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Apache Declares War On Oracle Over Java
jfruhlinger writes "The Apache Software Foundation, feeling increasingly marginalized as Oracle asserts its control over the Java platform, is fighting back, trying to rally fellow members of the Java Community Process to block the next version of the language if Oracle doesn't make it available under an open license amenable to Apache. Last month's Oracle-IBM pact was a blow against the ASF, which had worked with IBM in the past, but it appears that Apache isn't giving up the fight."
You sue them over patents. Look at what MS is doing to folks build android handsets.
I don't think that's right; this isn't about GPL vs. the Apache license. The issue isn't the licensing of OpenJDK itself, but about the licensing of the Java Technology Compatibility Kit (the JCK), which is used to test if an implementation is compatible with a given version of the Java spec. The JCK isn't available under an open source license at all. If the JCK were under the GPL, or even if it were under a license that didn't permit you to modify it, but only permitted anyone to run it, then Apache could use it to test their Java implementation, which is what they want to do.
A lot of the people who comment on the subject seem to be familiar with the Java language itself, but not so much with the significance of the frameworks and libraries that are out there. In these threads, I don't usually get the sense that some of the posters are very aware of just how much business software has been built in Java in the past decade. Whenever I see comments dismissing Java based on stuff like applet or Swing performance, it just drives the point home that some people simply don't understand where the Java code is. (Hint, it's not in the end-user GUI or the 2D or 3D animation.)
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
You don't know what you're talking about.
The problem is that to be a compatible Java implementation you must pass the TCK. To get a hold of the TCK you must agree that your Java implementation has a limited field of use, namely desktop computers. That means you have to add a clause to your licence that tells your users where they can use the software - no such clause exists in any open source licence I'm aware of.
Sure you can use the OpenJDK, you can even fork it, but therein lies the problem... you can't, because if you do and you want to claim it's a compatible implementation you have to pass the TCK. So you have to licence the TCK, then you have to add a field of use restriction to your licence, but that's incompatible with the GPL that the OpenJDK GPL requires you to licence under.
End result, you can have Oracle Java or 'Open'JDK
The ASF don't have a political axe to grind with the GPL, aren't firing a salvo in some imaginary war based on their view of free; It's about a contractual obligation Oracle has to release the TCK to the ASF. An obligation Sun had and failed to meet and that Oracle continues to fail to meet.
The ASF was re-elected to the JCP with 95% of the vote. No other elected member had anywhere near that. The members spoke with their vote and consequently the ASF leaving the JCP would be big news in a war with Oracle, nobody else. The ASF is outside core Java and the work of the JCP probably the biggest single contributor to the Java ecosystem. Their threat to leave the JCP would seriously damage it and Oracle's commitment to opensource's credibility.