I thought the Java edition of Minecraft was functionally dead as far as updates and support go. Have reports of its death been greatly exaggerated?
There is a lot of open source activity surrounding Minecraft, such as the Fabric, Forge, PaperMC, Sodium, and Modrinth projects. Most of this keeps up with the latest version of Minecraft Java edition, but some are still stuck behind playing 1.7, 1.8, 1.12, 1.16, etc due to mods that only existed on old versions.
Bedrock and Java edition are not interoperable, they have different save formats and multiplayer protocols. But there is a decent compatibility layer called GeyserMC that allows bedrock clients connecting to Java edition servers. It's a surprisingly polished experience but does cause bugs and incompatibilities.