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Sun's Java Will Be Free This Year
Ian Whyde notes that Sun is finally coming to the end of its struggle to open up Java completely. Simon Phipps, the chief open source officer at Sun Microsystems, said: "There were a couple of holdouts there. One was the area to do with raster graphics and 2D graphics. That turned out to be owned by a company that didn't want us to release that code as open source. We negotiated with them and because they've said 'yes, you can open source the code'... The only element that's left now is actually a sound-related component within Java. We finally decided that the vendor that's involved there just isn't going to play ball and we're rewriting the code from scratch. That's going to be done within the next couple of months." In another sense the milestone of a free Java was reached this week when IcedTea passed the rigorous Java Test Compatibility Kit.
I hope the GPL doesn't save this big steaming pile of shit. Nowadays you can browse most of the web without retarded applets popping up.
If we are going to go back to 1998 Microsoft could release ActiveX under the GPL as well. Ready for inclusion in FireFox 4 "GrandHole".
It's really another example of how irrelevant RMS has become. He's pushing his own agenda (this time Java Sucks) when Sun has gotten onboard 100% with the GPL. He'll find just about anything to bitch about, no matter how pedantic.
That's some sophisticated porn - are you sure it's not Greek?
One swallow does not a fellatrix make