. Here is the history of Java releases with its major features.

Java Release History

Here is the more details about the all the releases of Java Programming and Java Platform.

1991: In 1991 James Gosling along with his team worked on a project called "Oak," which later became a famous Java Programming Language.

1995: Later the Oak project was released as Java 1.0. Since then Java has become the most preferred programming language for enterprise application development.

1996: In 1996 Java 1.1 was released with new features such as applets and JavaBeans. The JavaBeans in Java is based on the component architecture. At that time Java Beans was very popular among developers for developing complex enterprise applications.

1997: Java 1.2 is released with new features such as the Swing graphical user interface library for creating the GUI application in Java. In this version of Java, Servlet API is also released for creating dynamic website applications.

1998: In the Java 1.3 version Internationalization API and the Java Security API is added.

1999: This is the major version of Java which is called Java 2 and includes three different platforms. These two platforms are Java 2 Standard Edition (J2SE), Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE), and Java 2 Micro Edition (J2ME).

2004: Java 5 was released in September 2004, which added new features such as generics, annotations, and enumerated types.

2006: In the year 2006, Java 6 was released with new features such as the Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME) CDC and Foundation profiles. The Java Management Extensions (JMX) 1.2 API also came with the version.

2010: In the year 2010, Java 7 was released including new features and many enhancements. New features added as try-with-resources statement, the diamond operator, and the nashorn JavaScript engine.

2011: One of the most popular versions of Java, the Java 8 was released in 2011. Java 8 added new features such as lambda expressions, streams, and the CompletableFuture API.

2014: Java 9 is released, adding new features such as modules, the JShell interactive shell, and the HTTP/2 client and server APIs.

2017: In 2017 Java 10 was released with the new features such as the text blocks and the var keyword.

2018: Oracles released the version 11 of Java in 2018 with the new features such as the ZGC garbage collector. The Flight Recorder diagnostic tool was also included in Java 11.

2019: Java 12 was released in the year 2019 and this version of Java came with the features such as the sealed classes and record types.

2020: Java 13 was another feature rich version which was released in 2020 with the features such as expressions and pattern matching for switch.

2021: Java introduced the Vector API and the Foreign Function & Memory API in Java 14 which was released in 2021.

2022: Java 18 was released in the year 2022 and this version of Java added new features such as the sealed interfaces. In this version of Java pattern matching for instanceof was also introduced.

2023: Java 21 released on 19 September 2023 with the features like virtual threads, a generational Z garbage collector.

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