There is a JSR that for the longest time has been bothering me. And this JSR is JSR 68: The J2ME Platform Specification.
Isn't this JSR supposed to be the specification that defines what the J2ME platform is, is not, and consists of? This JSR has been referred to by many as being such.
JSR 68 is a ghost JSR.
To be accurate, the JSR does exist, but it has never been finalized… it exists there, in limbo, in the stage of “Community Review” or “Early Draft Review” (see JCP timeline here), since the summer of 2002, never going public.
Something is peculiar about this JSR, as you don't see many JSRs in limbo. There must be some non-technical forces (political, licensing, intellectual property, etc.) playing a role here.
This JSR is a tough one, as there are so many opinions (from many companies/participants) on what J2ME should be, and how it should be architected – with implications on vendors, and developers.
It is interesting though that “what J2ME is” has been based on a couple of paragraphs that mentions “J2ME profiles and building blocks” in the Java Community Process Document and in the descriptions found in the JSR 68's website, and from pure extrapolation by the development community, from the evangelization by J2ME technical leaders and by the specification lead(s), and from Motorola and Sun and Nokia and others through their reference implementations and toolkits.
But the architecture, the platform for J2ME (Java ME) should be defined in its own specification, in a clear, non-ambiguous way.
I urge the JCP and the JSR 68 spec lead to ensure all the right players are involved, and decide what to do with JSR 68 (or whatever JSR as appropriate), and complete the initial work that meant to define the Java Micro platform.
ceo