Gosling on Opening Java

An anonymous reader writes "It sounds like James Gosling's nudging Sun closer and closer toward open-sourcing Java, as requested variously by IBM, Eric S. Raymond, and Richard Stallman, though not by JBoss's Marc Fleury. 'Developers value Java's cross platform interoperability and reliability,' Gosling writes, adding 'If we do something to make Java even more open-source than it is already, having safeguards to protect the developer community will be something we pay a lot of attention to.' Surprisingly, 'the creator of the Java programming language,' as Sun usually calls him, seems to be at odds on this issue with his own CEO, Scott McNealy. So, who should have custody of the child, the father...or the boss?"

Comments

Well, legally...

[Anonymous Coward]

The boss. They paid him for his work, so it is there's to do with as they please.

Re:Well, legally...

[The_Mystic_For_Real]

Actually, this was what the copyright ;aws were designed for. Just because you pay someone for something does not mean you own all rights to it. Think of every closed source program ever. The employee might still own it, though it is rare an employee will copyright it as opposed to the company doing it. Also, many employees have to sign a contract to say that anything they produce belongs to the company.

Re:Well, legally...

[generic-man]

Copyright law defines something as a work for hire if it was produced by an individual at the request of a company. All rights to a work for hire are retained by the company who paid for the work to be created.

Most of the employee contracts are supplemental to this definition. Many companies claim all rights to works created by employees without the explicit request of the company, as well.

Re:Well, legally...

[Feren]

[Also, many employees have to sign a contract to say that anything they produce belongs to the company.]

It's been standard operating procedure for years for most companies to have any employee who might even touch programming sign such a waiver/contract that gives all rights to the employer. Even some of the higher education systems (what we traditionally viewed as a bastion of free innovation because of projects like those put out by Berkely, etc) are taking on this practice. It's gotten to be a very dog-eat-dog world out there and everyone's looking to keep their cards close to the vest in hopes of gaining an edge over their competitors.

On the other hand it's generally a smart move on the employer's part to weigh the advice of the creator when they're about to do something with the project that the creator feels strongly about. They may not agree and ultimately they may not act on the employee's advice, but it's good form and wise business practice to at least listen to his or her opinion. Every once in a while these folks have an idea what they're talking about and it makes the employee feel as if his input is valued, meaning the company is less likely to lose a valuable resource.

Re:Well, legally...

[ron_ivi]

Parent wrote: "The boss. They paid him for his work, so it is there's to do with as they please."

Which boss? And no, bosses can't always "do as they please" (Tyco). They have fiduciary responsibilities to make responsible decisions.

Also, bosses can delegate authority.
Just as the shareholders delegates some responsibility to the board, and
just as the board deligates some responsibility to the executives,
a high-level exec delegates some responsibility to middle level execs.

Ultimatelly, they should be accountable to the shareholders - but where the chain of deletaing authority for software licensing stops probably depends on the management chain in place. There's no reason why this decision couldn't be delegated to a software-strategy person in some companies and be a board-level decision in others.

IMHO a CEO _should_ delegate domain-specific decisions to the most qualified person (and I'm just speaking hypothetically, not about java/gpl now). Not sure about "Legally", though - somone else will say if a CEO has a fiduciary responsibility to delegate such decisions or not.

Re:Well, legally...

[persaud]

Depends on state employment law. California is an at-will employment state, which means your employer has no ownership of work produced on your own equipment and your own time (you of course have to honor confidentiality and non-compete agreements).

This means you can be fired at any time or quit at any time. It also permits switching between headhunters whose contracts explicitly prohibit such switching. State law trumps the letter of any contract. But maintaining the spirit of fair employment contracts is in the interest of all parties.

Re:Well, legally...

[xero314]

Contrary to popular belief there does not need to a contract in place for most works create by employees, at the request of an employer. Here is a quote from the U.S. Copyright Office, which does cover Sun's Java Copyrights.

• In the case of works made for hire, the employer and not the employee is considered to be the author. Section 101 of the copyright law defines a "work made for hire" as:

• * (1) a work prepared by an employee within the scope of his or her employment;

To read more go to http://www.copyright.gov/

Re:Well, legally...

[cyborch]

...it is there's...

there != their

Why open Java?

[JamesP]

Please enlighten me? Why GPL Java?

Java is pretty good right now.

Re:Why open Java?

[mindriot]

Because it would be one hell of a Free software killer application. There's so many people using Java already, and Stallman's point against Java right now is that when writing code in Java (which many do simply because it's easy and beautiful to write in Java), you create dependencies to non-Free software making it practically impossible to run an entirely Free system using such dependent Free software.

Consider this: if Java were Free, it could easily be the world's most used piece of Free software (before you say Apache or something, let's say 'most used by private persons')

You might be a troll and I did bite, but it was just too good an opportunity to point out what Freeing Java could mean.

Re:Why open Java?

[JustinXB]

I don't believe bringing Java under an open source license would advance it any way, shape, or form.

Yes, there be ports to other platforms (I'd love to see Java on *BSD). Yes, there'd be performance patches and probably security patches. But with this comes the down side to all open source projects: Fragmentation.

One of Javas goals is to provide compile-once-run-anywhere. At the moment, it does a decent job of doing this. Other platforms do this better (Read: Inferno) but Java is trying. With fragmentation, compile-once-run-anywhere disappears and would be impossible to bring back.

Let Sun has Solaris and Java. Stop trying to force them to open source their software. They already are the second largest contributor of open source software, the first being Berkeley.

Re:Why open Java?

[T-Ranger]

Open Source and GPL have very little to do with each other. GPLing something would Open Source it, but the inverse is not necessaraly true. I think that there is exactly one person who thinks that Java should be GPLd.

Re:Why open Java?

[mindriot]

s/Java/Netscape/

I'm sure people said the same thing when the Mozilla project came to life -- and see where they're standing today. Of course things might go wrong -- but we, the Free Software community, can have an influence on that. And frankly, we don't really want "forks with incompatibilities" either. I don't really think that "the end of Java" is a possibility.

Re:Why open Java?

[FuzzyBad-Mofo]

and see where they're standing today

With an incredible standards-compliant cross-platform software package that's competitive against a monopoly-backed behemoth against all odds?

Re:Why open Java?

[njcoder]

Ok, so you've pointed out how this benefits the Free software community. How would this benefit Sun?

There is nothing stopping people in the Free software community from using, Java now.

Re:Why open Java?

[Ogerman]

I think that there is exactly one person who thinks that Java should be GPLd.

As opposed to what other license? (L)GPL would probably be the best choice for Sun because it ensures that people cannot create proprietary forks (Microsoft anyone?). BSD or similar less freedom-guaranteeing licenses would be an awful choice. And if you think Java shouldn't be open source at all, well.. you're just an idiot. It's going to happen whether Sun wants it to or not. This whole discussion is only a question of whether they remain a player.

Re:Why open Java?

[Ogerman]

Yes, there be ports to other platforms (I'd love to see Java on *BSD). Yes, there'd be performance patches and probably security patches. But with this comes the down side to all open source projects: Fragmentation.

Open Source fragmentation is a myth largely propagated a certain proprietary vendor's FUD campaign. Successful open source projects simply do not fork. Why? Because there's no interest and it's way too difficult with large scale software. There is one GNOME, one KDE, one Apache, one Linux kernel, one GNU Compiler Colection, one OpenOffice, etc. Similarly, an Open Source Java would be a large project with so much momentum that any unlikely attempts to fork would be rapidly ignored and wither away. Not to mention Sun would still hold the Java trademark..

One of Javas goals is to provide compile-once-run-anywhere. At the moment, it does a decent job of doing this. Other platforms do this better (Read: Inferno) but Java is trying. With fragmentation, compile-once-run-anywhere disappears and would be impossible to bring back.

Wrong again. Open Source developers are terrifically anal about sticking to standards. You don't see a dozen different C compilers each with a slightly different dialect do you? You don't see KHTML or Mozilla trying to extend web standards do you? Even more obvious: You don't see the existing clean-room Open Source Java projects deviating from Sun's specifications do you? -- and they're not even under legal obligation!! Fact is, an Open Source Java is the only way WORA can ever hope to fully live up to its promise. (btw, that's Write Once, not Compile.. minor correction) Three reasons: 1.) more ports 2.) better quality control 3.) less Java implementations floating about, whether proprietary or open.

Let Sun has Solaris and Java. Stop trying to force them to open source their software.

Nobody's trying to force Sun to do anything. They're simply asking because it would be mutually beneficial.

Re:Why open Java?

[Ogerman]

How does BSD provide less freedom? Are we talking about freedom of the code again? I'll let you on a secret. People can have freedoms and rights. Objects and information do not have rights. People can own information and inanimate objects.

BSD does not insure that what people create and then desire to be free, remains free. There are both philosophical and commercial reasons why this "restriction" can be desireable.

And, by the way, people cannot own information. They can only be granted a temporary monopoly on the use of information within the borders of a soverign state that grants such monopoly. Big difference philosophically and legally speaking. And, in case you're wondering, this viewpoint is fully backed up by the US Constitution and legal system. It's not "GNU/Koolaid" or hippie-speak.

How do you expect Java to be open sourced without Sun's consent? It is the IP of Sun. Careful about calling people idiots when you make statements about Sun being forced to do something with their property.

Sun's Java implementations are copyrighted by Sun. Clean-room Open Source like Kaffe / GNU ClassPath are not. (and legally they're not even Java(tm) but they effectively they are) Nobody ever said anything about Sun being forced to do anything with their own code. It would, however, be mutually beneficial if they released as much as possible under a freer license instead of fighting what they cannot stop.

Open sourcing Java under any license would be a mistake. Numerous forks of the code would occur completely destroying the "write once, run anywhere" nature of java. Maybe you don't understand that not everyone runs either Linux or windows on their desktop (not to mention phones, set top boxes and PDAs).

This is 100% pure recycled FUD. Since when do large, successful Open Source projects fork? Even more so, since when do Open Source projects go against established industry specifications? If Sun GPL'ed their Java code and somebody tried to fork it to be a jerk, nobody else would pay attention. It's entirely against the community ethos to fork without significant cause or out of spite. Practically speaking, large projects have gravity regardless.

As a programmer of in-house proprietary software, I'm painfully aware of forking issues. At times we have two developers working on two future versions and releasing patches to the version in production. :D

That's not forking, it's a management problem. Forking is when somebody purposely takes all the code and runs in a different direction.

Re:Why open Java?

[JustinXB]

Open Source fragmentation is a myth largely propagated a certain proprietary vendor's FUD campaign. Successful open source projects simply do not fork. Why? Because there's no interest and it's way too difficult with large scale software. There is one GNOME, one KDE, one Apache, one Linux kernel, one GNU Compiler Colection, one OpenOffice, etc. Similarly, an Open Source Java would be a large project with so much momentum that any unlikely attempts to fork would be rapidly ignored and wither away. Not to mention Sun would still hold the Java trademark..

The Linux itself is fragmented across distros. Try taking a Red Hat binary to SuSE, there will be trouble.

