Swan Lake Alpha3

Overview of Ballerina Swan Lake Alpha3

The Ballerina Swan Lake Alpha3 release includes the language features planned for the Ballerina Swan Lake release. Moreover, this release includes improvements and bug fixes to the compiler, runtime, standard library, and developer tooling. This release note lists only the features and updates added after the Alpha2 release of Ballerina Swan Lake.

Updating Ballerina
- For Existing Users
- For New Users
What is New in Ballerina Swan Lake Alpha3

Updating Ballerina

If you are already using Ballerina, you can directly update your distribution to Ballerina Swan Lake Alpha3 using the Ballerina update tool. To do this, first, execute the command below to get the update tool updated to its latest version.

bal update

If you are using an update tool version below 0.8.14, execute the ballerina update command to update it. Next, execute the command below to update to Swan Lake Alpha3.

bal dist pull slalpha3

Installing Ballerina

If you are a new user, then download the installers to install.

What is new in Ballerina Swan Lake Alpha3

Language

Support for module-level variables with list, mapping, and error binding patterns

Variable declarations with list, mapping, or error binding patterns are now allowed at the module level. Unlike simple variables, these variables must be initialized in the declaration.

Also, these variable declarations cannot contain the isolated or configurable qualifier.

type Person record {|
    string name;
    boolean married;
|};

function getList() returns [int, float] => [1, 2.5];

function getPerson() returns Person => {name: "John", married: true};

function getError() returns error => error("error message", code = 1001, fatal = true);

// Module-level variable declaration with a list binding pattern. 
[int, float] [a, b] = getList();

// Module-level variable declaration with a mapping binding pattern.
Person {name: firstName, married: isMarried} = getPerson();

// Module-level variable declaration with an error binding pattern.
error error(message, code = errCode) = getError();

Support for module-level public variables

Module-level variables can now be declared as public using the public qualifier. Such variables will be visible outside the modules in which they are declared.

Isolated variables and variables declared with var cannot be declared as public variables.

public string name = "Ballerina";

public [int, float] [a, b] = [1, 2.5];

Improvement to annotation attachment with empty mapping constructor expression

If the type of the annotation is a mapping type for which an empty mapping constructor is valid, the mapping constructor expression is no longer mandatory in the annotation attachment.

The absence of the mapping constructor expression in such an annotation attachment is equivalent to specifying a mapping constructor expression with no fields.

type Annot record {|
    int[] i = [];
|};

public annotation Annot v1 on function;

@v1 // Same as `@v1 {}`
public function main() {
}

Introduction of the `function` function type descriptor to represent any function

A new function type descriptor has been introduced to represent all function values.

import ballerina/io;

function add(int v1, int v2) returns int => v1 + v2;

function compare(int v1, int v2) returns boolean => v1 < v2;

public function main() {
    // A variable of type `function` can hold any function value.
    function f = add;
    io:println("Process (add, 1, 2): ", process(f, 1, 2)); // Prints `Process (add, 1, 2): 3`
    io:println("Process (compare, 1, 2): ", process(compare, 1, 2)); // Prints `Process (compare, 1, 2): 0`
}

function process(function func, int v1, int v2) returns int {
    // A function of type `function` cannot be called directly.
    // A function value assigned to a `function`-typed variable
    // can only be called after the type is narrowed to the relevant type.
    if (func is function (int, int) returns int) {
        return func(v1, v2);
    }
    return 0;
}

New lang library functions

New `xml:text()` function

This function can be used to select all the items in a sequence that are of type xml:Text.

xml name = xml `<name>Dan<middleName>Gerhard</middleName><!-- This is a comment -->Brown</name>`;
xml:Text nameText = (name/*).text();
io:println(nameText); // "DanBrown"

Bug fixes

To view bug fixes, see the GitHub milestone for Swan Lake Alpha3.

Runtime

New runtime Java API to create errors

A new runtime Java API is introduced to create errors.

