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Jon Skeet
How do you share Java functions without giving others source code?
When programming in C++ we have header files and source files. When our company sells our product (which is just a library of useful functions essentially) we provide the client only our header files and compiled source code (not the actual source code). This way clients buying the code see the function definitions in the header files and can make calls to these functions using the compiled code.
How would a company who is developing in Java go about sharing their library functionality without giving out their code? Since there are no header files in Java is this just done through documentation; i.e, provide the client with an API document showing all the function signatures and also provide a jar file with the compiled classes?
In Java you don't need source code to compile against - the bytecode contains all the metadata you need.
So for example, if I create an interface with some methods in, compile it into a class file, then package that up into a jar file and give you that jar file, you can use that interface and see all it's members etc without having the source code.
Typically you'd also provide documentation to explain the meaning of the methods etc, but they're not required in order to compile against the jar file.
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