Subject Jaybird: dropping support for older Java versions
Author Mark Rotteveel
Jaybird 2.2 currently supports Java 5 and up. When I planned Jaybird 2.3
(now 3.0), I was planning to continue to support Java 6 with Jaybird
3.0, and drop support with Jaybird 3.1. However I have decided to change
that decision.

Java 5 has been end of public updates since October 2009 and Java 6 has
been end of public updates since February 2013. Java 7 itself is end of
public updates since this month (April 2015). See the Oracle Java
End-Of-Life policy at:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/eol-135779.html.

Jaybird 3 is taking longer than I anticipated; I hope to have a beta
ready in Q3 2015, but this really depends on available time.

With this in mind, I have made the decision to make the following changes:

Starting with Jaybird 2.2.8, Jaybird 2.2 will no longer support Java 5,
and I will only release builds for Java 7 and Java 8 (I will maintain
Java 6 compatibility for the 2.2 branch, so people can compile their own
version if they really need it).

Jaybird 3.0 will *not* support Java 6. For the time being I plan to
support Java 7 and 8 (and probably also Java 9). Depending on the final
release date of Jaybird 3.0, Java 7 support might still be dropped.

Kind regards,
Mark Rotteveel
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Mark Rotteveel