There are now 3 projects who will use the X windows standards, and I can tell you there will be fragmentation. Each will try to improve it somehow and bye bye compatibilty.

There may be one GNOME and one KDE, but each use a different GUI toolkit resulting in the same effect as fragmentation.

Wrong again. Open Source developers are terrifically anal about sticking to standards. You don't see a dozen different C compilers each with a slightly different dialect do you? You don't see KHTML or Mozilla trying to extend web standards do you? Even more obvious: You don't see the existing clean-room Open Source Java projects deviating from Sun's specifications do you? -- and they're not even under legal obligation!! Fact is, an Open Source Java is the only way WORA can ever hope to fully live up to its promise. (btw, that's Write Once, not Compile.. minor correction) Three reasons: 1.) more ports 2.) better quality control 3.) less Java implementations floating about, whether proprietary or open.

GCC has it's own extensions, as does the GNU C library. Same goes for gmake. You can't compile software that use these extensions on Solaris using native compilers.

Nobody's trying to force Sun to do anything. They're simply asking because it would be mutually beneficial.

No, it would only hurt Sun and Java.

Re:Why open Java?

[doc modulo]

Satisfying the Open Source community is the only logical way to go for Sun.

Sun is a hardware company, they sell high-price, high quality servers. They sell their own processors which are incompatible with Intel.

To make everyone compatible with their servers they release the Java platform out into the world. Now everyone can run their programs on Sun hardware and hardware sales increase. As far as I know they don't make a lot of money out of software sales compared to their hardware sales.

So their strategy rests on the fact that everyone is running programs on the Java platform. Sun needs to spread Java as far and wide as possible so they get the most possible customers for their hardware.

A growing number of computer users are switching to open source/Free source, especially on the server side of the market. Open source software is going to grow bigger in the future so this group is important to have as a customer for Sun.

Here's the big one. The open source community don't want Sun to "pull a Microsoft" on them! Who's to say that when Sun has spread the Java platform everywhere, they won't abuse their position to treat users the same way Microsoft is treating it's users?

I'm not sure if Sun has completely embraced the idea of giving away the platform to increase hardware sales. They seem to want it both ways. Control of the platform as well as the increased hardware sales. I've heard people say that the Java spec can't be implemented in an open source way because of something in the license. I heard Sun was having arguments with the Blackdown team over their open source Java implementation.

Sun has blocked Microsoft from Embracing and Extending the Java platform in the past using their power over the Java platform, this was a good thing, it ensured that Java was not fragmented and stayed a powerful platform to make users compatible with their servers. However, it seems that now, Sun must let go of some of it's power to satisfy the Free Source community and keep them as hardware customers. Strenght against fragmentation is good, but letting the Java platform become a little more open doesn't have to mean that it'll become weak against attacks. As long as Sun convinces the Open Source community that it can't hijack the Java platform for evil in the future, those people will use Java. Sun doesn't have to go much farther than that in my opinion but Sun has to make it clear to everyone they ARE basically giving away java control in return for more hardware sales. That attitude has to shine through in their actions.

Then the Free source community might use Java more than mono's C#, Python, OCaml or whatever in the future. IBM sells services, Sun sells high-end hardware to more geeks, Microsoft slowly dies and everyone's happy.

Re:Why open Java?

[Quattro Vezina]

Of course, you're assuming it will be forked.

KDE and GNOME have never been forked.

GCC was forked once, as egcs, and the forks were later rejoined. It was also forked because GCC had serious problems--the fork was rejoined when GCC was effectively halted and egcs became the new official GCC.

XFree86 was forked once, and only very recently. There was also a damn good reason to start a fork--this wasn't something done on a whim.

Re:Why open Java?

[BokLM]

open source does not mean fragmentation.
Do you know php, perl and python ?
Theses are 3 languages which are Open Source projects (and they are not the only ones). Is there any fragmentation ?
Why couldn't it be the same with Java ?

Re:Why open Java?

[evilWurst]

"Open Source fragmentation is a myth largely propagated a certain proprietary vendor's FUD campaign"

Yes. A certain vendor that did itself try to fork Java, and now has a competing product that is extremely similar to Java. If Java went GPL, this company would not hesitate to muck around with it, just because they can, and the company has a history of doing anything it can to 'win'.

"Successful open source projects simply do not fork."

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. I would not expect Java to fork in the classic sense of the word (except the version that one particular company would make), but look at Linux as a whole; multiple distros out there, by companies, by individuals, by governments. That kind of "forking" alone would make it more difficult for WORA with Java; it'd increase the amount of tweaking neccessary. Every distro tweaking the JVM a little differently than the others... code then running great on some and flakey on others... well, maybe that's already true. Why make it worse, though?

And what about BSD? I'd call that successful, and it has most definitely forked. Even its forks have forked. BSD is totally forked! :) I could see the same easily happening with Java; different bright folks wanting to take it in different directions, without a leader, ending up disagreeing too strongly and going it alone. Would Sun and IBM and Microsoft and Oracle and so on always agree on the next level to take Java to? I doubt that.

For the record, I'm undecided about the opening-up of Java. I like the language, and it's the one I use the most. I'm not as against the idea as I may sound in this post.

Re:Why open Java?

[Ogerman]

The Linux itself is fragmented across distros. Try taking a Red Hat binary to SuSE, there will be trouble.

This is an improper example. Try taking some C source and compile it on both RedHat and SuSE -- same results. Fragmentation would be if RedHat or SuSE modified the Linux kernel or supporting GNU software so much that code would need significantly re-written to work.

There are now 3 projects who will use the X windows standards, and I can tell you there will be fragmentation. Each will try to improve it somehow and bye bye compatibilty.

Not even close. Read this: http://www.xouvert.org/faq.html#2.1 It should be especially noted the strong emphasis on sticking to standards. There are many X11 implementations and they are very much compatible, though some are at different levels of specification advancement.

There may be one GNOME and one KDE, but each use a different GUI toolkit resulting in the same effect as fragmentation.

This is an example of diversity, not fragmentation of an original standard. Would you say that there should only be one programming language? I should hope not. Each has its advantages. It should be noted, of course, that there is a growing movement to harmonize GNOME and KDE, but that's another topic of discussion.

GCC has it's own extensions, as does the GNU C library. Same goes for gmake. You can't compile software that use these extensions on Solaris using native compilers.

It can be easily argued that the only reason C compilers have extensions like this is because there does not exist as active a standards body as say, W3C or SCP, to recommend changes before they are tried experimentally. There are also different ISO C versions. I believe some of the GNU C "extensions" are actually part of the C99 ISO spec. Solaris's native compilers may be using an older spec, but I'm not familiar. Also, you can use the -pedantic option with gcc and it will warn you of any code that uses extensions beyond C89. There is little to make me believe a similar scenario will exist with Open Source Java. The industry has learned since C/C++ the value of creating standards early and then sticking with them. As I said, Open Source developers tend not to deviate when solid standards exist. Java is a solid standard.

No, it would only hurt Sun and Java.

How much have GNU ClassPath and the various open JVM's hurt Sun and Java? And how much have they deviated from Java specifications? The answer to both is: not at all. If Sun relaxed licensing on code for their implementations, it would only serve to promote their own over the clean-room versions.

Re:Why open Java?

[BokLM]

and why do you think it is different ?

Re:Why open Java?

[JustinXB]

This is an improper example. Try taking some C source and compile it on both RedHat and SuSE -- same results. Fragmentation would be if RedHat or SuSE modified the Linux kernel or supporting GNU software so much that code would need significantly re-written to work.

Red Hat is modifying the kernel, don't read the headlines? Although it won't effect the userland, try apply many existing patches against the existing Red hat source code. There will be problems.

Not even close. Read this: http://www.xouvert.org/faq.html#2.1 It should be especially noted the strong emphasis on sticking to standards. There are many X11 implementations and they are very much compatible, though some are at different levels of specification advancement.

We'll have to wait and see.

This is an example of diversity, not fragmentation of an original standard. Would you say that there should only be one programming language? I should hope not. Each has its advantages. It should be noted, of course, that there is a growing movement to harmonize GNOME and KDE, but that's another topic of discussion.

It's fragmentation. There's no reason why KDE couldn't have used GTK. But they didn't, and now programs are less portable.

It can be easily argued that the only reason C compilers have extensions like this is because there does not exist as active a standards body as say, W3C or SCP, to recommend changes before they are tried experimentally. There are also different ISO C versions. I believe some of the GNU C "extensions" are actually part of the C99 ISO spec. Solaris's native compilers may be using an older spec, but I'm not familiar. Also, you can use the -pedantic option with gcc and it will warn you of any code that uses extensions beyond C89.

You admit it's fragmentation, good. You're learning.

There is little to make me believe a similar scenario will exist with Open Source Java. The industry has learned since C/C++ the value of creating standards early and then sticking with them. As I said, Open Source developers tend not to deviate when solid standards exist. Java is a solid standard.

Then you're a fool. There are millions of reasons why Java will fragment if it goes open source. The C standards are solid standards, but GNU made extensions anyway. Open source developers do what they want, standards or not.

How much have GNU ClassPath and the various open JVM's hurt Sun and Java? And how much have they deviated from Java specifications? The answer to both is: not at all. If Sun relaxed licensing on code for their implementations, it would only serve to promote their own over the clean-room versions.

Open source zealots would choose an open version over Suns clean-room version. It's what you people do. Sooner or later, the Sun version isn't mainstream.

IBM, for example, could fork the code and really open up to the community. The entire open source community gets behind the IBM version and, after awhile, Sun disappears.

Re:Why open Java?

[iroberts]

Successful open source projects simply do not fork. Why? Because there's no interest and it's way too difficult with large scale software. There is one GNOME, one KDE, one Apache, one Linux kernel, one GNU Compiler Colection, one OpenOffice, etc.

Not to mention one Emacs, one XEmacs.

Re:Why open Java?

[Ogerman]

Yes. A certain vendor that did itself try to fork Java, and now has a competing product that is extremely similar to Java.

What this proves is that it doesn't take Sun Open Sourcing their own implementation for a fork to occur! And yet, the existing Open Source implementations of "Java" are not forking from the spec.

If Java went GPL, this company would not hesitate to muck around with it, just because they can, and the company has a history of doing anything it can to 'win'.

How exactly could they muck around with a GPL (or similarly licensed) Sun Java to win? They couldn't release proprietary versions. They couldn't make changes without telling everyone. They couldn't completely fork the code and still call it Java (Sun trademark). And they don't even need Java anymore since they have .NET and CLR. MS is really out of this picture. Oh, one more thing: they won't touch anything GPL with a ten foot pole because that would only further legitimize it to those on the fence.

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. I would not expect Java to fork in the classic sense of the word (except the version that one particular company would make), but look at Linux as a whole; multiple distros out there, by companies, by individuals, by governments. That kind of "forking" alone would make it more difficult for WORA with Java; it'd increase the amount of tweaking neccessary. Every distro tweaking the JVM a little differently than the others... code then running great on some and flakey on others...

