Why compile Java ports and commons-logging

[Anders F Björklund]

Blair Zajac wrote:

>>> The only reason I see to compile a Java port is if you are patching 
>>> the source code.
>> Isn't running the supplied jar just like running the supplied binary ?
>> Seems more like a question of binary blob versus open source to me...
>
> I don't think the comparison with binary packages is entirely fair.  
> Jar files fall in between source packages and complete binary ones.  
> You can relocate a jar file without it breaking, but you can't 
> relocate a binary package with dylibs, say if you want to move 
> /opt/local into /Users/blair/my-macports.  You have to recompile.  
> There's also too many customizations people like to do with source 
> releases, look at all our variants.  You don't find many variants in 
> Java packages.

But just because they're relocatable and not many want to customize, 
doesn't make them not binary ? We are talking about regular .jar files 
with .class code here, right - and not .zip cousins with .java source, 
or something ?

> And I think saying "open source" is just mixing different concepts in 
> this discussion.

I might have misunderstood the original suggestion, I thought it said 
something like "why bother compiling the source when using the binary 
works better" ? Didn't mean to introduce a difference concept...

--anders