javaclass

The javaclass collection of packages and utilities (also known as ClassFile) provides a means of importing Java classes and packages directly into Python, without the need for a Java virtual machine, so that the classes may be instantiated, accessed, run and manipulated just like Python classes, and that the resulting objects and methods can be accessed and manipulated just like Python objects and methods. It should be possible to run compiled Java programs with the Python interpreter and not notice that it isn't the Java virtual machine being used - given sufficient library support for the program concerned, of course.

Quick Examples

It can be quicker to see what this is about by seeing some examples.

The Not Very Convincing Example

You can run Java classes by finding one with a main method and executing it. Here's a comparison of a freshly prepared Java class being run in Python and in a Java virtual machine:

cd tests/

javac Value.java

runclass.py Value

v.getValue() correct: 123
v.getValue() correct: 456
v.isPositive() correct: 1
v.isPositive() correct: 0
v.compare(-790) correct: -1
v.compare(-788) correct: 1
v.compare(-789) correct: 0
v.getValue() == v2.getValue() correct: 0
v2.add(-123) correct: 0
v2.getValue() correct: 255

java Value

v.getValue() correct: 123
v.getValue() correct: 456
v.isPositive() correct: true
v.isPositive() correct: false
v.compare(-790) correct: -1
v.compare(-788) correct: 1
v.compare(-789) correct: 0
v.getValue() == v2.getValue() correct: false
v2.add(-123) correct: 0
v2.getValue() correct: 255

The Slightly More Credible Example

It can be more interesting to get into Python's interactive mode and then start playing around with Java classes:

Python 2.2.2 (#2, Jan 21 2005, 16:16:57)
[GCC 2.96 20000731 (Red Hat Linux 7.3 2.96-112)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.

import javaclass.classhook

from __this__ import Value

dir()

['Value', '__builtins__', '__doc__', '__name__', 'javaclass']

dir(Value)

['__class__', '__delattr__', '__dict__', '__doc__', '__getattribute__', '__hash__', '__init__', '__init______I_', '__module__', '__new__', '__reduce__', '__repr__', '__setattr__', '__str__', '__weakref__', 'add', 'add____I_', 'compare', 'compare____I_', 'getClass', 'getClass___', 'getValue', 'getValue___', 'isPositive', 'isPositive___', 'main', 'main___java__lang__String_array_', 'newValue', 'newValue___', 'setValue', 'setValue____I_']

v = Value(20050121)

v.getValue()

20050121

v.setValue(20050401)

v.getValue()

20050401

Getting Started

See the README.txt file in the distribution directory.

Motivation

Pick one of the following:

• The need/desire to access Java libraries from Python without firing up Java virtual machines or switching to Jython (and thereby losing convenient access to various CPython libraries).
• Mixing languages available for the Java runtime with Python.
• Static typing for the Python environment, albeit achieved by writing Java or other appropriate languages.
• Having an open source environment from top to bottom to run Java bytecode on.
• Experimentation around import hooks, bytecode generation; observation of different runtime and type systems interacting.
• Making Python libraries available to Java programs - Tkinter for Java, anyone?!

Limitations

It isn't all great, however. Here are some reasons why this might not do what you want it to:

• It runs on the Python runtime which does not have the security, threading and just-in-time compiler features that people enjoy about Java runtimes, so if what you like to do is to run one big servlet container with lots of classes and threads from different people floating around, this isn't going to protect them from doing all sorts of things to each other and to your system. However, you may take the unfashionable view that the operating system is supposed to do that kind of thing.
• It works by generating Python bytecode from the Java bytecode in class files (and .jar archives). Generally, anyone who is anyone in the Python pantheon has largely recommended against doing anything with the bytecode, despite noble efforts to make exciting things happen by transforming it, optimising it, and so on. (Instead, there's been more emphasis on lots of runtime baggage for things which could be done by analysis of the code with modified bytecode being produced as a result, and let's not get started on some of the syntactical enhancements.) Consequently, stability might be an issue for some configurations, especially since CPython doesn't fail particularly graciously with badly behaved bytecode.
• Some of the translation from Java to Python bytecode takes a few liberties. For example, Java exceptions are handled in ways reminiscent of a 1980s microcomputer assembly language, whereas Python bytecode has higher level constructs for exceptions; this translation can probably be done incorrectly, triggering some kind of bytecode misbehaviour, and we all know what happens then.
• At the Python level, not all things seem totally right. For example, Java bytecode instructions are used to instantiate and then initialise exceptions just like other objects, and while Python can support this with new-style objects, Python won't let you use new-style objects as exceptions. Consequently, when Java exceptions appear in Python programs, they will be wrapped in old-style exceptions and have to be handled specially.
• In order to support method dispatch properly, special names are used for the translated methods which include the type information found in the bytecode; things like main___java__lang__String_array_ and setValue____I_ appear when you look inside classes and objects. When implementing libraries in Python for Java programs, such method naming conventions have to be used because the original code is very specific about which method is being invoked, and for specialised versions of __init__ it becomes necessary to do a setattr to add such methods into classes because of various "name mangling" measures in the Python compilation process. Now, many people might start advocating decorators at this point, but not everyone is running the very latest stuff from python.org, and decorators won't help you target a specific specialised method anyway.
• Imported and translated bytecode is not written out or cached. This means that a fair amount of work happens every time you need to import Java classes, although the generation of .pyc files could be introduced provided that it captured the slightly different import semantics of Java; for example, you can import classes belonging to a package from several places on the PYTHONPATH, and this is something that generally isn't allowed/supported with the classic Python module import mechanisms.

Suggestions for Python Improvements

• Make the bytecode interpreter more robust when encountering badly behaved bytecode, consider bytecode verification and other exciting features.
• Allow new-style objects as exceptions. Actually, just do something about the whole old-style vs. new-style class thing!
• Allow possible optimisation for things like statically predetermined method calls. The debate about static typing intersects slightly with the need to define methods with parameters of particular types, but supporting Java-style method "coexistence" (or multimethods, or whatever the proper name is) would presumably involve doing lots of things to the language that were once thought to be highly un-Pythonic. Besides, the need to interoperate with statically typed languages shouldn't dictate the design of Python, especially if better type systems could be adopted instead, leaving the static typing glue for strictly special occasions.
• Not that threaded Java programs have been run on Python yet, but with Python's current threading architecture I'd expect some disappointment.