Linux distros are not a proper comparison because they are a conglomeration of very diverse software. Here, we're only about talking the JVM and a set of libraries. There's no incentive to fork and any 'tweaking' would only be within the implementation of the specs. With Sun still holding the trademark, they would still be the sole source of endorsement. So "Bob's J*** Derivative" could fork and tweak to heck and back, but typically only experimenters would use it. And if they came up with something really great that SCP approved of.. cool! roll it back into the official codebase that normal people use.

well, maybe that's already true. Why make it worse, though?

Because there's virtually nothing to lose and a lot to potentially gain.

I could see the same easily happening with Java; different bright folks wanting to take it in different directions, without a leader, ending up disagreeing too strongly and going it alone. Would Sun and IBM and Microsoft and Oracle and so on always agree on the next level to take Java to? I doubt that.

Sun would still be a strong leader, even if they Open Sourced their implementations. Weak leadership or poor quality is what encourages forks. As for IBM and Oracle contributing, that's what the SCP is for. It works and is well established. Why would anyone want to diverge? All that would do is make them look bad.

For the record, I'm undecided about the opening-up of Java.

Java is already being opened-up. (http://www.kaffe.org/links.shtml) It's just a matter of how long that takes. If Sun helped out, it would happen a lot sooner and dramatically increase their influence over the whole 'open Java' scene.

Re:Why open Java?

[nathanh]

Please enlighten me? Why GPL Java? Java is pretty good right now.

A GPL Java might become a standard part of the Linux desktop (really GNOME/KDE desktop). Right now it doesn't even rate on the meter.

I can appreciate Sun's position. They want to avoid a fork and the current Java license was a good attempt. Unfortunately it's too restrictive for most Linux distros. Oh sure, I can install a free JVM like Kaffe or Jikes but nobody seriously thinks they're "there yet". And the majority of value in Java isn't the language or the JVM. The value is in the class libraries. The free class libraries definitely aren't there yet.

So I'm on Debian and I can't install a decent Java environment from the primary apt archives (only from third party apt sources). And if it's not part of the standard distribution then nobody is going to target it for their applications. I see a lot of enthusiasm for Java anyway, but it's mostly in the webspace where people are expected to be intelligent enough to download and install Sun's J2SE by themselves. Java isn't "integrated" with Linux like Perl or Python or Bash has been integrated. An open source J2SE would allow it to be a standard part of Linux, alongside Perl and Python. It doesn't have to be Sun's J2SE either, but none of the other J2SE implementations look like they'll be finished this decade, so Sun's J2SE is the only practical choice.

Think of it this way. Nobody seriously thinks that the majority of apps for a future version of GNOME will be written in C. It's hard to write C code. You have to do your own memory management. It takes a lot of skill and a lot of effort. Even the "flagship" GNOME applications like RhythmBox and Galeon have their fair share of memory leaks and segmentation faults. GNOME needs a framework and language for writing simple apps. Stuff like image viewers and music players and cheque-book balancers. Stuff that isn't performance critical. Take a look at the current apps being written for MONO, like Muine. They're written in C# and use the Sharp framework but the performance is really good. Because modern apps don't do a lot. A modern application is just glue between the underlying libraries and objects. An interpreted language like C# is fine for that.

So it must really burn Sun's boots that there is a good chance that a future version of GNOME will promote MONO for writing Linux desktop applications. Sun knows that would be the death blow for Java on the desktop. Linux and Microsoft in arms against Java, who would have imagined that would ever happen! It's in Sun's best interest to ensure that Java is the preferred applications language for the GNOME desktop. But that's never going to happen with the current license.

Re:Why open Java?

[AstroDrabb]

When your fortune 500 company standardizes it's web browser to Mozilla on the desktop, then you can come back and claim some sort of victory.

I work on back-end servers, middleware and web apps. When we develop web apps, they are standards compliant and do work on Mozilla, IE, and other browsers so there is no need to "standardize on IE". In fact, the majority of problems reported from home users have been from IE users that have had their computers taken over by spyware and the like thanks to the great security of IE. It would save most companies tons of money in support if they did "standardize" on Mozilla.

Re:Why open Java?

[Ogerman]

Red Hat is modifying the kernel, don't read the headlines? Although it won't effect the userland, try apply many existing patches against the existing Red hat source code. There will be problems.

Exactly.. won't affect userland. Which is what I was talking about. I never said distros don't patch the kernel. On the other hand, you can always plug in a virgin kernel without issue.

It's fragmentation. There's no reason why KDE couldn't have used GTK. But they didn't, and now programs are less portable.

It seems by your definition, the simultaneous existance of C, C++, and Objective-C is an example of fragmentation. If so, that's patently silly. KDE didn't choose GTK because at the time it was vastly inferior to Qt. Fragmentation would be if KDE had split off of the GNOME project.

You admit it's fragmentation, good. You're learning.

I never said that smartass. C/C++ doesn't have the level of standardization that Java does because of its history. Modern languages do and Open Source implementations of those languages are on spec with high precision.

Then you're a fool. There are millions of reasons why Java will fragment if it goes open source. The C standards are solid standards, but GNU made extensions anyway. Open source developers do what they want, standards or not.

The C/C++ standards are *now* becoming solid, but they have an enormous history of variation. Some things that are "traditional C" are not part of the ISO standard and this is why GCC supports them unless you turn off support.

Java already is going Open Source and it's not fragmenting yet. Get your head out of the sand. A forked Java is not in anyone's interests and there's nothing to suggest it will ever happen. It very easily could have by now, but it hasn't. And I'm talking about all the proprietary, non-Sun implementations even.

Open source zealots would choose an open version over Suns clean-room version. It's what you people do. Sooner or later, the Sun version isn't mainstream.

You mean: Open Source advocates will choose their own open clean-room version because its the only one they can legally redistribute and it's just as good if not better than the proprietary versions. Sun's version won't be mainstream too much longer if they don't find a way to participate in the inevitable change.

IBM, for example, could fork the code and really open up to the community. The entire open source community gets behind the IBM version and, after awhile, Sun disappears.

IBM's code is based on Sun's. They can't legally open it. Now, suppose Sun was to GPL their implementation. IBM could participate openly, but they still wouldn't fork because it would break all compatibility and everybody would cry foul.

Re:Why open Java?

[T-Ranger]

The reasons are well documented and well understood.

• The GNU docs
• (half way down) The OSIs docs on the question

.... Or do you want a different reason why the grandparent post was modded a troll? It doesnt need any better reason then that.... You yourself recogonize the topic as being "crap".

Re:Why open Java?

[Ogerman]

So under the BSD license whoever writes the line of code gets to determine whether it's free or not. That's sounds quite fair to me.

Not necessarily. It encourages proprietary free-riding on the efforts of the community rather than a healthy responsibility to give back. That's only good if you don't believe OSS is more than a toy and don't care what direction the industry goes. In the commercial realm, GPL prevents your competitors from holding back their improvements to your code, again free-riding. Thus GPL is more like a social contract than a simple give-away.

Re:Why open Java?

[the MaD HuNGaRIaN]

Have you forgotten?

Java was ALREADY forked by none other than our good friends in Redmond.

"Some vendors, notably Microsoft, have insisted on adding platform-specific features (for example, in Microsoft's case, for Windows) and Sun has reacted strongly....Sun sued and won both damages (some $20 million dollars) and a court order enforcing the terms of the license from Sun." source

And I really think this is the type of thing that would pollute the language and destroy the whole concept of the platform, and as Marc Fleury points out, Sun's oversight is really what's holding the developer community and the platform together.

Re:Why open Java?

[spectre_240sx]

But that goes for anything closed source. If Cisco goes bust, you won't get firmware upgrades.

True, but then again, you haven't put months of labor into those switches / routers, etc. either. They can be replaced if they fail, whereas a program written in a sudenly deprecated language has to be ported, meaning a lot of time and money down the drain.

Re:Why open Java?

[killjoe]

Let me.

It would help propagate java further by having it included by default in every single linux distribution.

The OSScommunity could fix some of the long standing bugs in teh JVM. The bug parade also include tons of feature requests which although very popular are not important to sun. If Java was open sourced these feature requests would be implemented and make java a better platform.

They could save money that they spending on java development now.

Last but not least. It would prevent java from becoming another cobol. Java is facing heavy competition from .NET. In a year or so parrot will come out of beta and preliminary results show that it will be faster then the JVM. If parrot fulfills it's promise (and there is no reason to think that it won't) you'll get all the advantages of the JVM while being able to use perl or python.

Parrot has the potential to be a very disruptive development for java. Sun needs to be proactive about defending against it and .NET/mono. Right now they are simply pretending that there is no threat and they can go along like they always have.

Re:Why open Java?

[t4k1s]

.Net+C# or even J# is similar enough to Java to attract former Java developers and to leverage the marketing done by Sun for Java. Sun promoted portable bytecode as being essential, JIT compiled code as being competitive with native compiled code and these same advantages Microsoft is using now to promote its .Net. So, they are actually using Sun's effort already and imho you could already consider .Net as a Java fork.

Joint Custody

[modifried]

So, who should have custody of the child, the father...or the boss?

Boss gets it on the weekends, father gets it during the week.

kudos to gosling...

[all your mwbassguy a]

...we need java to be open source, so we can fix all the flaws he left in it. i mean, no goto?!

Re:kudos to gosling...

[malakhi]

goto statements in Java are virtually useless. There are other, better ways to accomplish anything a goto statement would be used for in Java (break and continue come to mind Remember, Java is not C or C++. It has it's own way of doing things. That's why we use Java. If we tried to "fix" everything C/C++ developers thought was "wrong" with it, we'd just have C all over again.

Thanks, but no thanks. I'll stick with my "evil" non-GPL Java.

Re:kudos to gosling...

[Timothy Brownawell]

What you talkin' bout foo? GOTO has been long supported by Java, it just hasn't been used by its developers.

From the page *you* linked: "The keywords const and goto are reserved, even though they are not currently used. This may allow a Java compiler to produce better error messages if these C++ keywords incorrectly appear in programs."

So, the Java language does not support goto. Trying to use a goto will result in a compiler error.

Tim

Re:kudos to gosling...

[woodhouse]

Well I suppose this is supposed to be funny, but actually, the idea that goto is always evil is just wrong. There are a few occasions when it's justified:

Try finding a better way to break out of an inner loop. For example:

for (int i=0;i<n;i++)

for (int j=0;j<m;j++)

if (blah[i][j]==1) goto doublebreak;

doublebreak: ...

To exit from a function, while cleaning up properly afterwards:
if (error) goto error;
...
if (anotherError) goto error;
...
error:
close(files);
delete stuff;
return -1;

Well, ok, that one is pretty much covered by exceptions in Java, but in C it's useful and justified.

Re:kudos to gosling...

[bug_hunter]

mainLoop : for(int i=0; i n; i++) {
for(int j=0; j m; j++) {
if (blah[i][j] == 1) break mainLoop;
}
} ....

