This week’s Java roundup for June 19th, 2023 features news from JDK 22, JDK 21, updates to: Spring Boot; Spring Security; Spring Vault; Spring for GraphQL; Spring Authorization Server and Spring Modulith; Liberica NIK 23.0, Semeru 20.0.1, Micronaut 4.0-RC2 and 3.9.4, JNoSQL 1.0, Vert.x 4.4.4, updates to: Apache Tomcat, Camel, Log4j and JMeter; JHipster Lite 0.35, KCDC 2023 and JCON Europe 2023.
JDK 21
Build 28 of the JDK 21 early-access builds was also made available this past week featuring updates from Build 27 that include fixes to various issues. Further details on this build may be found in the release notes.
JDK 22
Build 3 of the JDK 22 early-access builds was also made available this past week featuring updates from Build 2 that include fixes to various issues. More details on this build may be found in the release notes.
Versions 3.1.1, 3.0.8 and 2.7.13 of Spring Boot 3.1.1 deliver improvements in documentation, dependency upgrades and notable bug fixes such as: difficulty using the from() method defined in the SpringApplication class in Kotlin applications; SSL configuration overwrites other customizations from the WebClient interface; and support for JDK 20, but no defined value for it in the JavaVersion enum. Further details on these versions may be found in the release notes for version 3.1.1, version 3.0.8 and version 2.7.13.
Versions 6.1.1, 6.0.4, 5.8.4, 5.7.9 and 5.6.11 of Spring Security have been released featuring bug fixes, dependency upgrades and new features such as: align the OAuth 2.0 Resource Server documentation with Spring Boot capabilities; a new section in the reference manual to include information related to support and limitations when working with native images; and a migration to Asciidoctor Tabs. More details on these versions may be found in the release notes for version 6.1.1, version 6.0.4, version 5.8.4, version 5.7.9 and version 5.6.11.
The release of Spring Vault 3.0.3 delivers bug fixes, improvements in documentation, dependency upgrades and new features such as: a refinement in logging to log the token accessor upon token revocation failure; AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) authentication added to the EnvironmentVaultConfiguration class; and the inclusion of a key_version attribute to the encrypt() method in the VaultTransitOperations interface. Further details on this release may be found in the release notes.
Versions 1.2.1 and 1.1.5 of Spring for GraphQL have been released featuring bug fixes, dependency upgrades and new features such as: an enhanced GraphQL request body check to prevent a 500 Internal Server Error when a 400 Bad Request is expected; elimination of the IllegalArgumentException due to no defined ConnectionAdapter interface when using existing Java Connection types. More details on these versions may be found in the release notes for version 1.2.1 and version 1.1.5.
Versions 1.1.1, 1.0.3 and 0.4.3 of Spring Authorization Server have been released featuring bug fixes and dependency upgrades. Version 1.1.1 ships with a new feature in which there was a performance enhancement by simply replacing the replaceFirst() method with the substring() method from the String class while using the OAuth2AuthorizationConsent class. Further details on these versions may be found in the release notes for version 1.1.1, version 1.0.3 and version 0.4.3.
The first milestone release of Spring Modulith 1.0.0 ships with bug fixes, dependency upgrades and a new feature that propagates instances of the ExecutorService interface defined in an application into instances of the Scenario class by default. This project has been promoted from its experimental status yielding these breaking changes: a rename of the actuator endpoint from applicationmodules to application-modules; a rename of the group identifier from org.springframework.experimental to org.springframework.modulith; and the removal of the previously deprecated configuration properties, spring.modulith.events.jdbc-*, in the JDBC-based event registry. More details on this release may be found in the release notes.
BellSoft
BellSoft has released version 23.0 of their Liberica Native Image Kit (NIK) featuring: the integration of the ParallelGC garbage collector as an experimental feature; implementation of the JFR ThreadCPULoad event; a removal of type checks from JNI-to-Java call stubs that can break compatibility; and implementation of the user CPU time thread with the getThreadCpuTime() method in the LinuxThreadCpuTimeSupport class.
