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OpenOffice 2.0 Criticized on Use of Java
karvind writes "Yahoo is running a story on how OpenOffice 2.0 Faces Opposition over Its Use of Java. According the article: "The problem, according to some free software voices, is that OO.o relies too much on Sun Microsystems Inc.'s proprietary Java programming language in an open-source project. In particular, free software advocates are objecting to the use of Sun specific Java code for such OO.o 2.0 features as the new, Microsoft Access-like database management program, Base and Writer's (OO.o's word processor) document wizards." Linus Torvalds also moved to an open-source solution for software configuration management system."
It's here, it's (basically) free. Why not use it?
Also, who is Linus Trolvalds?
Hey ASSHOLES, the current Java source code can be downloaded here, and the latest development version can be downloaded here. And if that's not enough for you, your precious Kaffe, gcj, GNU Classpath, and other "Open Source" projects are working on reimplementing the JVM. I don't particularly care if you like Java or not, but I've had enough of this bullshit about Java being open or not. It's a God damn language/platform with thousands of successful Open Source projects under it, and has been opened up six ways to sunday. Comparing the issue to Linus's predicament is disingenuous at best, is not outright dishonest!
Not to mention that OpenOffice is Sun's baby. They PAID MONEY FOR IT. (I know that's a foreign concept here, since the entire fraking world is supposed to be FREE for the fraking taking.) If you don't like the direction OpenOffice has taken, then go play with KOffice. Oh wait, you alreay pissed them off too. Is there anyone you people won't make an enemy of in your Quixotic quests of stupidity?
Apologies for the abrasiveness of this post, but crap like this deserves it. You've been given a gift and all you can do is look it in the mouth.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
If someone could explain how this relates to OO.o's use of Java, I'd appreciate it :P Otherwise I'll just assume the submitter is trying to be a little more sensational about things.
Java works, and works well. However, I can see the point about OpenOffice being totally *free.* However, Since OpenOffice is essentially StarOffice, which, if I am not mistaken, comes from SUN, why not use it?
I'm not a troll, but I play one on Slashdot.
Sun buys StarOffice, and spins up a free version of it for the "community." They decide to use some of their own technology (Java) in this program. So what?
Sun controls OpenOffice/StarOffice, and Sun controls Java. Both have been opened more than your typical commercial holding. What's the problem?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
well, assuming that Java _does_ run everywhere, which of course, we know it doesn't. Or doesn't run _well_... like on HP-UX.
But anyway...
What better language should they pick? VB? csh? Perl? Python? Mono? Java has relatively point-n-click installers for many popular OSes, has a remarkable amount of functionality, and will smooth their development wrinkles because of its universality. Remember, this is a desktop app, it needs to largely 'just work' from an installation perspective, you don't want Joe Windows User going to ActiveState and getting some Perl package, or needing some cygwin-esque environment to run Python or something else.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
--- You are in a little twisty maze of comments, all different.
Because it depends on undocumented "features" that are only available in the sun JRE, which is THE PROBLEM THE ARTICLE IS ABOUT. Wasn't this exactly what sun (quite rightly) criticised MS for doing with java?
I am trolling
Python which is slow, has a much smaller user base and far less consistent and well-documented standard library?
Perl whose readability for many coders is next to nothing?
C++ because we all know that more buffer overflows and random craziness is what OpenOffice needs to compete with Microsoft Office?
C# since 93-95% of the desktop users out there use Windows, why bother with the minority of others? (I actually quite like C# and am hopeful about Mono)
Ruby because a language that most coders have never even seen before is clearly the best way for a fresh start?
Objective-C because when Steve Jobs takes over the world, we'll need to be on his good side?
C, since objects really are overrated for anything that normal developers might want to maintain?
So seriously, of all of the major language choices, which would be better?
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
Believe it or not, but OO2 relying so heavily on Java is a problem, as Java is not free software.
Now all the name calling that is currently going on here will not change this simple fact and all this "I don't give a f*** as long as it works" won't change the fact that java not being free software poses a problem.
Look for example at Debian, or Fedora, or Ubuntu, they all ship without Java because of licensing problems. Having one of the most important apps for desktop linux rely heavily on Java sure poses a problem for these distributions and their users.
That said, I get the feeling that something good will eventually come off this situation, as said distributions (and especiall RedHat) are now working even harder on providing a true free Java environment and make OO2 run with it.
As someone who prefers free software and someone who runs linux on non-x86 (ppc, therefor no current Java + firefox plugin available) I can only welcome this development.