Is also how you can break out of nested loops in Java. More restrictive then goto's so it keeps the code neat.

"Even more open-source than it is already"...

[JessLeah]

Java is not open-source at all.

(Pre-emptive response to the argumentative sorts who point out the various GNU Java projects: These are not "Java proper". Java is a Sun product, and it is not open-sourced.)

Re:"Even more open-source than it is already"...

[blackdragon7777]

When you download java, you get the source files along with it. GPL is not the only license that makes something open source.

Re:"Even more open-source than it is already"...

[Earlybird]

• When you download java, you get the source files along with it. GPL is not the only license that makes something open source.

Both of the above assertions are true. However, in the context of the parent, they imply that because Java comes with source files, Java is open source, while is categorically false. The "open" in open source represents a freedom to modify and redistribute, which is encoded in the GPL and other open-source licenses. The sources that come with the Sun Java distribution -- which, incidentally, only cover the standard class libraries -- are not "free as in speech".

Re:"Even more open-source than it is already"...

[vegetasaiyajin]

When you download java, you get the source files along with it. GPL is not the only license that makes something open source.
Actually, the source code you get is for the standard library, not the JVM source code. That one is a separate download.

Re:"Even more open-source than it is already"...

[T-Ranger]

Correct.

The list of licenses that make something Open Source is here.

While there are some Sun licenses on the list, the Sun Community Source License (which Java source is provided under) is NOT.

This is not an opinion question. This is a fact. Java is NOT Open Source. It is not a little Open Source, or almost Open Source. Open Source is a binary state. It is, or it isnt. Java IS NOT.

Re:"Even more open-source than it is already"...

[persaud]

They get to define Open Source (registered tm), not "open source". Because they paid for trademark registration, in the US and possibly other jurisdictions.

Re:"Even more open-source than it is already"...

[Brandybuck]

If we choose to use the term 'Free Software' instead, there is no confusion.

To someone who hasn't drunk the FSF Koolaid, "free software" means software that is free of cost and/or relatively unencumbered by legal restrictions. Since Java is free of cost, and relatively unencumbered by legal restrictions, most people would consider it to be "free".

"Free Software" is just as confusing as "Open Source". Actually it can be more confusing since
"free" has about fifteen more synonyms than "open".

wow!

[narkotix]

first maybe solaris....now maybe java...whats next...open source star office??? oh wait..

Re:wow!

[aristotle-dude]

Use it at your own risk? Come on. If it is based on OO and they use the same format, what is your point besides being a GNU/Troll?

GPL != Open Source. GPL is one of many Open Source licenses.

Proprietary software has it's place as long as it uses open standards and formats.

Not such a big deal?

[spellraiser]

Question from the artice:

2. "Some have asked what IBM would get if Java were open-sourced: doesn't IBM already have the source?"

Gosling's answer: Again yes, they do have the source. It's also true that anyone can get the source. The major restriction is that if folks want to redistrubute their changes, they have to pass the test suite. Which means that about the only thing that they could get from liberalization is to be able to skip testing.

So it doesn't seem to be such a big issue after all. The source is already available, and all that is required to change it and redistribute it is to pass a standard suite of tests. Now, call me crazy, but I think that's not A Bad Thing. This restriction is what helps Java to be uniform and platform-independent.

The benefits of making Java fully open source therefore seem overrated. Isn't the availablity of the source most important? Or perhaps I'm misunderstanding something ...

Re:Not such a big deal?

[Chalybeous]

The source is already available, and all that is required to change it and redistribute it is to pass a standard suite of tests.

I agree with the parent. I'm not 100% clued up on such technical matters, but it seems to me that if Java were opensourced, suddenly every developer would implement their favourite functions and fixes, and it could risk losing its crossplatform compatibility.
As it stands, I understand that Sun is (as the parent quotes) pretty liberal with its Java policy. Would it be worth creating potentially problematic issues by changing this policy to make Java opensource?
It seems sensible, at least to me, to keep Java as it stands with regard to source changes, or we'll end up having Joe's Java, MSJava, Java for Nokia Mobile Phones, Java Reloaded... all built off the same core, but all implementing the same thing different ways, possibly with platform dependence or crosscompilation compatibility issues.
I'm guessing that Sun's "standard suite of tests" for additions/changes to Java is designed to prevent this kind of branching, and is (in a multi-OS, infinite-diversity-of-hardware-combinations world) A Very Good Thing.

Opinions, developer-type /.ers?

Re:Not such a big deal?

[pfafrich]

The benefits of making Java fully open source therefore seem overrated. Isn't the availablity of the source most important? Or perhaps I'm misunderstanding something ... For most users I'd agree with you, for me personally the current way Java is licensed seems fine. The one thing which could happen is that people could fork the source to try some language extensions, something like adding aspect oriented programming (aspectJ) or adding in operator overloading. Sun could keep their community process for the main branch.

A lot of this just seems to do with the name Sun could feel good about being "open source" GNU can feel good about another OS project, IBM can feel good about making it happen and Microsoft can feal confused. But it does not mean anything really changes for developers.

Maybe there needs to be a distinction between and Open Source License and an Open Source Development Process. Just because the code is open source does not mean they need to follow the same development model as Linux.

Re:Not such a big deal?

[Chalybeous]

Interesting, AC.
I know that since switching to Mozilla Firefox and the latest version of Sun Java, I've had some minor issues with web-based applications (mostly games) which refuse to work with anything but MS Java VM. So I suppose there's at least one forked (or b0rked, depending on your view of MS Java VM) version of Java out there in widespread use.

Anyone else wants to throw their 2c into the ring on this?

Re:Not such a big deal?

[rutwms]

Maybe there needs to be a distinction between and Open Source License and an Open Source Development Process.

Open Source software is based on a development process. You are asking for a distinction between Free Software and Open Source software witch does exist, but is often confused.

Color me confused...

[ItMustBeEsoteric]

"If we do something to make Java even more open-source than it is already"

Is it even possible for something to be partially open source? As far as I've always been concerned, something either is or it is not.

I know someone will definitely say "well, X part of Y OS is open source, while the OS isn't" but Java isn't an OS. Even in that case, let's use OS X. Are its Darwin portions open source? Well, yeah. I doubt we'll argue that? Will any /.-er in their right mind say OS X is open source?

Hell no. And I love my Macs.

Closed for your own protection

[Curtman]

This sounds a lot like pkware's strategy with DCL. They actually tried to tell me I should use it because its patented. I told them it's surprising that we'd even consider using it in spite of it being patented.

Re:Closed for your own protection

[Curtman]

That was pretty much word for word my exact question. Apparently, some people see vendor lock-in as a good thing. They treated me like I was from another planet when I suggested that software patents might be a bad thing. 'What happens when pkware goes out of business', was my follow up question. I never heard back.

What's important is

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

that they open-source it before Sun tanks, or before some nasty company takes control of it. In short, they ought to do like Netscape did, and I'm sure even McNealy would rather do that than any other alternative...

Gosling???

[Anonymous Coward]

Worth noting that Gosling is the one who produced the first non-free version of emacs, which was a direct motivation for RMS to produce the GPL!

He also produced NeWS which was superior to X in almost every way... except... it wasn't open either!

I've always thought that Java will become open source over Gosling's cold dead body, but maybe he'll prove me wrong.

Per King Solomon

[big tex]

McNealy gets Ja, and Gosling gets Va.

Now that's a fork.

How can a language be open-source?

[creidieki]

I'm very confused by both the article from Gosling and the discussion here.

"Java" is a programming language, right? Programming langagues doesn't have source code, they have specifications. Are they talking about open-sourcing a specific compiler for Java? Or are they talking about releasing or loosening license restrictions on the specifications for the language?

Re:How can a language be open-source?

[vegetasaiyajin]

"Java" is a programming language, right? Programming langagues doesn't have source code, they have specifications. Are they talking about open-sourcing a specific compiler for Java? Or are they talking about releasing or loosening license restrictions on the specifications for the language?

They are talking about open-sourcing Sun's compiler and runtime. The Java language specification is very open. It literally says:
"Sun Microsystems, Inc. (SUN) hereby grants you a fully-paid, nonexclusive, nontransferable, perpetual, worldwide limited license (without the right to sublicense) under SUN's intellectual property rights that are essential to practice this specification. This license allows and is limited to the creation and distribution of clean room implementations of this specification...".

Re:How can a language be open-source?

[mindriot]

Don't forget that there's a whole run-time library associated with Java. You have the language specifications, of course, but there's also all the classes that are coming with the JRE already. These are available in source code within the Java SDK, but under a more restrictive license. And then there's also, of course, the compiler itself, the virtual machine, and tools like javadoc. OK, there's kaffe, for instance, but they're not completely there yet (read their What is Kaffe not? section on the title page). There's also GNU classpath to replace Java's core class libraries, but they're not quite there yet either.

Possible solution: exclude Microsoft et. al.

[MisterLawyer]

From the article:
"Developers value Java's cross platform interoperability and reliability. They're afraid that if Java is open-sourced then someone will try to fragment the community by creating incompatible versions of Java and ignore the community process, just like Microsoft did. Microsoft did a lot of damage to the community and many developers strongly do not want that to happen again."

Microsoft is one of a handful of entities in a strong enough position to be able to do a lot of damage to the community.

In the present situation, that damage could be avoided by writing a License that, for example, specifically excludes 'any employee of Microsoft'.

Re:Possible solution: exclude Microsoft et. al.

[Wesley Felter]

The open source definition includes "No Discrimination Against Persons or Groups" specifically to head off such misguided ideas.

Besides, Microsoft doesn't need Sun's source code to fork Java. They have enough people to write a VM from scratch. Or they could use Kaffe.

Why IBM Wants Open Sourced Java

[njcoder]

Basically, they want to be able to have more control of it and Sun, or anyone else to have less.

The reason for this is that IBM is the big money maker in the Java/J2EE Space. It is fighting strong competition from BEA and now JBoss, maybe soon to be Jonas and Geronimo.

I think it's a credit to Sun that while they help build and manage the standards, they are not the big players providing the solutions that are being sold in that space.

They would like to sell more of their Java middleware components and are working towards it but they are not dependant on that to make (lose) money. The fact that they haven't made changes to the specification to favor their products over any one else's products speaks volumes. They have said they were going to open the standards so that others may benefit and everyone will compete on other merits while offering a lot of common features. The market proves they've kept their word.

I don't see IBM doing the same. Look at Mark Fluery's comments on how IBM forked a version of Axis back into a proprietary product. They did the same with other products they worked on. JetSpeed I believe is one.

They get the open source developers to help build the application, help people get buy in, then they take the codebase in house and work on it from there making improvements and selling it for mucho dinero.

That's not a bad thing, and is allowed under the license. The OS community has a good base to start building based on the initial investment by IBM. It's just something that isn't acknowledged by others.

With the JCP, the new arrangements with the Apache Group, Java keeps getting more and more open (with a little 'o').

