ESR Responds to Sun's Claims of Being a Better Bazaar

UnixSphere writes "Sun has been quoted to have said, 'Sun's Java is developed more in the mode of the bazaar than Linux is,' which has prompted OSI President Eric Raymond to correct Sun's view of what open source really is."

Comments

Re:Free Forking?

[SHEENmaster]

The difference is that Microsoft did it maliciously. If Sun forked an ancient version of Redhat, and sold it as Sun Redhat/Linux, Redhat would be rightfully pissed when people assumed that their modern software is crap because of it.

When Microsoft implemented J++, they touted it as Java, but it lacked many features that became standard in Java, like Swing. Including their own VM with Windows made users think they had Java, when they didn't, such that Swing applets couldn't be generally deployed for years.

I'm not defending Sun's claim that Java is more open than Linux, just that they had every right and every duty to keep Microsoft from fucking Java up for all of us.

What about GCJ and Kaffe and others?

[Kunta Kinte]

You are only stuck with the JRE for Java because Sun keeps you from having a choice. If Java were an open standard, there would be dozens of different implementations, and those implementations would work out amongst themselves what features were important core features and what features were vendor-specific extensions.

Yeah right! Magical open-source developers will come out of nowhere right?

If you want open-source Java, and feel serious about helping out, then you have GCJ and Kaffe.

Sun has allowed alternative JVMs for a long time and there are now many other JVMs to choose from.

You have your opportunity you develop Open-source Java, put your time and money where your mouth is, support Kaffe today!

Or do you just want to freeload off Sun's investement in their JVM?... Even if they already provide it for free.