Java 27 grows up, makes better choices

If one sign of maturity is making better choices, then Java has grown up a fair bit in its version 27 release Tuesday.

“JDK 27 is the release where Java stops asking you to opt in to good defaults and simply turns them on,” wrote backend engineer Arvind Kumar, on his education site Codefarm.

Better default settings may not be groundbreaking, but they do make life easier for developers because they mean coders have fewer things to change.

Nor should users have to grapple with new features, particularly if they are not of interest.

Java 27 succeeds on both counts.

Built from the now-completed Java 27 specification, JDK 27 is a short‑term release that won't get long-term support.

It includes four new features, or JEPs (JDK Enhancement Proposals) that are ready for production, none of which, Kumar points out, require any immediate changes in developers' code.

The release includes another five new features offered as previews for further incubation.

Headers get compact In Java 27, compact headers are now available by default (JEP 534).

Up until now, the developer had to set them with a flag.

Now, no additional action is required.

Traditionally, a Java object header takes up 96 bits in a memory heap, much of which is rarely used.

With Java 27, the default is a 64-bit header.

Turns out the header had too much empty space.