Sun IS doing good things with Java and for the java developer community. They are making it easier for people to contribute back to java. Sun has a lot of things it needs to do in other areas but they really are doing a good job with Java. If it ain't broke why fix it?

One of the reasons's Java/J2EE is doing so well is because of the competition in the marketplace. Different vendors bring different things to market. Some wind up becoming standards, some get coppied from others. It works out to the advantage of the user community who relies on these different technologies to do their jobs.

Whether IBM will do this, we really don't know. They have more of an incentive to do this as JBoss is cutting into some of their installations. We do know that Sun isn't.

Re:Why IBM Wants Open Sourced Java

[psycho_tinman]

Ok, I'll bite. Sun is in the application server market, they have their own product. Is it one of the big names? No, it's not. Would they like that to change? I am certain they would. Just that it doesn't seem to be working too well at the moment. If you think for a moment that Sun isn't interested in controlling the direction of Java, google a bit for the rants people have written on how "heavy handed" and "autocratic" (I quote those terms because I don't completely agree) they can be in the JCP process.

IBM already has the source, they have an implementation of the JDK, there is nothing to stop them from making competing products. The fact of the matter is that for IBM or anyone else, once you open source Java, they can fold it back into your own product, but nothing can prevent someone else from doing the same. We, as consumers, have the freedom to decide which implementation we wish to use. Do you honestly think that BEA and other application server makers won't scream blue murder ?

I can't make a decision either way. On one hand, yes, there would be benefits to open sourcing Java. The community *could* get more involved in contributing extensions and patches to how Java works. The developer community surrounding Java being such, I think the pace of development would proceed at a much higher pace than Sun does. Another worrying factor is that if Sun has to fight for it's survival, it needs to make some tough decisions down the road. How many engineers will be pulled off a project which doesn't (strictly speaking) provide Sun with any revenue ? If Java development is left solely in the hands of a company who's survival is uncertain, then Java development will suffer as a result and I don't like seeing that happen.

On the other hand, Sun hasn't done badly in it's role as "steward" of the directions in which Java goes.. They've (their marketing has) driven the Java brand relentlessly forward and I think the sheer size of the developer community is a good thing. I can't think of any reason why it would be advantageous for them to spend 8+ years promoting and developing the product, only to "give" it away to the masses. Even the Linux kernel has Linus at the helm. Who else can be trusted to take the helm of such a commercially valuable piece of intellectual property ? Who would resist the temptation to subvert it to their own ends?

One final note to everyone who wants Java open sourced just so their favourite distro can start packaging it.. please, think a bit. Not all useful software is open sourced now, nor will it be in the foreseeable future. If it's your only reason for Sun to cast out a decade or more of research and development, it's not enough.

The boss

[Omega1045]

So, who should have custody of the child, the father...or the boss?

I think making Java open source would be very cool. But I am sure all of the developer who invented Java were paid well for their time, and Sun should make the decision.

Re:So...

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

What kind of idiot would confuse a freakin' computer program with a child?

A computer program is much like a child : when you release the first versions, it keeps on crapping out and you're constantly after it to fix it, then it slowly grows and grows and costs more and more money to maintain, then it's big enough that it becomes an ugly unmanageable thing that keeps on making unreasonable demands on the system, then when it finally matures, it leaves the development team and goes in maintenance mode until it's end-of-lifed.

Re:What's important is; Shareholder lawsuit

[David Hume]

What's important is that they open-source it before Sun tanks, or before some nasty company takes control of it. In short, they ought to do like Netscape did, and I'm sure even McNealy would rather do that than any other alternative...

Well, at least as long as they don't admit to doing so publicly. :) Can you say, "Shareholder lawsuit for waste of, or giving away, corporate assets?" I knew you could. :)

Yes, your Honor, we decided to essentially give away our valuable intellectual property for no consideration (i.e., nothing in return) before some "nasty company" could either: (a) buy the property; or (b) pay more for Sun's stock based on Sun's owndership of the property. NO, we wouldn't want that! Not if it meant Microsoft might get the property. Similarly, we couldn't possibly take the risk that MS would buy the asset out of bankruptcy, thereby enriching our creditors and/or stockholders.

Re:Please Mister the Boss...

[vegetasaiyajin]

I don't like programming in Java, but having a free Java (as in speech) would be really great !

There is a very good free java implementaiton. GCJ (GNU Compiler for Java). The library lacks a few things (e.g. AWT/Swing), though, but other than that it is a great implementation. And it is not based on a JVM, but is a traditional ahead of time compiler, so the related disadvantages (as well as the advantages, if any) dissapear. It uses the same (or at least a very similar) object model as C++, so interoperation with it is much easier.

Think about how it can be easy to include Java in a Linux Distro.
Sun's Java JVM can be included in linux distributions without problems. Knoppix, SuSE and SoL include it. Don't know about others. The reason some distributions don't include Sun's Java implementation is because they don't want to include it.

If Java becomes free, I can imagine a lot of thing. Why not bindings with GTK for example They already exist. Check Java-GNOME. It includes GTK and GNOME bindings for Java.
There are also bindings for Qt and KDE.
You can also use GTK via the SWT toolkit .
Java is NOT a proprietary language (despite some ignorant people who say so), you can find many open source libraries for it, and there is at least a high quality free (as in speech) implementation of it.

"If Done Carefully"

[njcoder]

He says "if done carefully". Open sourcing Java isn't just a simple matter of replacing the license.txt file. There is a lot at stake and you don't want this to be the thing that kills Java.

Of course if it doess all the OS zealots will say "see they did it too late".

I don't see Gosling's comments as as strong a call to open source java as other's do.

He's saying there could be a good thing.

The rest of Sun thing it could be a good thing too that's why they were looking into it. It's neither an easy decision to make nor an easy one to implement.

Re:"If Done Carefully"

[shaitand]

How could it possibly kill java to open source it? I imagine sun would remain the maintainer, so it's not exactly like anything is going to go in they wouldn't approve of.

The whole "millions of forks" argument is pointless. Anyone can look at the specs and implement a Java VM NOW and many DO. In fact there are open source Java VM implementations ALREADY so anyone too lazy to code one from scratch can do it now.

What we have NOW is millions of forks, if java opens and sun actually accepts contributions as well (if they don't, it WILL fork and eventually settle on another major VM, read XFree86) then alot of those will disappear as additional features they offer become part of the new open source Sun java.

Open sourcing java alone is not enough though, two other things need to happen.

1. Sun must actually actively maintain and accept contributions. Or appoint a third party from the community to do so.

2. The spec must become standardized and be taken out of sun's hands so that the community can actually submit extensions, etc.

Basically Java must become open. As far as the VM, yes it's a matter of changing the license.txt file and putting the source out there. Fragmentation won't occur if they don't give it a reason to, if sun is slow or unwilling to accept contributions THEN it will kill java.

by definition Gosling is not the father of Java

[Anonymous Coward]

He was (and still is) a Sun employee and developed Java during that time, by today standards any product developed by an employee is property of the company, so even McNealy is the father, McNealy is just the obnoxious uncle that says wierd things when is drunk.

Gosling was just a surrogate father.

BTW what happened to the other people around OAK project?, did sun killed all of them and throwed them into a ditch?.

GPL Java? Who cares...

[Anonymous Coward]

As has been pointed out, it's a programming language with an environment. Open sourcing it is irrelevant. What it really needs is ISO Standardisation - so that the test suite is not a moving target as defined by a single vendor.

For goodness sake, MS did that for C# and environment that it requires. Anyone can implement it and MS get no say and no kickback.
Please may Sun do the same for Java.

Weekly Schedule

[cubicledrone]

Monday: Open source Java
Tuesday: Forked
Thursday: Enormous whirling clusterfuck

Saturday: Start on new language

dont know if its a good idea.

[xmorg]

I dont know if its a good idea to open source Java. Imagine every website you come to demanding that you install their "version" of the java plugin. Which then of course, in addition to adding addware to your system, will generally screw up your java environment. MS VM anyone?

Re:dont know if its a good idea.

[BokLM]

There is no reason for this.
Do you see a lot of programs that require you to install their "version" of python or perl to run ?
Do you know a lot of .sxw files that require you to install their "version" of OpenOffice ?
Do you know a lot of .tex that require you to install their "version" of LaTeX ?

The MS VM was different, they volontary created something incompatible to break portability (that's what they often do).

The devil's in the details

[Wesley Felter]

One thing Gosling neglects to mention is that it costs tens of thousands of dollars to get access to the test suite.

While compatibility is great, a major advantage of open source is the ability for people to make and distribute experimental changes (after all, new features often start out as experiments).

While anyone can get the source code to Sun's VM, there is concern that looking at the code taints you for life, unlike open source.

Response to Mono?

[PCM2]

I think -- and I'm really serious -- Sun should probably be looking at open sourcing Java as a response to Mono, if for no other reason.

Miguel and Ximian took a look at Java and decided it didn't suit their needs, as far as developing rich desktop applications for Linux (e.g. Evolution). So rather than use Java, they decided it was actually better to implement the .Net environment themselves, from scratch. To me, that sounds like a fairly heavy indictment, and one that Sun should be looking into, if they're smart.

Now you've got Mono humming right along, with the developers busy implementing two distinct stacks: One that's a Microsoft compatibility layer, for using all the stuff you might have written with Visual Studio, and another that's more Linux-oriented, with GNOME and GTK bindings, Linux printing architecture support, and so on -- the kind of things that people hope would come of an open-sourced Java.

If Sun doesn't care about this, they've got more problems than I realized.

Re:Response to Mono?

[PCM2]

True, true ... you could probably do a lot or even all of it with Java. But my point is that Miguel doesn't want to. He thinks Sun has failed to listen to the market as far as language features, changes to the VM, etc. While Microsoft, on the other hand, has developed what is essentially a Java competitor, only they've taken the opportunity to learn from all of Sun's mistakes or shortcomings. (Plus, .Net does some things that Java will never do, like multiple language support in the VM.)

So here's Ximian, now part of Novell, pouring a significant amount of resources into developing tools that will make building complex desktop applications easier on Linux -- and they're not doing it with Java. I think that's significant, or at least Sun should see it as being significant.

Because meanwhile, here's Sun promoting what's essentially a Linux distribution for the desktop, only they're branding it "Java." It's not the Sun Linux Desktop, it's the Java Desktop. One is led to ask: Is that supposed to be some kind of hint? What are we led to infer about Sun's Linux position, based on that? For a company that's suddenly all about promoting Linux on the desktop, just what has Sun done for the Linux desktop application developer lately? What do they intend to do?

I guess it all comes down to Sun's perpetually half-assed Linux strategy. Do they have a Linux strategy, or don't they? Is Linux on the desktop important or isn't it? They can call their Linux desktop "Java" all they want, but at the end of the day, if the best tools for developing desktop applications for Linux are going to come from Mono... well, good luck, Sun.

So that's why open-sourcing Java could be a good move for them. Even if it doesn't really change anything much about the way Java works in the real world, at least it could send some sort of message to the growing community of developers who are interested in Linux -- and open source in general -- that Sun is finally ready to either shit or get off the pot.