Maybe they think that OOo 2.0 will get released too soon and would prefer to wait a few years for the developers to port, and test the code.
There's HypersonicSQL, that would have to be removed from its dev team, forked, and ported to a non java language. Then all of the code that uses it. I'm sure there's lots of other stuff.
So, we could add a year or more to the release and get the exact same features with the same performance, the same license (OOo license), and more bugs.
Yes, we could wait and get nothing except binaries that were made from source that was written in a language that has a different license.
Or maybe the crybabies, who think this is such a big deal, could take the open source java source code and port it too some other language (C#?) of their choosing and thank the original developers for devoting their time. I notice that Richard Stallman is calling for volunteers instead of just doing it. Typical.
Bill Gates has got to love this. The open source community builds a product to compete against his products. Then instead of unifying to make the project better, they split up to make a competing copy of the competing product. And this is over a language that there are open source tools to deal with.
Or, we could all give a word of thanks to the developers who dedicated so much time so that we all may benefit. Even MSOffice users will benefit as MS improves their product and lowers their prices to cope with new competition.
----- If communism is a system where the government owns business, what do you call a system where business owns govern
We need the ability to moderate the articles themselves. Myself, I'd give the article a -1, Redundant (covered before, as you mention), -1, Troll (for trying to get people unnecessarily spun up), and -1, Flamebait (for name dropping Linus in a conversation that has nothing to do with him).
Rule #1 -- Politics always trumps technology.
It doesn't do any good to have open source software if it requires a closed source VM to run. You're still at the mercy of whoever controls the VM. If they decide to pull your license (as Sun did to FreeBSD) then you're no longer allowed to use your own software. You can't build Free Software on a non-Free foundation.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
-- from the article --
Still others have suggested that instead of using an open-source Java, these components be rewritten in an entirely different language such as Ruby or Python.
However, some programmers have just gone ahead and found fixes for OO.o, which enables it to run with GCJ.
Caolán McNamara, a programmer with Red Hat who specializes in word processing, has created one such set of fixes.
A source at Sun said, "OO.o 2 works OK with GCJ" and that "Red Hat has been tremendously helpful in the effort to make that so, filing bug reports etc."
In addition, while OO.o will run without a JVM (Java Virtual Machine), it will use one if it's available, and its performance has been found to be much better if Sun's 5.0 JVM is used.
But, as Scott Carr, OO.o's quality assurance project co-lead pointed out, "OO.o will run perfectly well without any JVM, but if there is a JVM then it has to do checks to make sure what features are supported in the JVM as well as run various functions. These are only run in the presence of a JVM."
-- end FTA --
So... if there is a JVM, [something] runs better/faster than if there wasn't. For starters, the app works without Java. Secondly, it's been fixed to compile with an open-source Java compiler. Thirdly, what kind of code runs this way? The article didn't specify.
How odd.
Regardless, this is still a big deal about nothing, as per usual.
-Rob
Marriage doesn't have to suck!
Hé des ABRUTIS, le code source courant de Java peuvent être téléchargés ici [ sun.com ], et la dernière version de développement peut être téléchargée ici [ java.net ]. Et si ce n'est pas assez pour vous, votre Kaffe précieux [ kaffe.org ], gcj [ gnu.org ], GNU Classpath [ gnu.org ], et d'autres projets "de source ouverte" travaillent à reimplementing le JVM. Je ne m'inquiète pas en particulier si vous aimez Java ou pas, mais j'ai eu assez de cette connerie au sujet de Java étant ouvert ou pas. C'est un rien language/platform de Dieu avec des milliers de projets ouverts réussis de source sous lui, et a été ouvert six manières au dimanche. Comparer l'issue à la situation fâcheuse de Linus est insincère au mieux, n'est pas malhonnête pure! Pour ne pas mentionner qu'OpenOffice est le bébé du soleil. Ils ONT PAYÉ L'CArgent LUI. (je sais qui est un concept étranger ici, puisque le monde fraking entier est censé être LIBRE pour la prise fraking.) Si vous n'aimez pas la direction OpenOffice a pris, alors va jeu avec KOffice. Attente d'Oh, vous alreay pissé leur au loin aussi. Y a-t-il n'importe qui que vous peuplez ne ferez pas un ennemi de à vos recherches de Quixotic de stupidité? Les excuses pour l'abrasif de ce poteau, mais le crap comme ceci le méritent. Vous avez été donnés un cadeau et tout que vous pouvez faire doit le regarder dans la bouche.
