- According to https://www.eclipse.org/projects/handbook/#specifications-implementations “Compatible Implementations may only claim compatibility with a final specification. ... No claims regarding compatibility may be made for an implementation milestone build or unratified specification version."
- https://github.com/jakartaee/specifications/blob/master/.github/PULL_REQUEST_TEMPLATE/pull_request_template.md, which states, "For a Release Review, a summary that a Compatible Implementation is complete, passes the TCK, and that the TCK includes sufficient coverage of the specification."
If I look really pedantically at these two statements, maybe I could read that only final APIs can be used by a compatible implementation, but this is also ignoring other discussions we have had about the special nature of the compatible implementation used to ratify a specification.
We need to make a clear statement about the requirements for the initial compatible implement(s) used to ratify a specification as well as any additional constraints on post ratification compatible implementation claims.
It has been common practice in EE and MP to use ratifying compatible implementations that do depend on release candidate APIs. It has been a requirement that the TCK used for certification was the proposed final TCK, but not the APIs. By virtue of passing the TCK signature tests, whatever API versions the compatible implementation used, they have been validated as compatible as determined by the final TCK. This should be a sufficient validation of the compatible implementation.
Let's discuss tomorrow.