BError createError(Module module, String errorTypeName, BString message, BError cause, Object details)

The createDistinctError API has been deprecated and should not be used to create distinct errors. The new createError API can be used instead.

Bug fixes

To view bug fixes, see the GitHub milestone for Swan Lake Alpha3.

Standard library

Log package updates

Introduced additional log levels and log functions

Introduced 2 additional log levels: DEBUG and WARN. The printDebug and printWarn functions in the ballerina/log module can be used to publish logs at the respective log levels. The print function was renamed to printInfo.

To set the global log level, place the entry given below in the Config.toml file:

[ballerina.log] 
level = "[LOG_LEVEL]"

Each module can also be assigned its own log level. To assign a log level to a module, provide the following entry in the Config.toml file:

[[log.modules]] 
name = "[ORG_NAME]/[MODULE_NAME]"
level = "[LOG_LEVEL]"

OS package updates

Removed the exec function.

Task package updates

The module has been revamped by removing the Scheduler and Listener classes and introducing the following functions to schedule and manage the job either one-time or periodically.

Configures the scheduler worker pool with the worker count and max waiting time.

import ballerina/task;

task:Error? output = task:configureWorkerPool(6, 7000);

Schedules the job at a specified time.

import ballerina/task;
import ballerina/time;

class MyJob {
   *task:Job;

   public function execute() {
       // logic goes here
   }
}

time:ZoneOffset zoneOffset = {hours: 5, minutes: 30};
time:Civil time = {
    year: 2021,
    month: 4,
    day: 12,
    hour: 23,
    minute: 20,
    second: 50.52,
    timeAbbrev: "Asia/Colombo",
    utcOffset: zoneOffset
};
task:Error|task:JobId id = task:scheduleOneTimeJob(new MyJob(), time);

Schedules the recurring job according to the given duration.

import ballerina/task;

class MyJob {
   *task:Job;

   public function execute() {
       // logic goes here
   }
}
task:Error|task:JobId id = task:scheduleJobRecurByFrequency(new MyJob(), 1);

Unschedules the particular job.

import ballerina/task;

task:Error? result = task:unscheduleJob(id);

Pauses all the jobs.

import ballerina/task;

task:Error? result = task:pauseAllJobs();

Resumes all the jobs.

import ballerina/task;

task:Error? result = task:resumeAllJobs();

Pauses the particular job.

import ballerina/task;

task:Error? result = task:pauseJob(id);

Resumes the particular job.

import ballerina/task;

task:Error? result = task:resumeJob(id);

Gets all the running jobs.

import ballerina/task;

task:JobId[] jobIds = task:getRunningJobs();

Time package updates

Revamped the entire time package as follows:

Introduced the time:Utc record to represent the UTC timestamp.
Introduced the time:Civil record to represent the localized time.
Added necessary APIs to do time generation, manipulations, and conversions.

Steps for migration from the previous version to the current version are listed in this issue.

Cache package updates

Introduced the new EvictionPolicy configuration to set the eviction policy in the CacheConfig record.

The EvictionPolicy record has been introduced with the option LRU as the module only supports the LRU eviction policy to evict the cache data when the cache is full.

Removed the AbstractEvictionPolicy object type.

This object type had the common APIs for the cache eviction functionalities to implement a custom eviction policy. It has been removed with the introduction of the above configuration.

New `xmldata` package

A new module is added to convert data in XML format to JSON format and vice-versa.

Converts a JSON object to an XML representation.

import ballerina/xmldata;

json data = {
    name: "John",
    age: 30
};
xml|xmldata:Error x = xmldata:fromJson(data);

Converts an XML value to its JSON representation.

import ballerina/xmldata;

json|xmldata:Error j = xmldata:toJson(xml `foo`);

Removed `jsonutils`, `xmlutils`, `runtime`, and `reflect` packages

The jsonutils, xmlutils, runtime, and reflect packages were removed from Standard Libraries.

The XML/JSON conversation APIs in jsonutils and xmltutils packages are now supported by the xmldata package.

