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Will Oracle Surrender NetBeans to Apache? (infoworld.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the ideas-for-IDEs dept.

An anonymous Slashdot reader quotes InfoWorld: Venerable open source Java IDE NetBeans would move from Oracle's jurisdiction to the Apache Software Foundation under a proposal... endorsed by Java founder James Gosling, a longtime fan of the IDE. Moving NetBeans to a neutral venue like Apache, with its strong governance model, would help the project attract more contributions from various organizations, according to the proposal posted in the Apache wiki.

"Large companies are using NetBeans as an application framework to build internal or commercial applications and are much more likely to contribute to it once it moves to neutral Apache ground," the proposal says. While Oracle will relinquish its control over NetBeans under the proposal, individual contributors from Oracle are expected to continue contributing to the project.
On Facebook, Gosling posted the proposal meant "folks like me can more easily contribute to our favorite IDE. The finest IDE in existence will be getting even better, faster!" InfoWorld reports that when aked if Oracle had neglected NetBeans, Gosling said, "Oracle didn't single out NetBeans for neglect, they neglect everything... I'm thrilled that the NetBeans community will now be able to chart its own course."

69 comments

  1. there is Free version of IntelliJ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    there is Free version of IntelliJ
    done

    1. Re: there is Free version of IntelliJ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, I use a lot of idea's community products. However, the community ones are always missing support for enterprise features. A good compromise for them to have a revenue stream. It kind of prevents it from ever seeing the adoption that eclipse already has however.

      I prefer netbeans to eclipse by far. I'm really happy this is moving forward. I avoid java duties just because I hate eclipse so much. Bloated hack.

    2. Re: there is Free version of IntelliJ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Every competent computer programmer knows vim is the ideal software development environment if you need an integrated development environment (IDE).

    3. Re: there is Free version of IntelliJ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Granted, NetBeans is a bit more polished.
      But Eclipse is more powerful, especially when it comes to software modeling.

      To say Eclipse is a "bloated hack" makes no sense however.
      Like NetBeans, Eclipse is plugin based and if you would download the platform
      only and then add the Java plugins only, there is nothing "bloated" about it.

      It's even incorrect to talk about "Eclipse" as an "application" because it comes,
      again like NetBeans, as various *compositions*, assembled from many plugins.

      If one uses the "Eclipse for Modeling" composition just to do some Java, then yes,
      the experience can be "bloated". But Eclipse Platform + Java will be as lean and mean
      as an equivalent NetBeans composition.

      Both NetBeans and Eclipse are powerful open source IDEs.
      Anyone who publicly states hatred for any of such open source projects
      implicitly displays complete lack of open source spirit.

      But, of course freedom of speech and opinions are not forbidden.

      So, this was mine...

  2. This seems more like a 'hostile takeover' by guruevi · · Score: 2

    For one, this is a proposal to the Apache foundation to take it onto. There is no indication that Oracle has any say in it.

    For second "CDDL + GPL v2 with Classpath Exception. Upon entering Apache, the NetBeans license will be migrated to the current Apache License." Not sure how it is possible to 'migrate' GPLv2 code to Apache since the license is incompatible.

    --
    Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
    1. Re: This seems more like a 'hostile takeover' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'm sure all commits to Sun and Oracle required copyright assignments, so it's trivial for Oracle to relicense.

    2. Re:This seems more like a 'hostile takeover' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Basically (L)GPL dependencies must be replaced. The licenses are, in fact, incompatible.

    3. Re: This seems more like a 'hostile takeover' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yep. Vote parent up!

    4. Re:This seems more like a 'hostile takeover' by slashdot_commentator · · Score: 1

      For one, this is a proposal to the Apache foundation to take it onto. There is no indication that Oracle has any say in it.

      That is a naive statement.

      Oracle owns Sun's intellectual property, which includes Java and Netbeans. Netbeans was under some form of Sun license (GPLish?) before Sun was bought out by Oracle. For the Apache foundation to adopt Netbeans, Netbeans code would have to be forked out of Oracle's repository.

      "Hostile takeover" is an invalid term when referred to forking. The question is whether Oracle will challenge the fork. Even if Oracle could lose in court over whether Netbeans "could" fork, it takes money to defend oneself in court. Many of Apache's projects are subsidized by Oracle.

