JavaCompilerCore/bcel/RELEASE-NOTES.txt

              Apache Commons BCEL 6.0 RELEASE NOTES

The Apache Commons BCEL team is pleased to announce the commons-bcel6-6.0 release!

The Byte Code Engineering Library (BCEL) is intended to give users a convenient
way to analyze, create, and manipulate compiled .class files. Classes are
represented by objects containing all the symbolic information of the given
class: methods, fields and byte code instructions.

BCEL 6.0 is a major release supporting the new features introduced in Java 6, 7
and 8. 

It requires Java 7 or higher to run.


Compatibility with 5.2
----------------------

Binary compatible - No

Source compatible - Yes, sort of;
 - Maven coordinates update:
    org.apache.bcel:bcel:5.2 -> org.apache.commons:commons-bcel6:6.0

 - Rename package imports: 
    org.apache.bcel -> org.apache.commons.bcel6

 - The org.apache.commons.bcel6.classfile.Visitor interface has been enhanced with
   additional methods. If you implemented it directly instead of extending
   the EmptyVisitor class you'll have to implement the new methods.

Semantic compatible - Yes, except:
 - BCEL handles new attributes such as code annotations that could only
   be processed by implementing a custom AttributeReader in the previous
   versions. Code relying on this behavior will have to be adjusted since
   the AttributeReader will no longer be called in these cases.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Changes in this version include:


Fixed Bugs:
o Bug fixes and improvements to InvokeDynamic and BootStrapMethods implementation.
        Issue: BCEL-209. Thanks to Mark Roberts. 
o Verification error when an invoke references a method defined in superclass.
        Issue: BCEL-187. Thanks to Jérôme Leroux. 
o Remove ObjectType cache.  Issue: BCEL-218. Thanks to chas. 
o The verifier now checks if methods with a void return type attempt to return an
        object.  Issue: BCEL-184. Thanks to Jérôme Leroux. 
o The verifier now checks if methods with a void return type attempt to return an
        object.  Issue: BCEL-184. Thanks to Jérôme Leroux. 
o MethodGen.removeLocalVariable now properly unreference the removed variable
        from the targetters of the instruction handlers delimiting the scope of 
        the variable.  Issue: BCEL-207. Thanks to Mark Roberts. 
o Utility.signatureToString() no longer throws a ClassFormatException on TypeVariables
        found in generic signatures.  Issue: BCEL-197. Thanks to Mark Roberts. 
o Removed the 'index' variable from the LocalVariableGen's hash code. 
        Issue: BCEL-194. Thanks to Mark Roberts. 
o The verifier should not check for run time compatibility of objects assigned to 
        arrays.  Issue: BCEL-193. Thanks to Jérôme Leroux. 
o Correct verification of the return value of a method.  Issue: BCEL-188. Thanks 
        to Jérôme Leroux. 
o Performance degradation with the UTF8 cache. getInstance no longer uses cache  
        Issue: BCEL-186. 
o org.apache.bcel.util.ClassLoaderRepository.loadClass(String) leaks input streams.
        Issue: BCEL-181. 
o Mistake in "Peephole optimizer" example at http://commons.apache.org/bcel/manual.html 
        Issue: BCEL-28. 
o BCEL cannot be used as java.system.class.loader  Issue: BCEL-74. 
o XSLT transforms broken in Turkish Locale.  Issue: BCEL-77. 
o java.lang.ClassFormatError: LVTT entry for 'local' in class file 
        org/shiftone/jrat/test/dummy/CrashTestDummy does not match any LVT entry  
        Issue: BCEL-79. 
o ClassParser.parse() throws NullPointerException if class does not exist and 
        ClassParser(String) constructor is used  Issue: BCEL-81. 
o ArrayOutOfBoundsException in InstructionFinder  Issue: BCEL-85. 
o Website: Incorrect URL for source; version 5.2 is not in the bug page  
        Issue: BCEL-87.
o bcelified method doesn't pass verification  Issue: BCEL-88. 
o return type not verified by JustIce  Issue: BCEL-89. 
o @since tag incorrect for Annotation classes in BCEL trunk  Issue: BCEL-94. 
o InstructionFactory missing % operator for Float, Double  Issue: BCEL-95. 
o Fields in Annotations and AnnotationEntry are inaccessible to subclasses  
        Issue: BCEL-96. 
o Add support for getResources to ClassPath  Issue: BCEL-97. 
o Two source files in repository are empty  Issue: BCEL-98. 
o Maven POM file calls in apache regex but code does not use it  Issue: BCEL-99. 
o ClassParser throws unintelligible Exception  Issue: BCEL-100. 
o verifier raises an AssertionViolatedException when done against Java 5 files
        with generics/annotations  Issue: BCEL-101. 
o Verifier fails in pass 2 with "Number of LocalVariableTable attributes of 
        Code attribute" on static methods.  Issue: BCEL-102. 
o ParameterAnnotationEntries are read not dumped  Issue: BCEL-107. 
o RuntimeVisible Annotations duplicated  Issue: BCEL-108. 
o ARRAYLENGTH incorrectly not StackConsumer  Issue: BCEL-112. 
o Error in method search() defined in org.apache.bcel.util.InstructionFinder
        Issue: BCEL-114. 
o Deleting all instructions of a list shows wrong behaviour  Issue: BCEL-115. 
o Make BCEL JAR OSGi compatible  Issue: BCEL-120. 
o ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException thrown from TABLESWITCH.initFromFile  
        Issue: BCEL-122. 
o tableswitch/lookupswitch invalid alignment of 4-byte operands  Issue: BCEL-124.
o Incorrect size calculation in InstructionFinder  Issue: BCEL-125. 
o Class files containing "ParameterAnnotations" are dumped incorrectly  
        Issue: BCEL-130. 
o Class files containing "StackMapTable" attributes (on method code) are dumped
        incorrectly  Issue: BCEL-131. 
o org.apache.bcel.classfile.ClassParser: NullPointerException caused by fileopen 
        failed  Issue: BCEL-132. 
o org.apache.bcel.classfile.ClassParser: NullPointerException caused by invalid
        filename  Issue: BCEL-133. 
o ExecutionVisitor doesn't support Class constant type for LDC and LDC_W 
        Issue: BCEL-134. 
o BCELifier issue: BCELFactory fails to handle float and long constants.
        Issue: BCEL-135. 
o "Invalid method signature: TT;" when using MethodGen for a method having a
        generic parameter  Issue: BCEL-137. 
o FieldInstruction.getFieldSize() doesn't decode Type.getTypeSize() output.
        Issue: BCEL-138. 
o org.apache.bcel.generic.Instruction.equals(Object) does not follow 
        Object.equals(Object) rules  Issue: BCEL-140. 
o Select instructions should implement StackConsumer instead of StackProducer
        Issue: BCEL-141. 
o Fix CPL License issues with EnclosingMethod.java and 
        LocalVariableTypeTable.java  Issue: BCEL-143. 
o Type.getReturnTypeSize() doesn't decode Type.getTypeSize() output.
        Issue: BCEL-145. 
o SyntheticRepository.loadClass() fails to close the inputStream.
        Issue: BCEL-146. 
o BCELifier produces incorrect code for methods containing loads of class 
        literals from constant pool  Issue: BCEL-148. 
o Code attribute size not updated  Issue: BCEL-151. 
o Incorrect link for Jasmin assembler language  Issue: BCEL-152. 
o Examples not present in source or binary downloads  Issue: BCEL-153. 
o ClassParser.parse() generates NPE if it cannot open the file  Issue: BCEL-154. 
o InstConstraintVisitor does not handle class constants  Issue: BCEL-155. 
o Pass3bVerifier crashes on empty methods  Issue: BCEL-156. 
o LocalVariableGen.getLocalVariable() computes incorrect length  Issue: BCEL-159. 
o Method does not have a method to access parameter annotations  Issue: BCEL-164. 
o ClassPath.getResource does not correctly perform URL escaping  Issue: BCEL-167. 
o ClassParser fails to parse JDK classes in Java 8: ClassFormatException: Invalid
        byte tag in constant pool  Issue: BCEL-173. 
o Verification of interfaces with default methods fails with Java 8
        Issue: BCEL-174. 
o When reading the number of parameters in a MethodParameters structure
        only read a single byte as per the JVM specification.  Issue: BCEL-177. 

Changes:
o Major release of BCEL requires updating package name and maven coordinates.
        Issue: BCEL-222. 
o Make org.apache.bcel.classfile.ConstantPool.ConstantPool(DataInput) public.
        Issue: BCEL-219. Thanks to Maxim Degtyarev. 
o Add parent type processing for ClassPath class.  Issue: BCEL-76. 
o Add support for getResource and getResourceAsStream to ClassPath  Issue: BCEL-83. 
o Properly parse StackMapTable attributes in Java 6 classfiles  Issue: BCEL-92. 
o Javadoc overhaul  Issue: BCEL-104. 
o BCEL is unnecessarily slow  Issue: BCEL-119. 
o Add support for INVOKEDYNAMIC and MethodHandles  Issue: BCEL-157. 
o Why using unstable sort at MethodGen.getLocalVariables() ?  Issue: BCEL-160. 
o Incorporate patch file from Findbugs  Issue: BCEL-163. 
o Implement the MethodParameters attribute  Issue: BCEL-175. 


Have fun!
-Apache Commons BCEL team

Feedback
--------

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    http://commons.apache.org/bcel

Please direct all bug reports to JIRA:

    https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/BCEL

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