Google, Sun Headed for Showdown Over Android

narramissic writes "There may be trouble brewing between Google and Sun. Google has written its own virtual machine for Android, 'most likely as a way to get around licensing issues with Sun.' If Google used any of Sun's intellectual property to build Dalvik, Sun could sue Google for patent infringement. But here's where it gets interesting - Sun is a vocal advocate for open source and it would 'hardly appease the open source community to sue Google over an open source software stack.'"

Comments

To put it bluntly.

[LWATCDR]

So reporter thinks that Sun might sue Google for forking Java all the while over looking the fact that Sun has GPLed Java and that other groups have produced versions of Java with out getting sued. Google and Sun both are saying that they are working together.
In other words a none story.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's not a non-story.

OK, mini-rant about Sun and Java's naming. Java is three distinct things that Sun has helpfully lumped into one name:

1. The virtual machine.
2. The collection of libraries.
3. The language itself.

Google is using #3, the Java language. They are not using #1, the virtual machine, and using only some subset of #2, the collection of libraries.

Now given the way that Sun sued Microsoft over changing parts of Java in the past, it's almost guaranteed that they'll do it again over Google not using their virtual machine or library.

I can't really blame Google though, since the VM is why Java is notoriously slow, and the libraries is why it's notoriously member hungry. For a PC that's not a big deal, but on a mobile device, it is. There's a reason Java ME has gone nowhere, and Google is trying to succeed where Java has failed.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[davester666]

I think Android is good for the cell phone industry and for developers in that it sounds like it's a full reset of the API's that are available to developers. The current setup that Sun provides has boatloads of backwards compatibility cruft and old API's like AWT that just don't help with providing either great experiences for developers or end-users. If anything, Sun will jump on the Android bandwagon by adding the same API's to their VM [making it even more bloated].

Re:To put it bluntly.

[fm6]

Pretty much. But it's worth noting that many companies in Sun's position would sue Google. Not only did Google clone Sun's Java technology, they hired some of Sun's best Java people to do it. Of course, suing wouldn't accomplish much, but some ego-driven CEOs wouldn't let that stop them.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Yes, it is a non story. Sun sued Microsoft years before they open sourced java. Micorosft has also signed a license saying that they would not fork java, but they did anyways. In this case Sun says its cool, then its cool. I don't know how true your assertions about Java ME are, but they are not true of Java in general. GuI interfaces are usually done horribly in Java, because its easy to screw them up. The unresponsive Gui (see zend framework) often makes people think that Java is slow.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[cromar]

It's not the CEOs. It's the PR and legal depts.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[Dr. Slacker]

I think you forgot that MS had to stop using their Java VM and use Sun's VM instead. If you look in an XP machine's Control Panel you'll see Sun's JAVA icon.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[Actually, I do RTFA]

GuI interfaces are usually done horribly in Java, because its easy to screw them up. The unresponsive Gui (see zend framework) often makes people think that Java is slow.

Unresponsive is slow. From a user's (and my) POV, I don't care if code executes in 10ms or 299ms if the GUI refreshes every 300ms. Why, because I use a program to do things, not to marvel at the effiency of the algorithim (unless I'm examining the code).

Additionally, a lack of progress bars leads to killing processes and restarting them, making them slower in reality.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[Pollardito]

Now given the way that Sun sued Microsoft over changing parts of Java in the past, it's almost guaranteed that they'll do it again over Google not using their virtual machine or library. but did they just take away things from the library and not add new features to the core? it's one thing to release a new platform that doesn't support all of the java libraries, that just means that existing programs aren't completely portable to your new device and is really your own loss. it's another to do what MS did and that is to add language features (method pointers for callbacks), release a developer suite for your bastardized version of the language, and encourage people to develop programs using it that won't work on other VMs. Sun probably doesn't love either choice, but they're not equivalent problems.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[ReeceTarbert]

There's a reason Java ME has gone nowhere

Uh? You are kidding aren't you?

What about this list of Networks Operatos and Carriers

Or the Java ME Device Table?

Or, for that matter, what about these phones from Nokia, Motorola and Sony Ericcson just to name a few?