The second release candidate of Micronaut 4.0.0 was also released providing bug fixes, dependency upgrades and these improvements: use of unsafe setters for Jackson; a new UnsafeBeanInstantiationIntrospection interface, a variation of the BeanIntrospection interface that includes an instantiateUnsafe() method for allowing to skip instantiation validation; and support for the All-open compiler plugin for the Kotlin Symbol Processing API.
The Micronaut Foundation has released Micronaut Framework 3.9.4 featuring bug fixes and updates to modules: Micronaut Security and Micronaut Servlet. There was also a dependency upgrade to Netty 4.1.94. More details on this release may be found in the release notes.
Eclipse Foundation
More than six years after its inception in March 2017, version 1.0.0 of JNoSQL, the compatible implementation of the Jakarta NoSQL specification, has been released. New features include: a migration to the jakarta.* namespace, support for the Jakarta Data specification; an implementation of new methods that explore fluent-API for the Graph, Document, Key-Value and Document NoSQL database types; and new methods, count() and exists(), as default on the DocumentManager and ColumnManager interfaces. Before it became a compatible implementation in November 2019, JNoSQL was a project for developers to more easily create NoSQL database applications using Java.
Two months after MicroStream had announced that their Java-native persistence layer had become an Eclipse Project, the first release of Eclipse Store, formerly known as MicroStream Persistence, has been made available to the Java community. Current non-Eclipse integrations in the MicroStream code base, such as Spring Boot, Quarkus and Helidon, will remain open source and the code will be hosted in a new MicroStream repository after they have been refactored to make use of the Eclipse Store and Eclipse Serializer projects.
Eclipse Vert.x 4.4.4 has been released featuring an upgrade to Netty 4.1.94.Final to address CVE-2023-34462, a vulnerability in which an attacker can manipulate the SniHandler class, with no configured idle timeout handler, to buffer the maximum 16MB of data per connection that can quickly lead to an OutOfMemoryError error and potential for a distributed denial of service. Further details on this release may be found in the release notes.
Apache Software Foundation
The Apache Tomcat team has disclosed that versions 11.0.0-M5, 10.1.8, 9.0.74 and 8.5.88 are affected by CVE-2023-34981, a vulnerability in which a regression in the fix for Bug 66512 could lead to an information leak if a response did not include any HTTP headers, then no Apache JServ Protocol (AJP) SEND_HEADERS message would be sent for the response. This was fixed in Bug 66591 and developers are encouraged to migrate to minimal versions 11.0.0-M6, 10.1.9, 9.0.75 or 8.5.89.
The release of Apache Camel 3.20.6 provides bug fixes and improvements such as: ensure that the REQUEST_CONTEXT and RESPONSE_CONTEXT headers are mapped when populating a Camel CXF message from Camel Message; and enhancements to the Camel JBang module to support OpenAPI. More details on this release may be found in the release notes.
Similarly, the release of Apache Camel 3.14.9 ships with these bug fixes: use the createTempFile() method in the Files class within the FileConverter class instead of directly creating a file; and a potential NullPointerException when using XML Tokenize on an Woodstox XML namespace. Further details on this release may be found in the release notes.
The first alpha release of Apache Log4j 3.0.0 delivers notable changes such as: allow plugins to be created through more flexible dependency injection patterns; split support for Kafka, ZeroMQ, CSV, JMS, JDBC and Jackson to their own modules; and removal of support for the Serializable interface in several classes and interfaces that include Message, Layout, LogEvent, Logger, and ReadOnlyStringMap.
Apache JMeter 5.6.0 has been released featuring bug fixes and new features such as: use Caffeine for caching HTTP headers instead of the Apache Commons Collections LRUMap class; use the Java ServiceLoader class for loading plugins instead of classpath scanning for improved startup; and improved computation when many threads actively produce samplers by using the Java LongAdder and similar concurrency classes to avoid synchronization in the Calculator class. More details on this release may be found in the release notes.
JHipster
The JHipster team has released version 0.35.0 of JHipster Lite with bug fixes, improvements in documentation, dependency upgrades and an improved Sonar analysis that provides more error details and an option to wait. Further details on this release may be found in the release notes.