HTTP package updates

Changed the return types of the client methods to depend on the targetType argument. The default targetType is http:Response.

ttp:Client myClient = check new ("http://localhost:9090”);
ttp:Response response = check myClient->post("/backend/getResponse", "want response");
son jsonPayload = check myClient->post("/backend/getJson", "want json", targetType = json);
ml xmlPayload = check myClient->post("/backend/getXml", "want xml", targetType = xml);

Introduced a header map as an optional argument for non-entity-body client remote methods (GET, HEAD, OPTIONS).

http:Client myClient = check new ("http://localhost:9090”);
map<string|string[]> accHeaders = { "Accept" : "application/json" };
var response = myclient->get("/some/endpoint", accHeaders);

Introduced header map and media type as optional arguments for entity-body client remote methods (POST, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, EXECUTE).

http:Client myClient = check new ("http://localhost:9090”);
json payload = {}; 
map<string|string[]> accHeaders = { "Accept" : "application/json" };
var response = myclient->post("/some/endpoint", payload, headers = accHeaders);

Improved the data types of outbound request/response payloads which can be set directly.

type RequestMessage Request|string|xml|json[]|byte[]|int|float|decimal|boolean|map<json>|table<map<json>>|
                      table<map<json>>[]|mime:Entity[]|stream<byte[], io:Error>|();

type ResponseMessage Response|string|xml|json[]|byte[]|int|float|decimal|boolean|map<json>|table<map<json>>|
                      table<map<json>>[]|mime:Entity[]|stream<byte[], io:Error>|();

Marked HTTP client remote methods as isolated.
Introduced module error inheritance and remove error union types.

WebSocket package updates

Introduced auth support for the WebSocket client. The bearer token, Basic Auth, JWT, and OAuth2 support have been introduced with the WebSocket client declarative authentication.
Introduced HTTP cookie support for the WebSocket client.

http:Cookie cookie = new ("username", "name");
http:Cookie[] httpCookies = [cookie];

websocket:ClientConfiguration clientConf = {
  cookies: httpCookies
};

websocket:Client wsClient = check new ("ws://localhost:21316/ws", config = clientConf);

Made the websocket:Caller optional in WebSocket service remote functions.
Introduced support to send text, binary, and pong messages by returning them from the remote methods. Text/binary data can now be sent to the peer by returning a string or a byte[] value from the onTextMessage and onBinaryMessage remote methods. Also, a pong frame can be sent to the peer by returning a byte[] value from the onPing remote method.

remote function onTextMessage(string text) returns string {
    return "Hello World!";
}

remote function onPing(byte[] pingData) returns byte[] {
    return pingData;
}

Removed the support for the websocket:AsyncClient.

GraphQL package updates

Added the support for hierarchical resource paths. The Ballerina GraphQL resources now can have hierarchical resource paths. Each intermediate resource path then maps to a new type in the generated schema.

import ballerina/graphql;

service /graphql on new Listener(9104) {
   isolated resource function get profile/name/first() returns string {
       return "Sherlock";
   }

   isolated resource function get profile/name/last() returns string {
       return "Holmes";
   }

   isolated resource function get profile/age() returns int {
       return 40;
   }
}

Supported resource functions to return optional types.

The Ballerina GraphQL resources now can return optional types.

resource function get profile/name/first(int id) returns string? {
    if id == 0 {
        return "sherlock";
    }
}

Email package updates

Enabled read/listen for multiple emails in a single TCP connection.

Each POP3 or IMAP client/listener creation initiates the connection. Then, the email sending, receiving, or listening operations can be performed many times. Finally, the client/listener has to be closed.

POP3 client example

email:PopClient popClient = check new ("pop.email.com", "reader@email.com","pass456");
email:Message? emailResponse = check popClient->receiveMessage();
check popClient->close();

A similar format is used in the IMAP client.

