Question

So, I’ve been programming for a while now, but since I haven’t worked on many larger, modular projects, I haven’t come across this issue before.

I know what a .dll is in C++, and how they are used. But every time I’ve seen similar things in Java, they’ve always been packaged with source code. For instance, what would I do if I wanted to give a Java library to someone else, but not expose the source code? Instead of the source, I would just give a library as well as a Javadoc, or something along those lines, with the public methods/functions, to another programmer who could then implement them in their own Java code.

For instance, if I wanted to create a SAX parser that could be “borrowed” by another programmer, but (for some reason–can’t think of one in this specific example lol) I don’t want to expose my source. Maybe there’s a login involved that I don’t want exploited–I don’t know.

But what would be the Java way of doing this? With C++, .dll files make it much easier, but I have never run into a Java equivalent so far. (I’m pretty new to Java, and a pretty new “real-world” programmer, in general as well)

Answer 1

Java .jar library is the Java equivalent of .dll, and it also has “Jar hell”, which is the Java version of “dll hell”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAR_(file_format)