Google is trying to succeed where Java has failed

I agree that there's a lot NOT to like about Java, but calling it a failure it's just trolling... and I just fell for it! ;-)

RT
--
Your Bookmarks. Anywhere. Anytime.

nothing to see here

[doktorjayd]

FTA:

While Sun declined to comment directly for this story, it pointed to some public statements from company executives. Jonathan Schwartz, president and CEO of Sun, wrote a blog post congratulating Google on the day of Android's launch. Notably, he refers to Android as a "Java/Linux" platform

where is the trouble? the article is pure beat-up.

the reason for dalvik is entirely technical. check out the youtube presentations, it makes it pretty clear that you develop in pretty much pure java, but the runtime needed a little more than the standard jme could provide.

move on..

How about an Android for this Web ?

[kyashan]

A bit offtopic...

How about Google bringing decent Java performance on the Web ? Possibly with OpenGL ES like for Android.
Java on web browsers has possibly gotten worse with years. Sun loaded it so much with useless crap and didn't even try to get a proper way to vsync an applet (very important if you are trying to make a media application/game that requires the basic concept of frame-rate).

Current multi-media web dev is relegated to Flash, but I'm sure that there are many skilled programmers out there that would be glad to have a lean Java VM & API working in web browsers. Sun gave up long time ago, Google could take over and make it ubiquitous.

Re:How about an Android for this Web ?

[mhall119]

Java on web browsers has possibly gotten worse with years. Java 6 update 3 contains improvements to both install and startup of the JVM within web browsers.

Current multi-media web dev is relegated to Flash, but I'm sure that there are many skilled programmers out there that would be glad to have a lean Java VM & API working in web browsers. Sun gave up long time ago, Google could take over and make it ubiquitous. A new spec for easily embedded media components is in the works, hopefully it will make it into Java 7, and will be a good compliment to Java FX script on the web. There is talk about plugging it into existing media frameworks like GStreamer or VLC, to bring in all of their supported formats. Sun may have deglected multi-media, but it's not quite forgotten yet.

Slashdot is being sensational

[bogaboga]

The article that Slashdot links to is headed: "Google and Sun may butt heads over Android." Key word: "May".

Then Slashdot modifies the headline to say: "Google, Sun Headed for Showdown Over Android."

Question is: Does anyone of these reporters work for either company in order to have this seemingly serious situation? I doubt it.

J2ME

[notknown86]

IMHO, Android fills a void in Java Mobile applications by providing API to build richer applications (lcdui, in particular, is limiting) - more useful for Smart Phones which contain the ability to provide these types of functionalities. If J2ME filled every void, Android as an API wouldn't be needed (though Android as an OS could still fill a void). According to the article, JME requires a licencing fee. Android does not - this precludes building on the existing platform (unless, of course, Sun actually did waive the fee). Regardless, isn't it possible that this is a fragmentation where the positives outweigh the negatives?

Ahhhh, Slashdot

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Title: "Google, Sun Headed for Showdown"
Summary: There MAY be trouble brewing between Google and Sun...
TFA: Google COULD get in trouble with Sun, according to some analyst (but both parties declined to comment)
Reality: Move along, nothing to see here...

Re:Ahhhh, Slashdot

[bladesjester]

Sun uses death star to kill google

Let's not get AT&T involved in this.

Re:Does Sun make any money from Java on phones?

[mhall119]

Sun has or is in the process of open-sourcing their implementations of JavaSE, JavaME and JavaEE, as well as their JVM and Java compiler.

Sun does make money licensing their Java code to third parties, but that isn't a requirement for providing Java support. The Java language specification is freely available, anybody can create their own implementation, but for most companies it is cheaper to reuse Sun's implementation than make their own. Sun even provides financial assistance for small businesses or open-source projects to take the Java compatibility test. Heck, they've even open-sources the test harness for the compatibility test.

Re:Does Sun make any money from Java on phones?

[ricegf]

I don't know for sure, but since it's Slashdot, I'll happily speculate. ;-)

Java is GPLed. A manufacturer is free to tweak Java for his machine and ship it... with the source code. Or, he can pay Sun a nominal fee for a non-GPL license and tweak to his heart's content, and keep his tweaks to himself.

This is precisely the dual-license model used for QT, and it works pretty well. Free software gets to use the technology for free. Proprietary software pays for a proprietary license, but they're charging their customers anyway. Everybody's happy. Well, except for BSD advocates... ;-) ;-)

honest to god

[pugugly]

I read this for a second as "Google, Sun Headed for Showdown Over Asteroid", and thought Google *might* be overreaching - .