POP3 service example

service object {} emailObserver = service object {
   remote function onMessage(Message emailMessage) {

   }

   remote function onError(Error emailError) {

   }

   remote function onClose(Error? closeError) {

   }

};

Note how the close() method calls the onClose method in the service.

Made email body a mandatory field in sendEmail method API.
Renamed email sending method names removing Email in each of them Renamed sendEmail as send, sendEmailMessage as sendMessage, receiveEmailMessage as receiveMessage and onEmailMessage as onMessage.
Set the default from address of the email:Message record from the SmtpClient authentication field, username. Earlier, the username for authentication was decoupled from the message data. Now, the from field is made optional and the default value will be set from the username.
Made POP3 and IMAP clients as blocking clients by providing an optional timeout argument. The time unit is in seconds and the data type is decimal. The default value is 0 in which the inbuilt polling interval is 100 milliseconds. A sample client code is as follows.

email:Message|email:Error? email = popClient->receiveMessage(timeout = 2);

In the PopListener and ImapListener configurations, the polling interval is not set with the decimal type in seconds to the pollingInterval field, which was earlier named as pollingIntervalInMillis.
Renamed the email:SmtpConfig, email:PopConfig, email:ImapConfig, email:PopListenerConfig, and email:ImapListenerConfiguration as email:SmtpConfiguration, email:PopConfiguration, email:ImapConfiguration, email:PopListenerConfiguration, and email:ImapListenerConfiguration respectively.
Removed the cronExpression field from the email:ImapListenerConfig and email:PopListenerConfig.
Made the body field of the send method mandatory in the email:SmtpClient.

WebSub package updates

Introduced a websub-listener configuration for the websub-listener.

import ballerina/websub;

websub:ListenerConfiguration configs = {
    		secureSocket: {
        		key: {
            		certFile: "../resource/path/to/public.crt", 
                    keyFile: "../resource/path/to/private.key"
        		}
    		}    
    // any additional configurations related to http-listener 
};

service /subscriber on new websub:Listener(9090, configs) {
   // resources
}

WebSubHub package updates

Included HTTP Headers parameter into the WebSub Hub API.

import ballerina/websubhub;
import ballerina/http;

listener websubhub:Listener hubListener = new(9095);

service /websubhub on new websubhub:Listener(9090) {
    remote function onRegisterTopic(TopicRegistration message, http:Headers requestHeaders)
                                returns TopicRegistrationSuccess|TopicRegistrationError {
		return {};
    }
    // http:Headers parameter will be an optional parameter for all the API endpoints
}

Introduced pre-initialized constant responses to be used in the websubhub:Service implementation.

import ballerina/websubhub;

service /websubhub on new websubhub:Listener(9090) {

    remote function onRegisterTopic(websubhub:TopicRegistration message)
                                returns websubhub:TopicRegistrationSuccess {
        log:print("Received topic-registration request ", message = message);
        return websubhub:TOPIC_REGISTRATION_SUCCESS;
    }

    // implement other service methods
}

Initializing the websubhub:HubClient with the client configurations.

import ballerina/websubhub;

websubhub:ClientConfiguration config = {
    retryConfig: {
        interval: 3,
            count: 3,
            backOffFactor: 2.0,
            maxWaitInterval: 20,
            statusCodes: [500]
        },
        timeout: 2
    };

HubClient hubClientEP = check new(subscriptionMsg, config);

websubhub:ContentDistributionMessage msg = {content: "This is sample content delivery"};

var publishResponse = hubClientEP->notifyContentDistribution(msg);

Introduced the websubhub-listener configuration to configure a websubhub listener.

import ballerina/websubhub;

websubhub:ListenerConfiguration configs = {
    		secureSocket: {
        			key: {
            			certFile: "../resource/path/to/public.crt", 
keyFile: "../resource/path/to/private.key"
        			}
    		}
    
    	// any additional configurations related to http-listener 
};

service /hub on new websubhub:Listener(9090, configs) {
    		// resources
}

Security updates

Renamed the ballerina/encoding module as ballerina/url and updated the APIs.