Not Java. Fork Open Office. Write the whole thing in Lisp if you wish. If yours is the better deal, the world will beat a path to your door.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
>If someone could explain how this relates to OO.o's use of Java, I'd appreciate it.
2 .0-development/ch19lev1sec2.html
s p
As I say in the story--in a one sentence remark--it's because in both cases, some people are objecting to the use of proprietary software in an open source project.
It's not like this is a new battle between free software advocates and open-source supporters. The one most people probably know best is the use of TrollTech's QT in KDE. For more on that, see:
http://developer.kde.org/documentation/books/kde-
For the original version of the OO.o story see:
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1813986,00.a
Steven
Because it depends on undocumented "features" that are only available in the sun JRE, which is THE PROBLEM THE ARTICLE IS ABOUT. Wasn't this exactly what sun (quite rightly) criticised MS for doing with java?
Read RMS's The Java Trap. He isn't complaining about undocumented features, he was complaining about using features that haven't been implemented in a 'free' version of Java yet. In essence, he's complaining that GNU Classpath isn't developing fast enough (although he would never word it that way). Once GNU Classpath catches up to Sun (if it happens), then Open Office will work just fine with it.
And this wasn't what Sun was criticizing MS for. MS was adding very well documented (and thoughtful) features to Java. New features like delegates. Sun just didn't want to loose control of Java. They didn't say no one should advance Java past version 1.1. They said only Sun should make changes to the language.
It seems that people are getting upset at looking at the imports in the code without realizing that THEY ARE NEVER USED!!! Again, I refer you to the blog entry, but for those of you too lazy:
This gcj request asks for the addition of java.awt.Frame.createBufferStrategy which is all that is missing from gcj to build the java canvas stuff. (Though the canvas module contains a pile of spurious imports of sun.awt which are unnecessary and can be removed, not that there's much point right now, if a createBufferStrategy becomes available then removing the sun.awt from the canvas/java .javas is all that's outstanding)
Nothing to see here, just move along. More jumping the gun rather than investigating things to completion.
Who is John Galt?
I don't see anywhere in the article that indicates they're using undocumented internal com.sun.* classes. The problem seems to be that some key functionality in OpenOffice is implemented with Java, and that Java itself is not free.
;)
;)
Whether they say it in the article or not, it happens to be the case. Here is a post by the main Kaffe developer about it. I quote:
>import sun.security.provider.*;
>import sun.security.provider.SystemIdentity;
>import sun.security.provider.SystemSigner;
Not implemented and most probably won't be. These are
the JDK 1.1 undocumented (actually sun mentions them
in an example in the java security architecture paper,
but explicitely recommends staying away from it) key
management apis. Sun has deprecated the corresponding
classes in java.security with java 1.2, and uses
different key management facilities. Open office
developers should know better, as they are supposed to
be using java 1.3, right?
[lots of other imports of sun.* and sunw.* classes]
Anyone using sun.* classes doesn't _want_ to be
portable accross VM releases/implementations. Someone
(either the open office developers, or the debian
developers wanting to build open office using free
software) should clean up the sun.* mess. I wouldn't
want to implement sun.* classes just to suit someone
else's bad programming style, and I don't know anyone
who does
GCJ can already compile and run Eclipse, which is one of the most complex Java apps out there. I doubt compiling OPenOffice 2.0's Java code into .so format would be a huge hurdle.
Why does slashdot insist on posting such obvious trolls? This whole article and slashdot story should be modded -99 TROLL! The submitter obviously was hoping to start a flame war with the OSS free-software *coughstallmancough* zealots and the people who know better currently have the highest modded posts on this forum. There is no Java trap. As long as Java's source lays out in the open people will implement their own JVMs and compilers and the world will move on. If Sun goes down the drain then well, I guess by gosh those OSS zealots that are whining need to get their act together to implement all of those open sourced "hidden features."
.Net has a long ways to catch up. Can't we find better things to argue over? That Java is even open sourced says multitudes about the effect of Free Software.
With the world all going to hell, you'd think that people could find better things to argue about. Java is obviously a well used toolbox in the open source and to say that it will have negative consequences is truly sad. Why do people use Java even though people bitch and moan about how slow and slow it is and how it lacks certain primitives (and it does), it is because it just works on nearly any operating system. When you only want to devote the time to develop for one platform, but at the same time allow just about anyone with a computer to run your code, what are you going to use?
