Even though Java is not listed as one of the 300+ new features, Java is listed as one of the “Key Technologies” listed under the tech specs for Leopard. Additionally, the development tools section also states that Leopard will include:

“Complete Java JDK, including javac, javadoc, ANT, and Maen tools “

Whatever “Maen” is Technically speaking, Java isn’t “new” even though Java 6 is a very big improvement over previous releases. I guess saying that they now have Ruby on Rails in every copy will sell more copies than saying that after 13 months, we finally have Java 6. Since Apple apparently removed the year-old developer preview of Java 6, I’m gonna go with Java 6 is finally going to appear in Mac OS X.

But seriously Apple, you need to do a better job at communicating with the development community on topics like this. We love your OS. We love your hardware. We hate the fact that the Java community was left in the dark as to what the state of Java was going to be in OS X Leopard. The Ruby folks seemed to have an awful lot of details around what was going to be included in 10.5. Whatever. I’ll still get my copy on the 27th at 10am.

So Apple has put out a page highlighting the 300+ new features Leopard will have. As I scan through this page, one word I’m particularly keen on is only mentioned once. That word is Java. It is only mentioned in DTrace section where it talks about how DTrace can monitor Java code. So we know Java is there, we also know it’s been tweaked for DTrace. We also know that Java on Leopard will be 64-bit. And we also know that Apple has been working on a Java 6 implementation for some time now.

So why isn’t Java a feature that’s listed? Honestly, this is primary reason for me to be purchasing Leopard in the first place. This is a pretty significant feature for me and many other folks who went out and got a MacBook Pro to do Java development on. These games that Apple is playing with the Java camp is certainly getting old!