Difference between Groovy Binary and Source release

Question

i have been seeing the words binary and source release in many websites download sections    What do they  actually mean    For example  I have seen this in Groovy download page    My question is how they differ  Both tend to install Groovy  but what s the main difference

User · Answer

Binary releases contain computer readable version of the application  meaning it is compiled  Source releases contain human readable version of the application  meaning it has to be compiled before it can be used

User · Answer

The source release is the raw  uncompiled code  You could read it yourself  To use it  it must be compiled on your machine  Binary means the code was compiled into a machine language format that the computer can read  then execute  No human can understand the binary file unless its been dissected  or opened with some program that let s you read the executable as code

User · Answer

A source release will be compiled on your own machine while a binary release must match your operating system   source releases are more common on linux systems because linux systems can dramatically vary in cpu  installed library versions  kernelversions and nearly every linux system has a compiler installed   binary releases are common on ms-windows systems  most windows machines do not have a compiler installed

[groovy] Difference between Groovy Binary and Source release?

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