Differences between JDK and Java SDK

From this wikipedia entry:

The JDK is a subset of what is loosely defined as a software development kit (SDK) in the general sense. In the descriptions which accompany their recent releases for Java SE, EE, and ME, Sun acknowledge that under their terminology, the JDK forms the subset of the SDK which is responsible for the writing and running of Java programs. The remainder of the SDK is composed of extra software, such as Application Servers, Debuggers, and Documentation.

The "extra software" seems to be Glassfish, MySQL, and NetBeans. This page gives a comparison of the various packages you can get for the Java EE SDK.

Yes, there is a difference between the SDK and the JDK. Most of people forget that Java Platform is not only used to develop programs in Java language. The JVM supports some other languages also.Thus, making it clear, the SDK is the generic bundle of software that supports software creation in a variety of languages like Clojure, Groovy, Scala, JRuby, and others.The JDK is the specific bundle to develop software in Java language, containing all Java standard API to do so.(I hope I've explaned it well, since I actually do not speak english)

JDK is the SDK for Java.

SDK stands for 'Software Development Kit', a developers tools that enables one to write the code with more more ease, effectiveness and efficiency.SDKs come for various languages. They provide a lot of APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) that makes the programmer's work easy.

The SDK for Java is called as JDK, the Java Development Kit.So by saying SDK for Java you are actually referring to the JDK.

Assuming that you are new to Java, there is another term that you'll come across- JRE, the acronym for Java Runtime Environment.JRE is something that you need when you try to run software programs written in Java.

Java is a platform independent language. The JRE runs the JVM, the Java Virtual Machine, that enables you to run the software on any platform for which the JVM is available.