The recently released Java 19 comes with the JEP 425 preview of Virtual Threads as part of Project Loom. VSCode was quick to adapt it.

Virtual threads are heralded as the big game changer for Java - even as a replacement for Reactive programming. You get all the goods but not the complexity, with little change to the current API.

In September's VSCode release, initial support for virtual threads in the Java debugger was enabled, while in October's edition that support has been improved. Note that you will need to install JDK 19 to use this feature.

Together with enabling Virtual threads debugging support, the general debugging capabilities of VSCode have also been enchanted by adding visual indicators for inline breakpoints

Consider a line like this:

Stream.of(“Frank”).map(name -> name.toUpperCase()).forEach((item -> System.out.println(item));

Now when you set a breakpoint on this line, Visual Studio Code will automatically identify the lambda expressions in this line, and visualize them with grey dots. If you want to further set inline breakpoints on those lambda expressions, you can directly click on those grey dots, and the grey dots will turn into red dots like normal breakpoints, then the debugger will stop at these breakpoints during the code execution.

This is another upgrade of VSCode embracing Java following its newly added Spring enhancements: 

• Spring bean properties when live process is connected
  The IDE helps in listing all the beans loaded when the Spring app is itself loaded. With that new addition, VScode goes one step further in also revealing the beans' property information, i. e whether they are singletons, prototypes and so on while also marking your own beans with 'defined' to keep things organized.
• A better getting-started experience for projects initialized with Spring Initializr
• Maven and Gradle improvements in Java Project Explorer 

It comes as no surprise then that Microsoft is pushing its tools in the Java direction, since yes, Microsoft loves Java too!

More Information

Java on Visual Studio Code Update – October 2022

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