As far as the WinForms stuff, Miguel doesn't really advocate that approach over any other. Mono is developing the more Linux-oriented stack precisely to suit the people who have no interest in WinForms development. But, for obvious reasons, a lot of the developers working on Mono are Windows developers. And a lot of the real-world code written in C#, for the foreseeable future, is going to be written on Windows, and a lot of those developers are going to use the tools available to them, including WinForms. So supporting that style of development with Mono is a good thing, as far as growing the installed base of Mono-compatible developers. But even if, at some point in the future, it became problematic, infeasible, or even impossible for Mono to keep up with what Microsoft is doing with .Net, Ximian would still continue to use Mono and the core .Net framework to do their development. They just wouldn't use WinForms (or whatever its successor might be).

Re:Response to Mono?

[r.jimenezz]

Thanks for the thorough reply. I confess I'm not a big Mono fan for a number of reasons, but what you've said is 100% true. Java is being disregarded as a desktop alternative on what is perhaps the last front it had other than the server side, given that Windows developers want (and justly so) tools that allow them to e.g. write natively to the System/Application Event Log, etc., and the war on the browser is long lost to Flash.

We do agree, then, that Miguel is doing this based above all on personal preferences about the language and not necessarily based on platform capabilities or deficiencies. And it might just be the right call especially because of the multi-language thing.

(Not that your previous post meant differently, but as I said earlier I needed a bit more detail. Thanks again!)

Re:Response to Mono?

[OmniVector]

i was looking for this post. and i was thinking of modding it up but felt i'd rather reply. you hit the nail on the head. if sun doesn't open up java now, it stands to let C# walk all over it. there's a major problem with java right now in that no distro in linux can bundle it. installing it in most distros is a pain in the freaking ass and requires going to some java website, clicking agree on a bunch of stupid licsense agreements, etc. in short, it's not SEAMLESS. and java support should be in every distro out of the box such that java could become *the* new language for desktop development via java gtk/gnome bindings. you have to take a look at the current stance of java. it's preinstalled on all os x machines. it *could* be bundled with linux machines, or easily installed via apt-get install sun-jdk or emerge sun-jdk, but as it stands we can't do this because it requires that damn website/license agreement crap. switching to gpl would fix this, and suddently grind the C# momentum to a halt i think. c# honestly has a few nice perks but the advantages stop there. the ONLY advantage you get out of supporting C# is the windows world suddently has the ability to run your apps. and i'm all for allowing easy porting, but i don't think the solution to porting is to make it easy for the crappiest OS in existance to have easy port capabilities. we should set our standards higher, and worry more about making the best environment out of the tools we have. and currently java is more portable via applets, preinstalled on os x, and if gpled preinstalled in linux, than just supporting windows.

"Java" is a standard, not a product.

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone is free to make their own implementation of a Java framework. There's an (outdated) list here of alternative implementations (and possibly more here as well).

For example, SableVM and Joeq are the first two that I found on Sourceforge (and there are several more).

So it's not really a question of "open sourcing Java" - because there are already open source implementations of Java (and a few commercial ones as well). It would be a question of Sun opening up their reference implementation of Java.

So the main advantage of opening up their reference implementation would be to focus the software community's efforts more on one Java implementation and to stop the fragmentation. People would still be free to develop their own Java compatible VM's & compilers, but it would provide less of an incentive for them to do that if there's one central, relatively community-oriented distribution.

Re:What's important is; Shareholder lawsuit

[mattyrobinson69]

GPL isn't giving it away. its not as if you have to pay for it anyway. whats the difference between freeware and GPL to shareholders?

all it means is that the OSS community can make it better, and Sun can, if they want, use it more in their operating systems or whatever to get more money.

how is GPLing something thats already freeware giving it away?

Why don't ........ ?

[Usagi_yo]

The people who want open source Java just buy it from Sun and then make it open source. I'm sure Sun would sell it for a billion or so.

Oh, wait. You want something Sun spent 100's of million dollars developing, and protecting for free. Like 100% really free.

Re:What's important is; Shareholder lawsuit

[Wesley Felter]

Sun actually makes millions of dollars from licensing their VM source code to IBM, Apple, HP, BEA, etc.

Fragmentation

[Florian Weimer]

A couple of years ago, most vendors certified their Java software just for selected Sun JVM versions. This meant that most serious Java users had to install different JVM versions on their systems. In a sense, Sun had already fragmented Java on its own.

Has this changed in the meantime? Is Sun's Java implementation fully backwards compatible now, and do other vendors trust Sun in this area?

GPL the JVM and keep the trademark

[forlornhope]

Somebody probably already said this, but...
I dont get why Sun can't keep the trademark and make people pass the test suite to us the Java trademark. Isnt this what happened to UNIX, the trademark went to one company and you have to pass a test suite to call your product a UNIX. This would be optimal for sun because Java would get a lot more use and development, while they still get to control what is called Java.
Maybe there is a difference that I just don't see, but it seems like they are doing this already, just also placing that as a restriction on distributing the changes as well. GPL the source and keep the trademark. Its that simple.

RTFA, my friend

[melquiades]

Stallman is less open minded than Java is open source.

OK, here's the deal with the Java source code: You can get it. You can modify it. You can redistribute it.

BUT...

It has to pass Sun's compatibility tests.

OK, so yes, I can see how an ideologue like RMS would lump Sun's Java implementation into the same category as closed-source software. But really, you do have quite a lot of freedom with Java. It's just that Sun (and the Java community, myself included) are very concerned about compability: cross-platform dependability is one of Java's must important features, and forking is a big concern. (Sun was already bitten once by Microsoft making an incompatible "Java" and basically wreaking havoc on the client Java market for years.) Just look at all the crap that goes into the typical C/C++ project's ./configure.sh to see why Sun is so anal about this!

Gosling explains this well in the article (for those who actually read it...).

On top of all that, Java != Sun's implementation of Java. Everything in Java is determined by a spec -- the language, the runtime, the libraries, everything. If Sun's requirement that you pass their test suite is too restrictive, just write your own damn implementation of the specs. Yes, I know that's a lot of work. Boo hoo hoo.

JessLeah is totally wrong on this point: the reason that the GNU Java projects are not "Java proper" is not that Sun didn't make them, but that they are immature and don't completely implement that Java spec. I think this may help explain why RMS is so sore (and unfair) on this point: GNU Java kind of sucks, even after many years of work, his "free software" baby isn't winning in the Java world, and nobody really cares except GNU ... so there's a bit of sour grapes.

Re:RTFA, my friend

[njcoder]

"JessLeah is totally wrong on this point: the reason that the GNU Java projects are not "Java proper" is not that Sun didn't make them, but that they are immature and don't completely implement that Java spec. I think this may help explain why RMS is so sore (and unfair) on this point: GNU Java kind of sucks, even after many years of work, his "free software" baby isn't winning in the Java world, and nobody really cares except GNU ... so there's a bit of sour grapes."

I'm trying to find a sound file of a hammer hitting the nail on the head. I can't find one... so just use your imagination.

The people actually working on the GNU java stuff don't want Sun to open source Java. they want to prove that they can do it themselves with out their help and do it better. There was a post on one of the previous slashdot threads by one of the developers indicating that.

The reality though is that most of the open source projects don't get to where they are based on a large community of volunteer developers. The big gains in open source software have been by corporations donating money and paying their developers to work on open source solutions. I'm not saying this is bad, but it should be recognized.

Maybe RMS is still just ticked off at Gosling over emacs.

Solaris & Java

[Alan Cox]

Except that it seems "Solaris maybe, especially if we can knock Red Hat, Java unlikely even though its creator gets it".

Sun need to keep a tight rein on the java name, and maybe the standard process. You want it to be called Java, you make it pass the test suite. That bit makes sense, although its hard to take too seriously given all the things out there like vnc java versiosn "patched to work with macos", "patched to work with ie5" etc.

What matters is that a JVM+class library called "Java" or "J2EE" etc behave in the defined way. Just as "Posix" and "LSB" matter. Implementation, reference code, no reason that can't be truely open.

In the Sun case the fact some of the interface specs are secret for tests for some of the extensions is not umm helpful. Imagine C++ programming where you had to sign an NDA to open a file 8)

Re:Solaris & Java

[narkotix]

You want it to be called Java, you make it pass the test suite.
kind of like the old method of naming programming standards like F77, C85, etc etc?
It sounds theoretically possible but like how feasable would it be considering there is a new java release/patch every 2nd month?

A good thing

[Earlybird]

Regardless of the motives of third parties who are pushing for the opening of Java, such as IBM, making Java truly free is a good thing.

Opening up a development process tends to bring more brains to the table, and that exposure, history has taught us, tends up to open the technology up in ways we had not imagined before.

Consider the flurry of activity surrounding Python after its internal reorganization around the time of version 1.6 -- modified license, python-dev list, PEP system, more lenience towards experimental and backwards-compatibility-breaking changes -- after which we have fantastic new language features, as well as strange, clever new techology such as Stackless Python, Pyrex, Psyco, PyPy etc.

Or, indeed, consider Linux. We all know what happened with that little insignificant grass-roots project. If Linux had been closed off around version 2.0, would we have an O(1) scheduler today, or configurable swappiness, or hyperthreading, or pre-emptible kernel?

Regardless of the quality of Sun's engineers, Sun's hold on the Java is constraining its growth. For example, what if I have a wild new idea to make the JVM's synchronization locks lightweight enough to have barely any overhead at all, thus improving the speed of applications? There's a large barrier to incorporating that kind of change. With something like Python you can grab the CVS sources and start hacking. Just the existence of such a point of entry is enough to inspire curious visitors.

Does Java need hacking? Sure. While my main point is that Sun possesses a finite number of brains -- what wonderful ideas and inventions aren't happening at Sun? -- there are specific areas that will benefit from the attention of outside hackers. JVM performance is still lacking, for one. The bytecode instruction set is still to specific to Java-the-language, as opposed to Java-the-platform, leaving potential other language platforms with much to desire.

Furthermore, anyone who has struggled with a bug in Sun's Java implementation knows that the process to get a bug fixed is often arduous, sometimes impossible. Last I checked there were serious problems reported years ago and not yet fixed.

Any language needs to develop in order to catch up with the times. With Java, it has been going rather slowly. With 1.5, Java is, in many ways, playing catch-up with C#. Other technologies spend much time in the pipeline before they are ratified and implemented. JDO took years. Support for "web services" is lacking, at best.

To me it seems that Sun does not have the resources to drive Java development. Witness Eclipse, which did what Sun never could do: produce a solid IDE. Eclipse is a multiplatform program, yet appears native on every platform it runs on; and supports a myriad of modern technologies, such as background compilation, refactoring, version control, remote file systems, and profiling; and is also a teeming breeding ground for experimental technology, such as AOP, fine-grained source-level version control, graphical editng, and quality control. Eclipse built this house in record time. To see what Sun did, over a considerably longer period of time, check out the ancient, outdated monster that that is Netbeans/Forte.