Kansas City Developer Conference
The 2023 Kansas City Developer Conference (KCDC) was held at the Kansas City Convention Center in Kansas City, Missouri this past week featuring speakers from the Java community who presented workshops and sessions on topics such as: Java, architecture, cloud, data science, JavaScript, project management and security. The conference also featured puppies available for adoption from the Great Plains SPCA.
JCON Europe
Also this past week, JCON Europe 2023 was held at the Cinedom in Kön, Germany featuring speakers from the Java community who presented sessions on topics such as: Java, developer productivity engineering, security, web components, microservices and cloud native.
The federal government is ordering the dissolution of TikTok’s Canadian business after a national security review of the Chinese company behind the social media platform, but stopped short of ordering people to stay off the app.
Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne announced the government’s “wind up” demand Wednesday, saying it is meant to address “risks” related to ByteDance Ltd.’s establishment of TikTok Technology Canada Inc.
“The decision was based on the information and evidence collected over the course of the review and on the advice of Canada’s security and intelligence community and other government partners,” he said in a statement.
The announcement added that the government is not blocking Canadians’ access to the TikTok application or their ability to create content.
However, it urged people to “adopt good cybersecurity practices and assess the possible risks of using social media platforms and applications, including how their information is likely to be protected, managed, used and shared by foreign actors, as well as to be aware of which country’s laws apply.”
Champagne’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment seeking details about what evidence led to the government’s dissolution demand, how long ByteDance has to comply and why the app is not being banned.
A TikTok spokesperson said in a statement that the shutdown of its Canadian offices will mean the loss of hundreds of well-paying local jobs.
“We will challenge this order in court,” the spokesperson said.
“The TikTok platform will remain available for creators to find an audience, explore new interests and for businesses to thrive.”
The federal Liberals ordered a national security review of TikTok in September 2023, but it was not public knowledge until The Canadian Press reported in March that it was investigating the company.
At the time, it said the review was based on the expansion of a business, which it said constituted the establishment of a new Canadian entity. It declined to provide any further details about what expansion it was reviewing.
A government database showed a notification of new business from TikTok in June 2023. It said Network Sense Ventures Ltd. in Toronto and Vancouver would engage in “marketing, advertising, and content/creator development activities in relation to the use of the TikTok app in Canada.”
Even before the review, ByteDance and TikTok were lightning rod for privacy and safety concerns because Chinese national security laws compel organizations in the country to assist with intelligence gathering.
Such concerns led the U.S. House of Representatives to pass a bill in March designed to ban TikTok unless its China-based owner sells its stake in the business.
Champagne’s office has maintained Canada’s review was not related to the U.S. bill, which has yet to pass.
Canada’s review was carried out through the Investment Canada Act, which allows the government to investigate any foreign investment with potential to might harm national security.
While cabinet can make investors sell parts of the business or shares, Champagne has said the act doesn’t allow him to disclose details of the review.
Wednesday’s dissolution order was made in accordance with the act.
The federal government banned TikTok from its mobile devices in February 2023 following the launch of an investigation into the company by federal and provincial privacy commissioners.
— With files from Anja Karadeglija in Ottawa
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2024.
LONDON (AP) — Most people have accumulated a pile of data — selfies, emails, videos and more — on their social media and digital accounts over their lifetimes. What happens to it when we die?
It’s wise to draft a will spelling out who inherits your physical assets after you’re gone, but don’t forget to take care of your digital estate too. Friends and family might treasure files and posts you’ve left behind, but they could get lost in digital purgatory after you pass away unless you take some simple steps.
Here’s how you can prepare your digital life for your survivors:
Apple
The iPhone maker lets you nominate a “ legacy contact ” who can access your Apple account’s data after you die. The company says it’s a secure way to give trusted people access to photos, files and messages. To set it up you’ll need an Apple device with a fairly recent operating system — iPhones and iPads need iOS or iPadOS 15.2 and MacBooks needs macOS Monterey 12.1.
