Java™ Application Development on Linux - Dator

176Chapter 6The IBM Developer Kit for Linux, Java 2 Technology Editionclass. 5 It also appears that IBM’s class may become the official Sun version inJava 5.0 when it comes out. The primary feature of this class is its ability todeal correctly with rounding and precision, which is of great benefit in financialand scientific applications. Check out IBM’s documentation and see if this issomething you should use.Note that Java bytecodes are Java bytecodes. You can download and usethe IBM class with the Sun Java Runtime. It is there if you need it.6.4WHAT ARE ALL THESE “_G”VERSIONS?One thing you will notice right away when you unpack the IBM Java SDK isthat it has virtually all of the same commands as does the Sun Java SDK, butthere is a whole bunch of them duplicated with a mysterious “_g” suffix. What’sup with that?These versions run a Java VM that was compiled with debug information,so that you can report information about bugs and errors that is of use to IBMSDK developers in locating and fixing problems. These versions should not beused for production work, but only to recreate and report bugs.6.5REVIEWWell, we told you this one would be short. With a handful of minor exceptions,the IBM Java SDK is a complete drop-in replacement for the Sun Java SDK.You could go back to the previous chapter and repeat every example and exercisewith the IBM Java SDK, and you would get the same results. There isdefinitely some comfort in knowing that even though you don’t have an OpenSource Java VM and SDK, at least you have two vendors the produce functionallyidentical development environments. You are not trapped into a singlevendor’s offering.5. http://www2.hursley.ibm.com/decimalj/decfaq.html