In summary, Java is better off in the hands of the community, not Sun alone.

Re:A good thing

[Bert690]

Very well said. I've reported several bugs in Java runtimes. Years back they were quite responsive, but the last one I submitted was well over six months back, and I have received no word yet. The previous bug I reported took about 7 months to be confirmed. That's pathetic. And I always submit concise source code clearly demonstrating the problem.

Sun -- either get your act together, or open Java up.

The licence choice is important - but be nice

[dbIII]

So, who should have custody of the child, the DEVELOPER...or the boss?

Now if we follow the example of RMS with emacs - the boss would get the full say in it and sack the developer. Fortunately, one thing that RMS did correctly is that those who wrote the emacs program based on RMS's text editor macros released it under the GPL. Because of that, the developer of the time could keep on going with a forked version after RMS objected to X windows support, so we ended up with an emacs with features which were previously not implemented because they did not contribute to the hurd.

I think RMS should sit this one out - his licence is good, but his "you're all evil if you don't use my own personal licence" comments are not going to help anyone.

Artistic Licence?

[erikharrison]

When we say "Open Sourcing" why do we really mean "GPL"? Granted, the GPL has the advantage from Sun's point of view, as they get any changes back.

But Perl was released for the longest time under the Artistic licence, which (IIRC) allows derivitive works, but doesn't allow you to call them Perl. This could keep the one, true source of Java unsullied by broken or incompatible implementations yet gives everybody else the hope that when Sun tanks Java won't.

Re:Artistic Licence?

[shaitand]

"But Perl was released for the longest time under the Artistic licence, which (IIRC) allows derivitive works, but doesn't allow you to call them Perl. This could keep the one, true source of Java unsullied by broken or incompatible implementations yet gives everybody else the hope that when Sun tanks Java won't."

The gpl will do this as well, sun java remains sun java so long as sun continues to maintain it and passes it off to another to maintain afterward.

Anyone can get the specs and write their own implementation of java now. Java being gpl'd doesn't change this, it simply means that people can write improvements and possibly get them into the main official java instead of having to write a custom vm to get the simplest change implemented.

Under the gpl we won't see a reappearance of the Microsoft Java VM either... or if we do it will have to be gpl'd.

this just shows you don't know java

[jbellis]

for the former, use a labled outer loop

outer: for ...
for ...
break outer;

for the latter, "cleaning up properly afterwards" is a textbook case of where you want to use the finally clause of a try/catch block.

#define PREPROCESSOR "No!"

[gidds]

What's wrong with having #ifdef, #define or some other kind of compile directive?

Two main things.

The generic any-language answer is that a pre-processor is awkward, fragile, and ugly. It's parsed, processed, and structured differently from the code -- it has different tokens and different semantics; it can lead to code that's a nightmare to maintain, and makes automatic source processing much harder.

And the Java-specific answer is that, as the parent says about 'goto', there are better ways to do any of the things you might want a preprocessor for:

• Probably the main one is to work around different compilers, OSs, architectures, and platforms. But Java is one platform; if you need to do something that different on each underlying OS or system, then you're doing something wrong!
• Another reason is isolation of constants and other singletons (is that what you mean by your comment about 'login'?); but Java has better ways to handle these (class constants, static finals, singletons, &c).
• A third reason is optimisation; but that's the sort of thing that a dynamic compiler can probably decide better than you can, especially given that your code may run on different JVMs with different characteristics. (Some 'optimisations' made to early Java code actually slow it down when run on more recent dynamic JVMs.)
• A fourth is conditional compilation for assertions or other development aids; again, you can do this more neatly with a simple 'if' statement -- and a decent compiler or runtime will optimise it away when not used.

In short, there are no reasons for a preprocessor in Java, and lots of reasons against.

Re:#define PREPROCESSOR "No!"

[Per Bothner]

But Java is one platform; if you need to do something that different on each underlying OS or system, then you're doing something wrong!

Nonsense. JDK 1.4 is a very different platform from JDK 1.1 or 1.0. In my Java code I might want to use weak references (say), which are available on JDK 1.2 but not 1.1. I might want to support JDK 1.1 using some inferior fallback backanism. In theory I can do this using reflection, but that's both slow and painful to write. So conditional compilation is reasonable alternative - certainly better than refusing to support JDK 1.1 - which is the solution most Java projects select.

Re:#define PREPROCESSOR "No!"

[AdamInParadise]

Sorry, you're mistaken. See this part of the Java Spec, toward the end of the page: http://java.sun.com/docs/books/jls/second_edition/ html/statements.doc.html#236365 Basically, if the condition of your if() is a constant (static final boolean), then the compiler 'may' drop the block entirely. The standard compiler does it. Eclipse doesn't.
See also the log4j cookbook, which says that leaving dynamic if() for logging statements all over the place has no mesurable performance impact.

Re:GPL fits the description.

[MisterLawyer]

"Have you heard of the Microsoft stance on the GPL?"

Yes I have. It's basically: "The GPL sucks because it prevents us from making money."

Here it is, from an article on Microsoft's website, titled "Microsoft's View of the GPL":

"Microsoft's concern is the resulting degradation of the software ecosystem that would be triggered by widespread acceptance of the GPL"..."Microsoft further contends that the combined forces of a well-funded research community and a robust commercial software industry will continue to drive global economic expansion."

FSS Java. MS Java.

[solprovider]

For an implementation to use the Java trademark, it must pass Sun's tests. The source is already "open" (easily available). Anybody can make changes and call it "Java", as long as it still passes the tests.

That sounds like "open source". We all want Java to retain its portability, so Sun requiring the tests is valid. The tests could be (and effectively are) under the control of the JCP, so that process is "open", although it is design by committee, which frightens me, but is the basic premise of the FSS community.

The issue is how to make Java free to redistribute. Under the current license, no JVM can be included in a totally free distribution. Is there some license that can protect the trademark and portability that allows free distribution? Can such a license be written that is acceptable to Sun?

Transfer the Java trademark to the JCP. Fund the JCP to protect it. Allow the JVM and all associated tchnologies to use the trademark if the tests score 100%. Allow free redistribution of certified code.

You could still modify your JVM for internal use, but you must recertify it if you want to distribute it. Is that close enough to the intent of the GPL to satisfy RMS? (No, they would not be using the GPL, but that should solve all real world issues without allowing Java to fragment.)

---
MS JVM:
Why do most people assign to malevolence what can easily be assigned to stupidity?

MS did not write a JVM that met the standards. In THIS case, they did it to add proprietary extensions to better allow virus and other integration with their OS.

But MS has a very lengthy record of not being able to write programs very well. Their original claim-to-fame was the BASIC interpreter that could not interpret the BASIC language. Their version became the standard we all learned to program in the early 80s, but they did not change it because they wanted to steal the market from all those other (nonexistent) BASIC interpreters; they changed it because they did not have the technical ability to write it correctly.

They have since won many software markets. I do not know of one case where the software they sold to capture the market was better than the current leader. The closest examples are when they leveraged MSWindows3 to capture the GUI market while making certain their competitors did not have the APIs to be able to write software for MSWindows3. Usually MS writes programs that work worse than the existing leader, then use their marketing and monopoly to conquer.

Every programmer will tell you that it is easier to write an application when there is already a working version. MS has repeated failed to match the existing functionality for their early releases.

Did MS change the JVM because they wanted to corrupt it? Or was it simply that they did not have the technical expertise to write it without corrupting it?

Re:Please Mister the Boss...

[Milton Waddams]

bindings with GTK!?!? but what if someone ran a GTK'd app on a machine with no GTK libs? what would be the point in writing an app in a cross platform language with bindings for a platform dependent library?

this is why java isn't and shouldn't be gpled. open source is great for certain situations but not for others. i think that it's great that java comes from one company, it means that it's completely controlled.

why are people pushing so much for this? java is free (as in beer) and is very well documented. there is no need to "port" an app that you write, all that's necessary to run a java app is the jre. and you can write an open source java app if you want with no restrictions.

oss advocates like this guy above are well intentioned but they can do more harm than good. with freedom comes responsibility and unfortunately developers can be egotistical and not think about the greater good of software when they make decisions.

really what's more important, a model that's free (as in speech) or something that works.

The One Reason to Open Java

[Nom du Keyboard]

Although it has been said in part in various different ways, there is one reason to open source Java:

Once open sourced, it cannot ever be bought out and buried.

We all know who I'm talking about. And frankly, Sun does look pretty weak these days. I wonder if they'll be around in 5 years.

Re:Please Mister the Boss...

[raindog2]

I mean no disrespect to the GCJ project, or Classpath or any of the other contributions to the goal of a fully compatible free software Java implementation. But...

Saying that GCJ's existence proves Java is not proprietary is a bit like saying that WINE proves Windows is not proprietary.

What are we talking about here?

[gidds]

Java is a platform -- it has a specification, and Sun's own implementation. Which are we talking about here?

At present, anyone can build a clean-room implementation of the Java specs; if it passes Sun's compatibility suite, then you can call it 'Java' and do what you like with it. I'd say that's pretty open already.

What more could be done? Well, one thing is to open up the specification. Sun already accepts outside input to that, via the JCP; any further would probably mean dropping the compatibility requirements, and letting anyone call anything 'Java'. A Very Bad Move(tm)! We'd get lots of competing 'Java' platforms that were all incompatible with each other, no-one would know what to write for, and it would kill the language.

The other thing is for Sun to open-source their own particular implementation. That would have several good effects, e.g. much easier porting to other platforms, fixing of bugs, optimisation, &c -- but they'd have quite a job to ensure that the results still had to pass their compatibility suite. (Or, again, chaos would reign.)

One final thing: Java gets a very biased press on /. If you believed what you read here, you'd think no-one used it, that it had died a death, that it never ran beyond a crawl, and that it epitomised everything that was bad about closed standards in comparison to the wonderful openness of C#. But that's all rubbish. In the real world out there, it's about the highest-demand skill; it's behind a staggering amount of development in the corporate, commercial world; implementations have come an awful long way in the last few years; and the platform as a whole is far more open than C# will ever be. I think it merits a place on the 'Reports Of My Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated' list, alongside BSD and Apple...

Re:What are we talking about here?

[shaitand]

A few things that can be done to improve on java. Make the standard a standard housed with an officially recognized standards body which does not allow patented features to be accepted into standards.

Right now java is in sun's hands and nobody has a say in the standard but sun.

And yes, open source sun's implementation, it's the only one anybody codes for! It does little good to split off a non-sun java vm. If they gpl it we don't have to worry about Microsoft doing this again either.

And yes sun java is still slow as hell, whatever you say, you can't change that. With things opened up the interpreter will be drastically improved... it's not like sun will stop working on it, and it's not like sun alone could ever compare to what the community can do with it. Just look at Open Office 1.1 if you want an example.

Java being in demand is all the more reason to open it up, why do you think people are clammoring for this? Sun needs to learned that closed standards and closed sourcecode are not where the money is anymore and start gpling all their software (it's not like software is sun's money maker anyway). If they want to be friends with this community they have to contribute to it and work in an open to all fashion (not merely visible to all).