import ballerina/url;

string|url:Error encoded = url:encode("http://localhost:9090", "UTF-8");
string|url:Error decoded = url:decode("http%3A%2F%2Flocalhost%3A9090", "UTF-8");

The Ballerina HTTP listener can be configured to authenticate and authorize the inbound requests with a Basic Auth file user store.
Improved client and listener SecureSocket APIs of HTTP, gRPC, WebSocket, GraphQL, WebSub, WebSubHub, TCP, Email, NATS, STAN, and RabbitMQ modules.

public type ListenerSecureSocket record {|
   crypto:KeyStore|CertKey key;
   record {|
       VerifyClient verifyClient = REQUIRE;
       crypto:TrustStore|string cert;
   |} mutualSsl?;
   record {|
       Protocol name;
       string[] versions = [];
   |} protocol?;
   record {|
       CertValidationType type = OCSP_STAPLING;
       int cacheSize;
       decimal cacheValidityPeriod;
   |} certValidation?;
   string[] ciphers = [];
   boolean shareSession = true;
   decimal handshakeTimeout?;
   decimal sessionTimeout?;
|};

public type ClientSecureSocket record {|
   boolean enable = true;
   crypto:TrustStore|string cert?;
   crypto:KeyStore|CertKey key?;
   record {|
       Protocol name;
       string[] versions = [];
   |} protocol?;
   record {|
       CertValidationType type = OCSP_STAPLING;
       int cacheSize;
       decimal cacheValidityPeriod;
   |} certValidation?;
   string[] ciphers?;
   boolean verifyHostName = true;
   boolean shareSession = true;
   decimal handshakeTimeout?;
   decimal sessionTimeout?;
|};

public type CertKey record {|
   string certFile;
   string keyFile;
   string keyPassword?;
|};
 
public enum VerifyClient {
   REQUIRE,
   OPTIONAL
}
 
public enum Protocol {
   SSL,
   TLS,
   DTLS
}
 
public enum CertValidationType {
   OCSP_CRL,
   OCSP_STAPLING
}

Improved the SecureSocket configuration of the JDK11 client of the JWT and OAuth2 modules.
Added support for OAuth2 client authentication of the JDK11 client, which is used to call an authorization endpoint.

TCP package updates

Introduced SSL/TLS support for both the client and listener.

import ballerina/tcp;

public function main() returns error? {
    tcp:Client socketClient = check new ("localhost", 9002, secureSocket = {
        cert: "../resource/path/to/public.crt",
        protocol: {
            name: tcp:TLS,
            versions: ["TLSv1.2", "TLSv1.1"]
        },
        ciphers: ["TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA"]
    });

    string msg = "Hello Ballerina Echo from secure client";
    byte[] msgByteArray = msg.toBytes();
    check socketClient->writeBytes(msgByteArray);

    readonly & byte[] receivedData = check socketClient->readBytes();

    check socketClient->close();
}

import ballerina/tcp;
import ballerina/io;

tcp:ListenerSecureSocket listenerSecureSocket = {
    key: {
        certFile: "../resource/path/to/public.crt",
        keyFile: "../resource/path/to/private.key"
    },
    protocol: {
        name: tcp:TLS,
        versions: ["TLSv1.2", "TLSv1.1"]
    },
    ciphers: ["TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA"]
}

service on new tcp:Listener(9002, secureSocket = listenerSecureSocket) {

    isolated remote function onConnect(tcp:Caller caller) returns tcp:ConnectionService {
        io:println("Client connected to secureEchoServer: ", caller.remotePort);
        return new EchoService(caller);
    }
}

service class EchoService {
  
    remote function onBytes(readonly & byte[] data) returns (readonly & byte[])|tcp:Error? {
        io:println("Echo: ", 'string:fromBytes(data));
        return data;
    }
}

Included a tcp:Caller as an optional parameter in the onBytes() method.

