Javadoc generic type parameters

While looking at the new NavigableSet interface introduced into JDK 6 (Mustang), I noticed this in the class javadocs:

 * @param <E> the type of elements maintained by this set
 * @since 1.6
 */
public interface NavigableSet<E> extends SortedSet<E> {

Well, that is new. I've not seen a generic type parameter used with the @param tag before.

Looking at the documentation for Javadoc 1.5, apparently this feature has been around since generics started.

A quick comparison between the sources of java.util.Set for JDK 5 and JDK 6 shows that Sun has added @param tags to the generic collection classes in Mustang.

Unfortunately, IntelliJ IDEA 6.0 beta does not show these class generic tags in the class quickdocs, which is why I never noticed them before. Hopefully JetBrains fixes this at some point.

On the flip side, the JDK 6 javadoc tool does handle the tags. Witness java.util.Set for Mustang.