Azureus, Slimserver's MP3 player, a bunch of emulators, and a whole slew of other projects that can be found on Sourceforge, amongst other places, were all built on Java.
Who knows, Java may live up to its promises as a platform for embedded devices one day. Given how many Universities teach Java right from the start and how many teachers are right now telling people that Java is likely to be the next big language, I wouldn't exactly say that Java is going anywhere anytime soon. Microsoft is now wishing they had come up with a similar idea and
Next troll/story please!
zosxavius photography
Of course you can. Stallman himself points out that that's how free software was developed. If the first free software had had to wait for the first free user to toggle the first free monitor and free assembler into memory one byte at a time, there wouldn't be any free software. Free software was built on back of unliberated software.
The message you quote is from 1 Jul 2002, nearly 3 years ago. Do you have any current indication that com.sun.* classes are still in use?
What cygwin-esque environment is needed to run python apps? Links and resources, please...
Normally, I just install python's win32 installer, and run my apps. If I need some third-party extension, I just install it, and go. No need for any cygwin-esque environment.
-gus
Which is precisely what the Free Software Foundation is doing. The FSF people are hoping that the folks at Sun will want to prevent a fork bad enough that they will work at little harder at making OO.org work with gcj. If Sun doesn't play ball then the FSF will fork OO.org and their gcj version will undoubtedly become the version that gets shipped with at least the Debian and Red Hat (and Fedora) distributions (and very probably others as well). And don't think these organizations are bluffing either. Gnome got its start in almost exactly the same way. The FSF, Red Hat, and Debian didn't like the licensing for KDE and so they did something about it.
The real question is whether or not Sun wants a large chunk of its current OO.org's user base to use someone else's fork of OO.org because that's what is currently shaping up to happen. If Sun's execs think that these organizations (especially the FSF) are likely to be "reasonable" about the use of non-free software then they are clearly delusional. Sun has been dealing with GNU software and the FSF forever, and they have never seen them back down once.
The worst part is that Sun really needs the Free Software faction of the Open Source community. After all, it really does take a zealot to propose replacing MS Office with some other piece of software. The pragmatists in the crowd are more than happy to wait and see if MS Office can really be replaced. The people that are currently considering replacing MS Office with OO.org are doing so because they believe in Free Software. Without enough zealots to take that first step OO.org is never going to have serious market penetration.
Framing java as "not open sourced" misses some significant shades of gray in the software development community. The useful tools for java development have been constructed by a community, and are available for download from sourceforge, apache, sun and other 'vendors'/bazaars.
The useful tools for competing languages are highly proprietary, and the availability of mature, useful communities and code for extending those languages is far more limited than with java.
Criticizing OpenOffice for being built with Java, which isn't "open", is kind of silly, in this broader context. It amounts to cutting off our nose to spite our face.
objectWizard42
What you and many others fail to understand is that Java the trademark might be owned by Sun, but Java the language LONG AGO went into the hands of the community - namly the Java Community Process. Java is really controlled by a LOT of companies now including IBM. Do you think IBM is really going to care if Sun withdraws into a shell? They would move forward with Java regardless, and they have a whole VM to back up such an action.
Java already has a community. It's up to Sun to try and mesh the two communities but if you just pretend Java = Sun then you will never understand the results of anything that happens, as the reality is far more complex.
Personally I'd like to see the focus be on catching up GCJ with the standards, and having a first-class Open Source Free VM. Then this whole debate is moot.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The JVM is a specification that may be implemented on different platforms as people are so inclined.
"Opening Java" will do nothing to address the problem of missing JVMs directly because the fundamental issue is one of demand. If you really need a JVM for your favorite toy OS, then start a project to build one.
Indeed, the problem is big. Some BSDs don't have java, linux ppc users either. Right now Java's "portability" is a joke with Sun's VM, even if it was free as in speech.
That's why GNU classpath & GCJ is important. It will provide us with a free (as in speech & beer) java VM for those who doesn't want to use Sun's VM (linux users, basically). Redhat is putting lots programmers & money behind of GCJ and collaborating with tons of community-based projects - they really want a free java. In fact, Redhat has some people hacking on GCJ to support openoffice's java features.
Actually, GCJ 4 is one of the GCC 4.0 greatest features, here is an article about why it's so great. They've achieved almost all Java 1.4 important features and there's work ongoing to support 1.5.