service class EchoService {
  
    remote function onBytes(tcp:Caller caller, readonly & byte[] data) returns (readonly & byte[])|tcp:Error? {
        io:println("Echo: ", 'string:fromBytes(data));
        check caller->writeBytes(data);
    }
}

Renamed tcp:ListenerConfig and tcp:ClientConfig to tcp:ListenerConfiguration and tcp:ClientConfiguration

UDP package updates

Renamed udp:ListenerConfig and udp:ClientConfig to udp:ListenerConfiguration and udp:ClientConfiguration

Kafka package updates

Renamed the sendProducerRecord function in the client object Producer to send.
Renamed the flushRecords function in the client object Producer to ’flush.
Replaced the kafka:ConsumerError and kafka:ProducerError with kafka:Error.

NATS package updates

Renamed the ConnectionConfig record to ConnectionConfiguration.
Included url as a field in the ConnectionConfiguration record.
Changed the ConnectionConfiguration in the client and listener init functions to an included record parameter. This allows the record field values to be passed as named parameters.

STAN package updates

Renamed the StreamingConfig record to StreamingConfiguration.
Included the url as a field in the StreamingConfiguration record.
Changed the StreamingConfiguration in the client and listener init functions to an included record parameter. This allows the record field values to be passed as named parameters.

RabbitMQ package updates

Renamed the ConnectionConfig record to ConnectionConfiguration.

Common standard library updates

All the timeout configurations are converted to accept decimal values and the time unit is in seconds.

Code to Cloud

Removed Docker annotation support.

Bug fixes

To view bug fixes, see the GitHub milestone for Swan Lake Alpha3.

Ballerina packages

Introduced local repository support

Apart from the Ballerina Central remote repository, you can now push packages to the local repository which can be found at <user-home>/.ballerina/repositories/local. Refer to the section on changes to CLI commands for information regarding pushing to the local repository.
To use a package from the local repository, the 'repository' has to be specified in the TOML table of the relevant dependency in the Dependencies.toml file.

E.g., to test a developed package before pushing it to Ballerina Central, build and push it to the local repository using the push command and add it to the Dependencies.toml file of the depending package as shown below.

[[dependency]]
org = "ballerinax"
name = "googleapis_sheets"
version = "1.0.0"
repository = "local"

Developer tools

CLI

Changes to CLI commands

Build and test commands
- Support for providing [(--key=value)...] is removed from bal build.
Run command
- Providing the project path to the run command is now optional. The default source root is the present working directory similar to how the build command works.
- Program arguments should be followed by the end-of-options delimiter --.
New and init commands
- Introduced creation of the Pacakge.md file for a library template. Passing the --template lib flag will create the Package.md file in addition to the Ballerina.toml file and the source BAL files.
Push command
- Introduced pushing to the local repository. Passing --repository=local will push the Ballerina archive (.bala) to the local repository. For information about local repository support, see the Ballerina Packages Changelist.
Run bal help <command> to get more information on the command changes.

CLI Auto-Completion

Installing On Linux Bash

Set up auto-completion in the current bash shell.

source <(bal completion bash)

Set up auto-completion permanently in the bash shell.

echo "source <(bal completion bash)" >> ~/.bashrc

Installing On Mac Bash

Set up auto-completion permanently in the bash shell.

echo "$(bal completion bash)" >> ~/.bash_profile

Test framework

Moved the Project Test Suite execution to a single JVM. Changed from running each Test Suite in a JVM instance. This improves the user experience when debugging tests. It no longer prompts to debug each test suite of a project.
Support for seamless integration of CICD tools by adding inbuilt path fixes to the JaCoCo XML generated for Ballerina packages.

Debugger

Added conditional breakpoint support. (Conditional expressions can now be configured for Ballerina breakpoints in the Visual Studio Code Debug view).
Added support to configure environment variables in the launch mode.
Added expression evaluation support for type cast expressions.

