The Java Community Process (JCP) program celebrates success. Members of the community nominate worthy participants, Spec Leads and Java Specification Requests (JSRs) in order to cheer on the hard work and creativity that produces ground-breaking results for the community in the Java technology.

The community gets together every year, virtually this year, to applaud the winners of the JCP Program Awards. This year we have two award categories: JCP Member/Participant of the Year and JCP Spec Lead/JSR of the Year.

With great appreciation, now for the 18th year, the community recognized the award nominees, listed below, with their nomination justifications. The award results were announced at the Annual JCP Community Party and Awards Ceremony, virtually this year, on Friday, September 18, 2020. Congratulations to all the winners and nominees!

• Bill Shannon * Winner *
  
  Posthumous nomination of the late Bill Shannon for his accomplishments in Java Enterprise Edition (Java EE), and the transition towards Jakarta EE. Bill had already won the Most Outstanding Spec Lead Award in 2005 for Java Enterprise Edition after he had already been Spec Lead of the first Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE), JSR 58 in 2001. Bill helped shape Java EE ever since it started and was a driving force behind the migration into Jakarta EE. He represented Oracle in the Jakarta EE Specification Committee and contributed to Jakarta EE 9 almost until his death.

• Donald Raab
  
  Don Raab has promoted Open Source Software (OSS) through various channels both internally within BNY Mellon and externally in the Java developer community. He has been extremely helpful in promoting developers to be able to come forward and advance their careers with contributions to OSS. He has discussed proposed JSR contributions to the JCP program, for Java Collections 2.0 which would be a next big step for Java Collection API framework.

  
  

• JSR 381 Visual Recognition API
  
  JSR 381 has reached public review stage in the JCP program and is very important for the future of Java platform. It provides support for machine learning and innovative applications. The JSR will provide a machine learning API that Java developers expect. The JSR has raised a lot of interest among developers and companies in the Java ecosystem.

• JSR 389, Java Standard Edition (Java SE) 14 * Winner *
  
  The JSR for the Java SE 14 Platform. This JSR and its participations have worked with the Java developer community to continue to deliver on the six month Java platform release cadence, providing predictable and digestible innovations to developers in the Java community, including significant language improvements that will help to attract the next generation of Java developers, such as pattern matching, switch expressions and records.

  
  

Description of the JCP Award Categories JCP Member/Participant of the Year - This award recognizes the corporate or individual member (either Member or Participant) who has made the most significant positive impact on the community in the past year. Leadership, investment in the community, and innovation are some of the qualities that EC Members look for in voting for this award.   JCP Spec Lead/JSR of the Year - The role of Spec Lead is not an easy one, and the person who takes that responsibility must be, among other things, technically savvy, able to build consensus in spite of diverse corporate goals, and focused on efficiency and execution. This award recognizes the person who has brought together these qualities the best in the past year, in leading a JSR for the Java community.