      There's almost no way any of Sun's intellectual property can be "taken" from Oracle. They just pissed away hundreds(?) of millions of dollars in court against Google over whether Google could use java(tm) in its android products. Before trial even started, that action forced Google to move from dalvik to the ART VM.

      So between Oracle threatening to sue Apache foundation, or even threatening to defund Apache foundation, I believe its really unlikely this forking will proceed without the blessing or indifference of Oracle.

      --
      There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, General Electric, and Exxon
  3. NetBeans 6.8 by s1d3track3D · · Score: 1

    NetBeans 6.8 actually had good vi bindings!

    1. Re:NetBeans 6.8 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nah.. I would be more interested in vim bindings than vi

    2. Re:NetBeans 6.8 by bn-7bc · · Score: 1

      Correct me I'm vrong but isn' vi oftten used synonomusly with vim (i know ir's wrong),? Iirc vi is often symlinked or sliased to start vim so it might alls pe that people write vi out of habbit even when reffering to vim, habbit beeing hatd to break etc

    3. Re:NetBeans 6.8 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Emacs has spell checking.

  4. Already approved by Dan+East · · Score: 2

    Will Oracle Surrender NetBeans to Apache?

    Why is this posed as a question? The articles say Oracle has already turned it over to Apache.

    Also, when I see stuff like this:

    The finest IDE in existence

    My attention immediately shuts off any I have no respect for what that person is saying. Sounds like marketing drivel.

    --
    Better known as 318230.
    1. Re: Already approved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      lol dude, it's better than eclipse by a mile... that should count for something.

    2. Re:Already approved by slickwillie · · Score: 1

      The finest IDE in existence

      My attention immediately shuts off any I have no respect for what that person is saying. Sounds like marketing drivel.

      So you have no respect for James Gosling - the creator of Java?

    3. Re:Already approved by The+Evil+Atheist · · Score: 1

      I certainly don't. It played a large part in cementing a culture where programmers learn to hate having to learn advanced parts of a programming language, and then, due to their own limitations and fear of learning, decide it's better to create yet another program language that has its own set of problems that either their parent language had solved in advanced features, or they reinvent the car crash from another language.

      --
      Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
    4. Re:Already approved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sounds like a crybaby to me. Jealous because somebody said his favorite programming language had problems and then proceeded to write a new one that proved to be even more popular than the old baby. Wah.

    5. Re:Already approved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I won't get silly. Netbeans is not the finest IDE in all existence for every purpose; however, for many of my purposes, I do drift back to NetBeans.

      It is a far finer IDE than many give it credit for, when it is used in it's sweet spot. No IDE I am aware of does better Maven integration, and the "design decision" of SWT is looking more like a "design mistake" every day. I only state this as a developer that helped heave the latest oil exploration abomination in fully SWT / Eclipse trappings into the world. What I would give to take back those years of my life trying to work around the issues of SWT which is looking more abandoned every day.

    6. Re:Already approved by lucm · · Score: 1

      It's also pretty good for PHP, js and python. Plus anything that uses yaml like Ansible. I've tried other IDE and always get back to Netbeans.

      --
      lucm, indeed.
    7. Re:Already approved by jandersen · · Score: 1

      My attention immediately shuts off any I have no respect for what that person is saying. Sounds like marketing drivel.

      They are expressing an opinion, no different from saying "Linux/OSX/Windows is the best thing ever!" - nothing wrong with being excited about your favourite tool, I think, even if others have a different perspective on things.

      Here's my experiences with the beast: I have, since the early days of Linux (kernel 0.9 installed wirh a huge pile of floppies) been a terminal+vi+make kind of guy; I never really liked GUI based IDEs and was not too keen on the fullscreen IDEs of the DOS era either. As everybody else with development background, I've had to use IDEs from time to time, but I still prefer to develop C and C++ without. However, since I started on working with Java EE, I suddenly found a use for an IDE, and the one that I converged on was Netbeans - I've tried Eclipse, Kdevelop and JDeveloper, but for me at least, Netbeans has all the things you need when you don't know too much about Java. It automatically suggests which things to import, and believe you me, that is a huge help in Java EE, with the enormous number of standards, annotations and what have you. Perhaps if I had lived with Java development from the beginning, I would have preferred the command line, but ...