And GCJ does support, in fact, MORE architectures and operative systems than Sun's propietary offerings - yes, more. It's what will make java truly palataform-independent. GCJ is part of GCC, so it supports the platforms that gcc supports - much more than Sun's VM or other propietary VMs
GCJ can compile java code for the platforms supported by GCC - way more than Sun's offerings or other propietary VMs.
Red Hat is paying people to support OOo 2.0 with GCJ. And GCJ 4.0 is already quite good...
See: The Java Trap, by Richard Stallman
Sun's implementation of Java is non-free. Blackdown is also non-free; it is an adaptation of Sun's proprietary code. The standard Java libraries are non-free also. We do have free implementations of Java, such as the GNU Java Compiler and GNU Classpath, but they don't support all the features yet. We are still catching up.
So the "free" version of Java is incomplete.
The reliable way to avoid the Java Trap is to have only a free implementation of Java on your system. Then if you use a Java feature or library that free software does not yet support, you will find out straightaway, and you can rewrite that code immediately.
And he wants developers to write Java targetting this crippled "free" version instead of the official Sun compiler.
Here's an idea FIX THE DAMN "FREE" COMPILER. There's nothing wrong with the Java code people are writing - it's the incomplete "free" compiler that's the problem.
I am the maverick of Slashdot
What's scary is that you are freakin' serious. First off, there's nothing similar to Java that runs faster at raw performance numbers (method calls/second, numerical speed, GC). Python is much slower in that respect. Even the leading Smalltalk implementations are 1/4 the performance of Java at object-oriented benchmarks like method call overhead. Smalltalks are similar to Python in being dynamic object-oriented languages, but have had a LOT more optimization work done. Microsoft does everything they can to prevent non-funded C# benchmarks from being released, but even their C# is significantly slower performance-wise in running "managed code" (mono is a non-contender).
You're right that Python can be faster, mostly at scripting, because of using native code in more direct ways, but for something like OO.o where there is a LOT of code and quite a bit of math (laying out all that data, updating spreadsheets) realistically a pure-python implementation would probably be around 1/20th the speed of a Java one. FYI, Python runs significantly faster than Jython/JPython because the Java virtual machine is not designed for dynamic ("message passing") form of OO... but running the quivalent code in Java and Python, and Java will be the clear winner.
And oh yeah you think Mono is faster because the Language shootout says so? Or Java is slow? Take for example the word-counting benchmark for C, C#, and Java. Notice that the Java version uses the system locale's definition of whitespace where as the C# version hard-codes checks against space, \n, and \t? Or that the C version uses freaking table of sums to avoid branching? Under the hood Java is doing three method calls, an &, and a compare is almost as fast as Mono doing just 3 simple integer comparisons. Not that the language shootout is even fair... for instance it should compare throughput by increasing the number of iterations until it takes more than a certain time (so if C is 5x faster on a benchmark it does 5x more iterations). When even this minor scripting is too difficult to do it doesn't inspire much confidence in the results. Without this change they have lots of granularity errors and measuring of startup time on the fast end.
So yeah mod me down because this is a rant... but I'm just tired of the ignorant repeating over and over that Java is slow, when it's really the fastest of its kind.
No, you're the one who needs to get a grip.
Free Software isn't about taking down Microsoft and other big corporations. I don't use FreeBSD because I want to "stick it to the man." Free software is about being able to use software unencumbered by licensing restrictions. And what do you mean that nerds have no vision? Richard Stallman, Linus Torvalds, the BSD developers, and hundreds of other nerds have the vision of creating completely free software for everyone. Yes, we still have some things to work on (like that Swedish thesaurus and spell checker that you mentioned), but it's getting there.
Nobody in the "real world" (boy I hate that phrase; I'll change it to "non-geek world") cares about Debian and Fedora shipping Java because the non-geek world uses Mac OS X and Windows. The last thing on the average Mac user's or Windows user's mind is the licensing of Java; it either comes with their computer or it is a quick download away. But Linux and BSD users are in a different realm, the "surreal world" as you probably call it, and they aren't generally going to put up with the licensing. Besides, Sun Java isn't available for many platforms. What if I'm using NetBSD on an Alpha machine? Too bad, I can't use Sun Java even if I wanted to.
The point is, free software isn't about "sticking it to the man." It is about using unencumbered software. If you have a problem with this, you can always return to your Mac or Windows box, along with your Java. Nobody's stopping you from using that, and nobody's stopping geeks like myself from forking OpenOffice.