For a very long time now, I have been able to explain and separate the concepts of the jdk and the JRE quite succinctly. The jdk was for developers and you only need it if you plan on developing, where is the JRE is essentially the resources associated with the Java virtual machine, which is needed by anyone wanting to run Java regardless of whether they are a developer or not.
Now, everywhere I read, people are telling others that they don't need a JRE, and that the jdk includes everything that is necessary. So, my initial thought is that the virtual machine and all the required libraries to run Java come with the jdk. That's fine.
However, I'm having difficulty understanding what a regular user experiences then. I have seen on my own devices updates to Java in the notification area, and I know tons of people who run Java on their computers and other devices that are not developers.
That being said, what exactly are they updating now if there is no JRE? They have to have a Java virtual machine on their machine in order to run Java, correct? Does the new virtual machine run software that is written with jdk 12? Specifically, I'll assume it has to work with openjdk 12?
These changes are a little bit confusing, so I'm trying to find out if any of you might have some information about them.
Thanks!