      Comparing with Eclipse, for example, Netbeans was really easy to get going with, perhaps not surprisingly, because I think Java and Netbeans have grown up together for a long time, whereas Eclipse seems to be more of a universal IDE that started closer to C and C++.(in my superficial view).

    8. Re: Already approved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      lol dude, it's better than eclipse by a mile... that should count for something.

      Sorry. Being better than a runny beer shit that leaks out and goes through your drawers and pants onto your car seat and you can still smell two weeks later doesn't count for much.

    9. Re:Already approved by DrXym · · Score: 1
      Ah right. Java was invented through a fear of learning and developer incompetence. It couldn't possibly be because C and C++ have very obvious shortcomings that some people have a desire to solve while still preserving as much of what they like about it.

      And clearly since Java has become the bedrock of enterprise development they clearly got something right.

    10. Re:Already approved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      >And clearly since Java has become the bedrock of enterprise development they clearly got something right.

      So... you're saying that Java is our generation's COBALT?

    11. Re:Already approved by DrXym · · Score: 1

      COBALT? Even assuming you meant COBOL, the answer is no. You're putting words into my mouth.

    12. Re:Already approved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So you have no respect for James Gosling - the creator of Java?

      I have zero respect for James Gosling's lovechild named Java. It was a bloated hack when it was released upon the software development world.

    13. Re: Already approved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      He didn't say that. He was ASKING you if that's what you meant.

    14. Re:Already approved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And clearly since Java has become the bedrock of enterprise development they clearly got something right.

      If popularity is an indicator of success, C and COBOL are the best languages ever.

      Think of the ten programs you consider to be excellent. How many are written in Java? I have been asking this of users for about ten years. I have yet to encounter a person who gives an answer above "2".

    15. Re: Already approved by DrXym · · Score: 1

      No dipshit, he/she/you were asking a leading question. i.e putting words into my mouth. And the answer is still no.

    16. Re:Already approved by DrXym · · Score: 1

      Perhaps it's because your question doesn't even make sense and is entirely subjective. Someone into gaming would probably not list any. Someone into their Android phone would probably list most of them.

    17. Re:Already approved by The+Evil+Atheist · · Score: 1

      Yes, it was invented through a fear of learning and incompetence. It's literally designed to handhold the developer and limit the features that are useful, like multiple inheritance and operator overloading. And it certainly didn't (and I would argue, still doesn't) handle resource cleanup especially well - it's not just about freeing memory safely and reliably, which C++ does better than Java, even before smart pointers, but also other resources like locks, instead of relying on the programmer to remember to release locks etc.

      Yes, Java has become a bedrock of enterprise development. But that's because enterprise development is boring and enterprises generally don't like to hire competent people or use state of the art technology. That's why enterprises require LTS versions of stuff and stick with J2EE instead of going to EE 7 or whatnot.

      Just a few weeks ago, there was an article posted here about Java 8 features like streams and lambdas. The reaction? Most people hated it. Gee, you don't think fear of learning and incompetence may have something to do with it? I, as a C++ developer, learnt Java 8 streams and lambdas and was writing "enterprise code" in a day with it. It was super simple and made complex things super simple, and yet people were nitpicking the syntax only because they were unfamiliar with it but tried to hide their fear by saying "it sucks" etc. I only need to see the attitudes of programmers themselves regarding new features that you can see a culture of fear of learning and incompetence.

      --
      Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
  5. Hoping it's a better success than OpenOffice.org by Kobun · · Score: 2

    Since Netbeans doesn't have an off-shoot project caused by Oracle's famous Neglect(tm), this seems like it ought to be more successful than the OO.org fiasco. Maybe?

  6. Probably not... by NoNonAlphaCharsHere · · Score: 1

    Were there possibly a paid installed base that Oracle had/could buy, so they could say "we have your quivering, twitching, small-mammal-terrified asshole over a barrel, surrender or die", they might possibly give a marginal fuck; otherwise, no, no, not so much. Surrender or die. It's the Oracle way.

  7. Excellent - NetBeans is vastly superior to Eclipse by blackpaw · · Score: 0

    Caveat: For me anyway :)

    Every time I'm forced to use Eclipse (lot of embedded dev environments require it) I end up wanting to poke my eyes out with a stick.