Pug

Change the name.

[SanityInAnarchy]

There used to be something like this with JavaScript, though I don't think Sun ever owned that -- wasn't it Netscape? Ah, well...

I remember Microsoft re-implemented it from scratch, but because someone owned the name "JavaScript", they simply called it "JScript".

So, Google is now selling the brand "Android", which is a shift from the pseudo-codename "gPhone". It seems like they're in an ideal position to say "Fine, we won't call it Java." And they will be careful to refer to it only as the "Android language", "Android libraries", and "Android runtime" in their official documentation -- even though many people will simply call it "Java" anyway.

So, threatening legal action when all you own is the name -- that's not always stupid, but here, they're going up against Google. Seems to me, they'd be throwing away a lot of perfectly good free PR for Java -- especially if Android kicks Java ME's ass.

Re:Change the name.

[ClassMyAss]

Jonathan Schwartz's blog post seems to indicate that Sun would prefer to milk this for the publicity rather than cause a fuss over it. Whatever happened behind the scenes, I took that post as a white flag from Sun, basically saying, "Look, we're not on board for a bunch of reasons, but we've got no beef here, let's all try to get along and spin this to each of our needs."

Even if the VM is not officially Java, you're still ending up with a whole lot of development energy invested in Java, which is good for Sun. I really hope there's no way they are stupid enough to bring this to court just to make a few bucks...

headline is kind of cool

[JeanBaptiste]

A number which is 10 followed by 100 zeros in a cage match against a hydrogen fusion reactor which accounts for 99.8% of the mass of our solar system. The whole thing happened over a misunderstanding regarding a robot designed to have human features.

it's a real issue

[m2943]

while over looking the fact that Sun has GPLed Java

Releasing software under the GPL wouldn't give Google patent rights, since Google is not basing their software on Sun's.

and that other groups have produced versions of Java with out getting sued

Quite to the contrary: all conforming Java implementations that have ever been produced are produced under license from Sun, and Sun has used legal threats to ensure that.

There are a bunch of non-conforming implementations where Sun has chosen not to press the issue yet, but that doesn't tell you that Sun doesn't have the patents or doesn't enforce them. And, if you look at USPTO, you'll see that Sun has dozens of Java-related patents, some of them on fundamental aspects of the platform like bytecode verification.

OTOH, I suspect Google was careful about this, and this is one of the reasons Google didn't use a standard JVM. In the end, all Android shares with Sun Java is a fairly generic programming language and some fairly generic core APIs.

A bigger story - BSD libc + Linux

[btarval]

Well, I wouldn't quite say that it's a non-story. But IMHO there's a bigger story which has been missed. Namely, that Google decided to take a BSD-derived libc and include it as a part of their Android effort. This is running on top of Linux.

This is a blow aimed squarely at the Free Software Foundation, and RMS's efforts to establish GPLv3. Good luck in trying to square that one away.

Now, why in the world Google would do this is beyond me. IHMO it smacks of too much money, and too many engineers with not enough relevant things to do. But hey, if Google's goal is to try to minimize both versions of the GPL, well, I can think of no better effort.

Re:A bigger story - BSD libc + Linux

[DavidNWelton]

No, it was aimed squarely at having a smaller libc than glibc, according to the google guy who was hanging out on #android. It is an "embedded device" with space constraints, you know!

Re:Does Sun make any money from Java on phones?

[kripkenstein]

This is precisely the dual-license model used for QT, and it works pretty well. Free software gets to use the technology for free. Proprietary software pays for a proprietary license, but they're charging their customers anyway. Everybody's happy. Well, I'm not sure Qt is such a good example. In fact many (including me) believe that the reason GTK+ has been popular in recent years (used on all major desktop distros - Ubuntu, Fedora, SUSE; Nokia devices; etc.) is precisely the licensing issue. Imagine if Linux itself (the kernel) used that licensing model - GPL for free, pay up otherwise. Would Linux be as popular today? I doubt it.

The general model of GPL for apps, LGPL for frameworks that apps run on top of, makes sense. You want to extend the kernel? Write in GPL. You want to run some app of yours on top of it? No problem, you are free to do so. This is precisely what the LGPL is for.