Google Backs Out of JavaOne

snydeq writes "Citing concerns about Oracle's lawsuit against it, Google has backed out of the upcoming JavaOne conference. 'Oracle's recent lawsuit against Google and open source has made it impossible for us to freely share our thoughts about the future of Java and open source generally,' Google's Joshua Bloch said in a blog post. The move may signal eventual fragmentation for Java, with Google conceivably splintering off the Java-like language it uses for Android."

Comments

Loss of confidence

[Duncan J Murray]

Looks like we're seeing a new loss of confidence in Java, much like the loss of confidence in mono, for which patent concerns stunted its uptake.

So where to next?

And where is my replacement for open office?

Re:Loss of confidence

[TheRaven64]

Ximian, now Novell, did fork OO.o. You can get their fork at http://www.go-oo.org/. The only reason that Sun maintained control over OO.o was that they provided most of the code. Last statistics I saw for OO.o contributions were around 80% Sun, 15% Novell, 5% everyone else. If Oracle doesn't keep up the contribution rate, then other forks will overtake theirs and be regarded as the main version. A lot of Linux distributions already include the Novell fork, rather than the main branch, as their OpenOffice.org package.

Re:Loss of confidence

[Anonymous Coward]

Where have the ever called it Java?
The platform isn't called Java, the VM isn't called Java, and the language only says "Java like".

I'm glad

[airfoobar]

The similarity of android's dev language with Java is only superficial. It's not really Java by a long way.

Now that Oracle's Java is showing its true colours and proving it's not really open source, I see no reason for Google (or any other company that backs open source) to support it.

This will lead to Java's death, and that's a good thing because it's WAY over-due.

Re:I'm glad

[TheRaven64]

The similarity of android's dev language with Java is only superficial

You mean, aside from the fact that they are exactly the same language and both provide a large number of the same classes in the java.* namespace, they are completely different?

Re:I'm glad

[John Hasler]

Oracle is sueing for patent infringement, not trademark infringement.

Re:I'm glad

[TheRaven64]

Same language? C# and Javascript have nearly identical syntax

Nearly identical is not identical. At the language level, the language that Google uses is identical to Java, both in terms of syntax and semantics. C# is close to Java, but is clearly a distinct language. JavaScript has vaguely Java-like syntax, but Self-like semantics (while Java has Smalltalk-like semantics).

Some of the same classes? Look at how many other languages have analogous classes in their libraries. It's irresponsible not to provide string utilities, for one.

There is a difference between similar and identical. Google's Java, being the same language as Sun's Java, has namespaces. In these namespaces, there are classes. Android ships with a large number of classes in the java.* namespace, which have identical names and methods to the classes in the java.* namespace.

All vaguely OO languages have some kind of string class. Java has java.String, Java.StringBuffer. Objective-C has NSString and NSMutableString. C++ has std::string. Google's language that you are claiming is not Java has... java.String, Java.StringBuffer. All classes in Google's not-Java-really language inherit from... java.Object.

When two languages have identical syntax, identical semantics, and an identical core standard library, claiming that they are not the same language is a bit difficult. Rather than just wave your hands, maybe you could point to somewhere where Java and Google's language are actually different.

Re:But its already been done!

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

The only difference here is that Sun sued over calling something "Java" that wasn't exactly Java. Oracle is doing something a bit deeper in that they are saying that Google can't fork the language even if they call it something different.

I think I've missed something - last I saw, Google isn't calling it something different? If they were, I can't see how this would be a problem. But when I look at the Android Fundamentals page, this is the first thing I see (emphasis added):

Android applications are written in the Java programming language. The compiled Java code — along with any data and resource files required by the application — is bundled by the aapt tool into an Android package, an archive file marked by an .apk suffix. T

So where do you see that they're not calling it Java?

Re:!Good

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a technique, not an algorithm.

Google built VM allegedly infring'g Oracle patents

[mmacdona86]

That's the whole case. There's no Java license or trademark involved.

Two enormous differences with the Sun/Microsoft case: 1-- Everything Google built for Android is open-sourced; 2-- No Java license is involved

Google built a VM called Dalvik. Like the Java and .Net VM's, it can run code written in a number of languages, including the Java language. That patents at issue are not related specifically to the Java language, but they do cover common techniques in VM implementation, and if upheld could threaten other VM implementations.

Re:!Good

[mark-t]

No, you may use pointer arithmetic to *IMPLEMENT* an algorithm more efficiently, but that doesn't make it a new or better algorithm, it just makes it a more efficient implementation.

Re:For bunnies sakes ...

[Joce640k]

They're just as likely to be using COBOL but most people regard that as 'dead'.

Re:Google built VM allegedly infring'g Oracle pate

[Lulu of the Lotus-Ea]

Parent is basically correct. However, pedantically, Dalvik does not, in general, run programs written in the Java language. The language is defined not just by its syntax, but also by a certain set of standard libraries being present and implemented according to Sun/Oracle specification. Dalvik doesn't support all of those, and hence doesn't run Java.

However, Dalvik does run a very Java-like language. One that has all the syntax of Java, and *many* of the same libraries. Moreover (as everyone here knows, I'm sure), programs compiled by 'javac' to .class file may be converted to Dalvik executables (as long as they contain only the subset of Java that Dalvik supports).

It would be proper to prevent Google from claiming that Android "Runs Java"... but then, I'm pretty sure they never claimed that to start with. Indeed mostly--almost entirely--it's claims about patents that should never have been granted, or really just about lawsuits to try to mess up competition and technical progress just for the sake of disruption (I doubt Oracle actually cares that much about the outcome, it's mostly FUD).

Re:!Good

[ToasterMonkey]

Call me back when your operating system is written in Java. Oh wait, Sun tried that - another failure.

You're an idiot.

Re:Is English not your first language?

[mark-t]

You misunderstand what I'm getting at. Pointer arithmetic may make an implementation faster, but that doesn't make the algorithm itself any faster. A faster algorithm is one that has a lower speed complexity, not one that simply runs more quickly than another. I'm not saying that pointer arithmetic isn't useful, only that it's superfluous to designing faster algorithms. At best, it's an implementation detail.