For iPhones, go to settings, tap Sign-in & Security and then Legacy Contact. You can name one or more people, and they don’t need an Apple ID or device.
You’ll have to share an access key with your contact. It can be a digital version sent electronically, or you can print a copy or save it as a screenshot or PDF.
Take note that there are some types of files you won’t be able to pass on — including digital rights-protected music, movies and passwords stored in Apple’s password manager. Legacy contacts can only access a deceased user’s account for three years before Apple deletes the account.
Google
Google takes a different approach with its Inactive Account Manager, which allows you to share your data with someone if it notices that you’ve stopped using your account.
When setting it up, you need to decide how long Google should wait — from three to 18 months — before considering your account inactive. Once that time is up, Google can notify up to 10 people.
You can write a message informing them you’ve stopped using the account, and, optionally, include a link to download your data. You can choose what types of data they can access — including emails, photos, calendar entries and YouTube videos.
There’s also an option to automatically delete your account after three months of inactivity, so your contacts will have to download any data before that deadline.
Facebook and Instagram
Some social media platforms can preserve accounts for people who have died so that friends and family can honor their memories.
When users of Facebook or Instagram die, parent company Meta says it can memorialize the account if it gets a “valid request” from a friend or family member. Requests can be submitted through an online form.
The social media company strongly recommends Facebook users add a legacy contact to look after their memorial accounts. Legacy contacts can do things like respond to new friend requests and update pinned posts, but they can’t read private messages or remove or alter previous posts. You can only choose one person, who also has to have a Facebook account.
You can also ask Facebook or Instagram to delete a deceased user’s account if you’re a close family member or an executor. You’ll need to send in documents like a death certificate.
TikTok
The video-sharing platform says that if a user has died, people can submit a request to memorialize the account through the settings menu. Go to the Report a Problem section, then Account and profile, then Manage account, where you can report a deceased user.
Once an account has been memorialized, it will be labeled “Remembering.” No one will be able to log into the account, which prevents anyone from editing the profile or using the account to post new content or send messages.
X
It’s not possible to nominate a legacy contact on Elon Musk’s social media site. But family members or an authorized person can submit a request to deactivate a deceased user’s account.
Passwords
Besides the major online services, you’ll probably have dozens if not hundreds of other digital accounts that your survivors might need to access. You could just write all your login credentials down in a notebook and put it somewhere safe. But making a physical copy presents its own vulnerabilities. What if you lose track of it? What if someone finds it?
Instead, consider a password manager that has an emergency access feature. Password managers are digital vaults that you can use to store all your credentials. Some, like Keeper,Bitwarden and NordPass, allow users to nominate one or more trusted contacts who can access their keys in case of an emergency such as a death.
But there are a few catches: Those contacts also need to use the same password manager and you might have to pay for the service.
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LONDON (AP) — Britain’s competition watchdog said Thursday it’s opening a formal investigation into Google’s partnership with artificial intelligence startup Anthropic.
The Competition and Markets Authority said it has “sufficient information” to launch an initial probe after it sought input earlier this year on whether the deal would stifle competition.
The CMA has until Dec. 19 to decide whether to approve the deal or escalate its investigation.
“Google is committed to building the most open and innovative AI ecosystem in the world,” the company said. “Anthropic is free to use multiple cloud providers and does, and we don’t demand exclusive tech rights.”
San Francisco-based Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, who previously worked at ChatGPT maker OpenAI. The company has focused on increasing the safety and reliability of AI models. Google reportedly agreed last year to make a multibillion-dollar investment in Anthropic, which has a popular chatbot named Claude.
Anthropic said it’s cooperating with the regulator and will provide “the complete picture about Google’s investment and our commercial collaboration.”
“We are an independent company and none of our strategic partnerships or investor relationships diminish the independence of our corporate governance or our freedom to partner with others,” it said in a statement.
The U.K. regulator has been scrutinizing a raft of AI deals as investment money floods into the industry to capitalize on the artificial intelligence boom. Last month it cleared Anthropic’s $4 billion deal with Amazon and it has also signed off on Microsoft’s deals with two other AI startups, Inflection and Mistral.
