There has been a lot of activity the last couple of months (end of 2005, early 2006) in the Java ME Community, with updates to many specifications (JSR). Many of these updates are happening because JSR 248 Mobile Service Architecture (MSA) is going final.
For those of you who don't know what MSA is, MSA is the umbrella JSR that will define the JSRs all MSA-compliant handsets must support, similarly to how JTWI defined the APIs to be supported (MMAPI 1.0, WMA 1.1, MIDP 2.0, etc.) by all JTWI-compliant handsets (note that the current generation of MIDP handsets are JTWI-compliant). MSA is the “next generation” JTWI if you will, and it will define many JSRs, including MIDP 2.1, as part of its definition. As I said, MSA is close to becoming final, and many JSRs are going or have been through maintenance reviews to include new clarifications that will help in creating new conformance tests (TCKs) that will result in consistent behavior across implementations… or at least that is the goal.
One of the JSRs that is currently getting updated is the MIDP 2.1 (JSR 118) specification, which currently is in maintenance review — the maintenance review period closes April 17. There are quite a bit of clarifications, important ones, under MIDP 2.1. If you are a mobility developer or product person, you should check it out and provide feedback (send feedback to jsr118-mr21@mobile-experts.org).
This revision is VERY important, because it will be the foundation or version for the upcoming MSA specification, and thus for all MSA-compliant handsets… and it is the last opportunity to include clarifications before MIDP 3.0 comes along, and, it will be foundation for MIDP 3.0.
You can find the MIDP 2.1 change log here, and the main page here.
Other Java ME JSRs in maintenance review include: JSR 82 Bluetooth APIs. The following JSRs recently closed their maintenance review: MMAPI, Location API for J2ME, and Scalable 2D Vector Graphics API for J2ME. I could be missing others.
Let me close by mentioning other important Java ME activities:
- A new expert group is getting formed for the new Location API specification for Java ME, the JSR 293 Location API 2.0
- A new expert group is getting formed for the JSR 290 Java Language & XML User Interface Markup Integration
- JSR 190 Event Tracking API for J2ME is in Early Draft Review
There are lots of opportunities for you to help shape the future of Java ME.
ceo