  8. Re:Finest IDE? by Pikoro · · Score: 1

    CVS, Subversion, Mercurial and ClearCase are supported out of the box, with Git requiring an addon but there is WIP to include it with the IDE itself.

    --
    "Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
  9. Re:Excellent - NetBeans is vastly superior to Ecli by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I had a similar opinion of eclipse, and for years used netbeans. But the constant bugs eventually drove me away. Which is fortunate since Intellij is much nicer to use in just about every way, I wish I'd jumped ship sooner.

  10. Re:Finest IDE? by TheRealMindChild · · Score: 2

    No SourceSafe? Pffffffffffff

    --

    "When life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade. Make life take the lemons back!" -- Cave Johnson
  11. Contributing to Open Source by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Although typically use other text editors / IDEs (Kate , Atom , Eclipse, IntelliJ etc. ) I would like to contribute with bug reports and patches to NetBeans under the Apache umbrella .
    Always healthy competition will only lead to positive results.

  12. Apache is where projects go to die by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Netbeans is still doing surprisingly well, and is one of the few projects *not* neglected by Oracle. I've yet to see a single project magically take off when migrating to Apache.

  13. Re:Excellent - NetBeans is vastly superior to Ecli by blackpaw · · Score: 1

    Ok, I'll give IntelliJ a go. Does get a lot of good reviews and there's a free edition now I believe.

  14. Re:Fuck Java by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Just FYI, despite what it says in the summary, NetBeans is an IDE with lots of plugins and language support, and works just fine for C++ development as well as Java. I'm using it for the Linux port of my game, written entirely in C++.

    --
    Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
  15. Re:Fuck Java by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sorry bro, the big boy web and big data all run on Java. You can rant all day and night about the power and speed of C++ (ever hear someone talk about FORTRAN like that? All the old skool engineers certainly do!) but in the end, Java has taken over.

    Yes, the browser plug-in is a festering piece of shit, but that's why it was replaced like 10 years ago (with something that doesn't even pretend to be safe). Forget Java as a competitor to Flash/Silverlight/HTML5. That war was lost pretty
    Much right out of the gate. But servers belong to Java these days.

  16. surrender... by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

    or get rid of?

    --
    Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
  17. Re:Finest IDE? by mark-t · · Score: 1

    git support has been OOB in Netbeaans for quite a while now.

    --
    File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
  18. Re:Finest IDE? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No SourceSafe. Which can be added with a plugin, but if it were unavailable, then it would be THE FINEST IDE IN EXISTENCE!

    I'm starting to rank IDEs based on how difficult it is to get SourceSafe integration. I call it "sort by sanity" with built-in SourceSafe at the bottom and no-SourceSafe at the top. So far, I'm still sane, but I did lose a permanent portion of that sanity in having to port our history from SourceSafe to SVN.

  19. help the project attract more contributions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Didn't help Apache OpenOffice any; but then, there isn't the big fork of Netbeans to compete with that OpenOffice has with LibreOffice. despite the apparent popularity of Apache's project among users, none of the major Linux distributions that were quick to dump OpenOffice while it was still in Oracle's hands have switched back. Apache Software Foundation > 'The Document Foundation', but those LibreOffice people just don't get it.

    Merge your shit back into Apache OpenOffice and retire LibreOffice, your reason for being, your reason for forking in the first place, providing a non-Oracle alternative, is long over.

    As far as Netbeans goes, Apache has a long history of Java projects, and it will fit in very well.

  20. Re:Excellent - NetBeans is vastly superior to Ecli by lucm · · Score: 1

    try IntelliJ if you have to, but don't uninstall Netbeans. You will get back to it, especially if you're like me and you're used to work with multiple projects.

    I have to use IntelliJ-ish for Android apps and I hate every minute of it.

    --
    lucm, indeed.
  21. Re:Finest IDE? by lucm · · Score: 1

    It's probably easier to rewrite an app than port its source code from SourceSafe to Svn or Git.

    --
    lucm, indeed.
  22. Re:Fuck Java by lucm · · Score: 1

    Sorry bro, the big boy web and big data all run on Java.

    Spoken like a true wannabe.

    Facebook -> PHP
    Twitter -> ruby
    Youtube -> python, C++
    google -> c++, java, go, name it
    Wikipedia -> PHP
    Walmart -> node js
    amazon -> perl, java
    imdb -> perl
    bing -> c#

    The "big boy web" is a lot more diverse and random than you think. As for big data, spark is scala and most data scientist work with R and Python. So take that smugness somewhere else, here you just look dumb.