Re:What are we talking about here?

[jswalter9]

The only thing Java is still "slow as hell" with is GUI on Linux. I've run plenty of tests vs C++, Obj-C, Perl, Python, etc. on non-GUI implementations of the same spec (proprietary in-house infrastructure spec).

GUI on Linux is slow for one reason: the linux implementations of Java pre-2.6 linux kernel has avoided the POSIX threading (because it had to) and used processes communicating through shared memory instead of operating from the same address space. This is most significant for GUI apps because in Java each Listener runs in its own Thread.

IF Sun releases a true thread-using implementation for linux you'll see a BIG performance gain on the GUI and maybe some gain elsewhere as well, but in the meantime I have to request (again) that folks not dump on Java unless they've used it within the previous year.

My $.005

Yeah maybe... but

[ValourX]

I think it's time for a regime change at Sun. They need someone in charge who is willing to let go of the 1980s software business mentality and adapt to the modern world.

You can't sell proprietary UNIX when others can get it for free. You can't sell StarOffice when you can get OO.org for free. You can't sell $8000 UltraSPARC workstations when you can build more powerful AMD64 machines for an 1/8th the price. You can't lock down a programming language that people want to use when there are so many other competing technologies that they can turn to.

It seems to me that Java is going to be dead within the next couple of years if it doesn't open up and become a Free standard.

Wouldn't it suck if Sun went under and Microsoft bought up all of their assets, including Java, and then killed it all? Don't laugh; it could happen.

-Jem

Forks are a good thing

[soloport]

Forks are a healthy thing. When a FOSS project goes bad (e.g. the head of the project looses his/her mind) forks allow the community to escape a bad thing.

If the fork is made for good reason, the world follows. If a fork is just someone's rant-child, the world ignores it and it whithers on th vine. Forking is one way projects evolve. When two branches (resulting from a fork) survive, there's also usually a pretty decent reason.

From the perspective of the CIO, forking should be seen as no more of a risk than a vendor being tossed around by a corporate buyout. It happens, but it shouldn't stop one from buying the tools one needs.

Who cares?

[hak1du]

Sun has had almost a decade to follow through on their initial promise of submitting Java to a recognized, existing standards body and they haven't done it. Instead, they have set up a process in which their customers and users do enormous amounts of work for them and Sun reaps the benefits and have the final say.

Most disturbingly, Sun still has complete ownership of JCPs (read the license agreement, say, for JCP 32).

Sun has had their chance. Java has been a positive influence on the industry, but it is time to move on to something else, both for legal reasons and for technical reasons.

Re:Who cares?

[aristotle-dude]

Excuse me? C# is not a standard language. The part MS published to the ECMA is only a fraction of the language. None of the GUI stuff works outside of windows. Most of the class library is closed and proprietary. As many have said, Java is a standard, not a product and anyone is free to re-implement the standard but they can only call it Java if they purchase access to the test suite to be certified.

As for your comment on Java not being cross-platform, that is not a flaw in the language or specification but rather the hostile attitude people on a certain platform (linux) have towards Java. If linux had an official version of the JVM, there would be no issues. Have you used Java recently or is this insight of your based on here say on the net? I can write a Java app on the mac and have it work with little or no modification on windows or another unix platform with a Java JVM. I'm well aware of wx and QT.

QT strongly tied to X-windows and could hardly be considered a cross-platform solution. wxWindows also look out of place on other operating environments as it tries to imitate windows dialogs and widgets. No thanks. Java AWT, on the other hand, can support a number of GUI personalities including OS X, Windows classic, Motif and CDE.

One final note, those solutions you mentioned will not work on non-pc environments. I am not aware of wx supporting anything other than OSX, Mac OS 9, windows and linux. What about all of the PDA and Phone OSes? You PC centric people talking about cross-platform development make me laugh.

it's not about GPL

[hak1du]

Please enlighten me? Why GPL Java?

That question itself points out a core problem with Java: it isn't a standard, it is just an implementation: Sun's implementation (and its derivatives: IBM, Blackdown, Apple). None of the implementations (gc, kaffe, waba) that don't derive from Sun's are even close to being compatible.

Before we can talk about Sun open sourcing their Java implementation, we have to talk about making Java an open standard. Right now, it is further away from that goal than even Microsoft Windows is.

In any case, it doesn't matter anymore. I doubt that it makes much of a difference at this point what Sun does with the Java license. I think the world is going to move away from Java over the next few years--Sun screwed up.

Re:Is the right to implement the spec perpetual?

[Mithrandir]

The way the specs are right now is that anyone can implement them. Sun owns a Trademark on "Java" and many derivative names. In order to call your work "an implementation of Java" you need to get Sun to give you a license to use the Java(TM). To do that, you need to pass the compatibility tests. To pass the compatability tests you must purchase a TCK (test kit), run the tests and give the results to Sun. They check it over, it if passes muster you get to call your work Java.

For a perfect example of seeing this happening in real life, have a look at the Wabi project. This was a Java-clone in all but name for small footprint devices, long before J2ME started. Basically it was Java - you could compile the code with a normal Java compiler and run it on the Wabi VM and it would work (except for the odd bug here and there). They never called it Java as they didn't want to pay for the TCK.

I must have missed something

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess I must have missed something. I seemed to think that java pretty well kicked ass over the last decade or so. I also thought that most books at the book store dealing with programming were about java.

Granted C# is the new hot language.

But can you tell me why with all the penetration java has had that it must be open source?

This argument is total bullshit. Java has done just fine without being open sourced. All open sourcing it will do is lead us to having a bunch of incompatible versions. Hell, just look at C++. Show me 2 different implementations that support the language the same. Show me any that fully comply to the standard. Certainly not the GNU version. And shouldn't it be the gold standard.

Like I said, this open source debate is bullshit. The only thing that will happen is we'll have incompatible versions and Microsoft will walk away with everything.

Re:mod funny, not interesting

[ClosedSource]

Since when is readabililty a concern of any 'C' derived language? To wit:

+=,-=, etc.
var++ vs. ++var
& vs. && etc
>> vs. >>>
?:

The GOTO may be bad practice but it's one of the most readable statements in Java.

OSS Java is good for Java but bad for Sun

[Crackerman111]

As the subject line sugests, I think open sourcing Java would be a great thing for Java. The problem is that it's not such a great thing for Sun. As shown in this thread/article, Sun is not doing so well. They really don't have a lot going for them. Java is one of the few big things happening at Sun right now. Why would they want to let go of Java right now? At the very least, Java makes them look like a good IBM acquisition in case things really start to go south.

Re:Please Mister the Boss...

[Per Bothner]

Sun's Java JVM can be included in linux distributions without problems. Knoppix, SuSE and SoL include it. Don't know about others. The reason some distributions don't include Sun's Java implementation is because they don't want to include it.

No, it's because some distributions are less cavalier about Sun's license than others. For example, the Supplemental License Term B iii (of JDK 1.4.2) seem to prohibit distributing both JDK and GCJ. Note also that redistribution is "non-tranferable", so somebody who receives a copy of Knoppix can't give it to somebody else. In fact your only allowed to reditribute JDK "for the sole purpose of running, your Programs".

Note also (3 RESTRICTIONS) "you may not modify, decompile, or reverse engineer [Sun's] Software."

I wish people who made these claims about Java being "Free enough" would actually read the Java license ...

Re:So...

[Distinguished Hero]

My intention was to illustrate that although Sun might be reluctant to open source Java, they have made several crucial contributions in the past, a fact many on Slashdot are far too eager to overlook. Many people are painting Sun as the Great Satan for not open sourcing Java; I merely meant to poke fun at this mentality and show how hypocritical some people (not necessarily yourself) can be. As for death, there are certain vegetative states which make the matter far less absolute than you make it out to be.

Re:what if things work out fine?

[glenstar]

I do think the entire OS should be called GNU/Linux, instead of just Linux, as most of the packages are GNU stuff.

You know, all it would take to make that a reality would be an advertising clause in the GPL saying something like "If you use this software in your program you must acknowlege the GNU project by either prepending 'GNU/' to the program's name, or...'

Trying to retroactively rename things GNU/ is just plain silly.

GCJ performance and capabilities

[__Reason__]

1. Performance? My experimentation 6 months ago with compute/object-intensive code showed a fully-optimized GCJ only getting 30% the speed of the latest Sun JVM.

GCJ isn't perfect (yet), but for the most part it produces pretty good code that matches or exceeds JRE performance on most large applications. If you are seeing such a large performance discrepency then most likely there is some bottleneck in the libgcj runtime/class libraries that your code is tripping over. We are fixing such problems regularly, but can't do so if we don't know about them. If your code runs poorly on GCJ then *please* send a message to java@gcc.gnu.org describing what you are doing or, better, with a test case/sample code. We'll do our best to help.

2. Popular applications? Can Jakarta Tomcat with JSP, etc., a common open source Java-based web server be run on it? If not, there is a clear list of what it is missing.

Tomcat runs great on GCJ. The issue today is not so much what GCJ can run, but making it easier for folks to build & run large scale applications like Tomcat and J2EE servers. The "native compiler" compilation and execution paradigm is substantially different from that of the traditional JVM, and this means it can be a lot of work to convert everything from an ant/javac build system to a native one. Solutions to this issue are a big focus for the GCJ development community right now.

3. Web applications sandbox? How about loading untrusted applications over the internet and running them in a security sandbox?

Infrastructure for the java security model is largely in place in libgcj already. There are a few bits remaining to be sorted out, but we should have a completely functional java.security AccessController/SecurityManager within the next few weeks. This will allow you to securely run a) untrusted bytecode, and b) untrusted bytecode compiled to native in a trusted compliation environment.

4. Is GTK or QT really ready to be the free cross-platform Java standard for UI?

Absolutely. Just look at java-gnome. The day will soon come when many of your native linux desktop applications are written in Java, and you won't even notice the difference.

Is there licensing preventing bundling of IBM's Eclipse UI toolkit with GCJ?

Unfortunately, it appears so. IBM's CPL, although a certified free software license, has been decreed incompatible with the GPL. This doesn't stop you writing SWT applications with GCJ, of course - many do. But the SWT itself will need to be distributed with your application or at least in a separate shared library.

Is relicensing under GPL possible?

Better ask IBM. I certainly hope a solution can be found to this problem.

Re:Please Mister the Boss...

[Per Bothner]

I did not make judgement about the reasons they have for not including it, but there is nothing in the Sun's JRE license that prevents a linux distribution from including it. Proof of that is that many do include it.

No, that is just proof that of lots of people (including distributions that ought to know better) are incredibly sloppy about licenses.

Of course they can distribute JRE - but may they? Are they violating the license - or encouraging others to violate the license? The license puts rather strong (if vague) restrictions on any GNU/Linux/*BSD distribution who wants to (legally) distribute the JRE, and a general-purpose distribution that does so is probably violating the license. Not a good idea.