Apache Karaf on IBM JDK 7!

As of Apache Karaf 2.2.3 JDK 7 is supported as a runtime JVM, it has only been recently though that IBM's JDK 7 implementation has been available so I took some time to test it out.

Apache Karaf console startup screen.

I'm happy to report that the Apache Karaf 2.2.3 tagged source tree fully compiles and runs on the new JVM! :)

Karaf info command output on IBM JDK7 for Linux.

There are a few IBM centric modifications related to JDK 7 that have been noted, mostly centered around the memory management, class data sharing, and diagnostics components amongst other changes (see IBM's JDK 7 information center for more details). 

The memory management changes I find particularly interesting, new GC options are outlined here, and the new Balanced Garbage Collection Policy is outlined here. The new GC policy being of particular interest to users whose heaps are regularly larger than 4GB (not too uncommon these days).