    --
    lucm, indeed.
  23. not neglected? by lucm · · Score: 1

    I can't even register a new account on netbeans website to report bugs. Even the "contact the webmaster" link is broken.

    --
    lucm, indeed.
    1. Re:not neglected? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      heh. looks like they fixed it https://netbeans.org/about/contact.html

  24. Re: Fuck Java by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Twitter witted WAS ruby now its all Scala which runs on the jvm. Amazon is also mostly java, the perl bits are almost nothing. The vast majority of google is also java, the python bits etc are all minor, most CPU time there is doing jAva....

  25. Re:Excellent - NetBeans is vastly superior to Ecli by Cyberax · · Score: 1

    IntelliJ works fine with multiple projects open at the same time.

  26. Re:Fuck Java by NotAPK · · Score: 1

    No Slashdot?

    Still Perl isn't it?

  27. Re:Fuck Java by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Twitter doesn't run on Ruby anymore. They switched to ... Java! Mostly because RoR is a toy language that isn't worth much and can't scale appropriately.

  28. Re: Fuck Java by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    most CPU time there is doing jAva

    That just says Java uses way more CPU than it needs to.

  29. Long-time Netbeans user here by vikingpower · · Score: 1

    I've used Forte for Java, and then Netbeans. On-premise contracts with various customer sometimes require Eclipse, using which feels like a herd of rodents nibbling at my brain. To me (caveat: this is an opinion based upon 17+ years of experience, not a fact) Netbeans is, indeed, superior to any other IDE in existence, except for emacs if used properly.

    What I admire in Netbeans is the ergonomic look-and-feel. It always seems as if the tool or feature you're looking for is right at hand, or at the most 2 mouse actions away. I LOVE the maven integration, and having Mercurial / git / Subversion out of the box. And no, installing plugins does not make the whole thing bloated and impossible to move around, as with Eclipse.

    So yes, Netbeans moving to Apache: great ! Let's take it away from Oracle's NeGlect (TM) attic.

    --
    Religous speak to God. Insane are spoken to by God. When all shut up, one can finally hear Shostakovich in peace
    1. Re:Long-time Netbeans user here by iampiti · · Score: 1

      I don't know if it's just me but I find Eclipse very cumbersome and unintuitive compared to Netbeans. In Netbeans things seem to be in logical places in Eclipse they're usually where I wouldn't normally look for them.

  30. Re:Excellent - NetBeans is vastly superior to Ecli by ausekilis · · Score: 1

    I too hate that Eclipse seems to be the de-facto standard. For me, if it doesn't overrun its memory limits (which I have set to 1G), it freezes, crashes, refuses to save files, and otherwise can be best described as acting like a child.
    Me: Save the file
    Eclipse: I don't wanna
    Me: Save the bloody file
    Eclipse: No, and now I'm not going to talk to you
    Me: Go to timeout (pkill -9 java)
    ...wait 3 min...
    Me: Ready to save the file?
    Eclipse: Save the file? Why didn't you say so earlier? I love saving files!
    (face on keyboard)

  31. Netbeans sux by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Use eclipse.

  32. Will Oracle surrender to Apache? by hey! · · Score: 1

    Or will they circle the wagons?

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  33. Re:Hoping it's a better success than OpenOffice.or by iampiti · · Score: 1

    I certainly hope so since I've been using Netbeans for many years and I really like it. However, it looks to me that when Oracle donates some project to someone else they just want to stop investing in it, and something the size of Netbeans I don't think will get very far without a corporate sponsor

  34. Why surrender? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think they should trade NetBeans for a cow.

  35. Re:Fuck Java by lucm · · Score: 1

    Too bad upgrading hasn't made them any more profitable

    --
    lucm, indeed.
  36. Re: Fuck Java by lucm · · Score: 1

    I find it amusing when java apologists talk about various other programming languages running on a jvm, as if it was anything else than a clear sign that java isn't all that optimal as a programming language. Why do you think exactly scala exists? (hint: read the wikipedia entry about scala).

    It's like when people run Linux on Azure. It's not that much of an endorsement of Microsoft.

    --
    lucm, indeed.