The Java Virtual Machine Specification, Java SE 7 Edition

Written by the inventors of the technology, The Java® Virtual Machine Specification, Java SE 7 Edition, is the definitive technical reference for the Java Virtual Machine.

The book provides complete, accurate, and detailed coverage of the Java Virtual Machine. It fully describes the invokedynamic instruction and method handle mechanism added in Java SE 7, and gives the formal Prolog specification of the type-checking verifier introduced in Java SE 6. The book also includes the class file extensions for generics and annotations defined in Java SE 5.0, and aligns the instruction set and initialization rules with the Java Memory Model.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1. Introduction
Chapter 2. The Structure of the Java Virtual Machine
Chapter 3. Compiling for the Java Virtual Machine
Chapter 4. The class File Format
Chapter 5. Loading, Linking, and Initializing
Chapter 6. The Java Virtual Machine Instruction Set
Chapter 7. Opcode Mnemonics by Opcode