OpenAPI

Added JSON file generation support to the Ballerina to OpenAPI command.

bal openapi -i <ballerina file> --json

Added improvements for handling the Ballerina resource method response type in the OpenAPI to Ballerina command.

Bindgen tool

Improved the generated bindings with the use of distinct type classes.
Improved the internal mechanism used to generate the bindings. Previous handlebars-based implementation is now changed to a syntax-tree-based implementation.

Documentation

Moved the standard library API documentation out to Ballerina Central Docs from the Ballerina Website.

Language Server

The Ballerina Language Server now supports telemetry-based crash reporting. This was enabled through the LSP protocol's telemetry events. If you wish to disable Ballerina Telemetry, uncheck the Ballerina: Enable Telemetry setting from VSCode.

To view bug fixes, see the GitHub milestone for Swan Lake Alpha3.

Ballerina Shell

The Ballerina Shell now supports redefining module-level definitions and variable declarations.

=$ int i = 3;
=$ string j = "Hi";
=$ string i = "Hello";  // Same variable can be redefined

A new /remove command has been introduced to be used from within the Ballerina Shell to remove one or more declarations from the snippet memory.

=$ int i = 3;
=$ string j = "Hi";
=$ /remove i j
=$ i
| error: undefined symbol 'i'
|       i
|       ^
| Compilation aborted due to errors.

Ballerina Shell can now load definitions and declarations from a file. The file to load from can be specified using the -f or --file command-line options when launching the Ballerina Shell. Alternatively, the /file command can also be used for this purpose from within the Shell.

$ bal shell -f my_file.bal

The --force-dumb command-line option will now have only a long option and the short option -f is now used to load from a file.

The Ballerina Shell now supports cyclic type definitions and list binding patterns.
The Ballerina Shell now preserves qualifiers such as the final qualifier of a variable declaration.

Debugger

Now, the debugger supports conditional breakpoints. Conditional expressions can be configured for Ballerina breakpoints in the VSCode debug view.

Breaking changes

== and != equality expressions can no longer be used with variables of type readonly.
Implicit conversion from xml:Text to string is no longer supported.

Swan Lake release notes

Swan Lake Update 10

Swan Lake Update 9

Swan Lake Update 8

Swan Lake Update 7

Swan Lake Update 6

Swan Lake Update 5

Swan Lake Update 4

Swan Lake Update 3

Swan Lake Update 2

Swan Lake Update 1

Swan Lake

Swan Lake Beta

Swan Lake Alpha

Swan Lake Preview

1.2.x release notes

1.1.x release notes

1.0.x. release notes

0.9.x release notes

Swan Lake Alpha3

Overview of Ballerina Swan Lake Alpha3

Updating Ballerina

Installing Ballerina

What is new in Ballerina Swan Lake Alpha3

Language

Support for module-level variables with list, mapping, and error binding patterns

Support for module-level public variables

Improvement to annotation attachment with empty mapping constructor expression

Introduction of the function function type descriptor to represent any function

New lang library functions

New xml:text() function

Bug fixes

Runtime

New runtime Java API to create errors

Bug fixes

Standard library

Log package updates

Introduced additional log levels and log functions

OS package updates

Task package updates

Time package updates

Cache package updates

New xmldata package

Removed jsonutils, xmlutils, runtime, and reflect packages

HTTP package updates

WebSocket package updates

GraphQL package updates

Email package updates

WebSub package updates

WebSubHub package updates

Security updates

TCP package updates

UDP package updates

Kafka package updates

NATS package updates

STAN package updates

RabbitMQ package updates

Common standard library updates

Code to Cloud

Bug fixes

Ballerina packages

Introduced local repository support

Developer tools

CLI

Changes to CLI commands

Test framework

Debugger

OpenAPI

Bindgen tool

Documentation

Language Server

Ballerina Shell

Debugger

Breaking changes

Introduction of the `function` function type descriptor to represent any function

New `xml:text()` function

New `xmldata` package

Removed `jsonutils`, `xmlutils`, `runtime`, and `reflect` packages