GNU has the GNU Classpath project which has been muddling along for a long time to recreate all of these libraries.
Not that long, really:) The whole thing really started to take off one or two years ago, when free software written in the Java programming language started to become interesting to people outside the 'Java-only' community. In the last two years we've seen a massive improvement on both the class libraries and on the runtimes themselves. For example, this graph shows how quickly Kaffe alone developped in the last two years. The progress is certainly similar for gcj and other free runtimes.
GNU Classpath is already in many ways superior to Sun's implementation, and in those where it's still lacking behind, it could of course use a bit of help to get there faster. Jump on the lists and join in the fun.:)
Your Java license can be terminated at any time. See
http://www.jcp.org/aboutJava/communityprocess/jsr/ tiger/JRE1.5.license.html
" 9. Termination for Infringement. Either party may terminate this Agreement immediately
should any Software become, or in either party's opinion be likely to become, the subject
of a claim of infringement of any intellectual property right."
Worst Case Scenario: Company A owns the rights to JRE. Company B sues company A for some claim of infringement of IP. Company A per JRE license immediately terminates all licenses to JRE to limit their liability. A settles with company B out of court. A offloads the cost of settlement current JRE customers by charging a certain amount for re-downloading the JRE with a current license. Conveniently, terms of the settlement could include passing on the list of registered JRE users to company B, so that B can go after those still violating their IP rights without having downloaded the new 'uninfringing' JRE for a small sum.
Oops. Is it likely? Who knows. Sun has been target of funny lawsuits before (see Kodak). So far they have not passed the costs on to consumers. But if they continue to be under fire by weird IP claims, chances are they will have to do a cost analysis, and cover the settlement costs somehow. The JRE license certainly explictely allows the JRE licensor to terminate the license even before a lawsuit to protect their interests.
Yes, you may be with a lot of luck able to build it, but it's not 'Java(TM)'. It hasn't gone through the compatiblity tests, it hasn't passed them for sure, so what you're running is worse than running Kaffe. At least with Kaffe and gcj you are not falsely lulled into an illusion of 'running the real thing', when in fact you're just running something, that maybe, under the right alignment of stars, behaves like a comaptible Java implementation. Quite probably it doesn't though.
My experience from dealing with Kaffe on several dozens of platforms, is that there are an awful lot of quirks that occur on all sorts of bizarre systems that occur nowhere else. That's what life is like when you build a VM on C, instead of taking a more platform-agnostic language. And Sun does C as well, for all I know about their code.
If you don't account for those things, by running an extensive regression test suite, and verifying that the things work as they should according to the specification, you've won nothing, except an illusion of compatibility that may come to bite you in the rear later.
Could Sun suddenly stop distributing Java and start charging for it? Of course. But you know what? They won't. Because they are not stupid.
Back in the old days, everyone used to write free software on Sun's SunOS/Solaris, becuase it was pretty good, and came with a pretty good, free as in beer C compiler toolchain. And then someone at Sun figured they should charge money for the development tools.
Oops. Enter gcc:)
It has happened before with Sun, why should it not happen again? It's a company, companies are greedy by definition. If there is more money to be made by selling Java runtimes and development tools, rather than by giving them away gratis, be sure Sun will not hesitate to do that. They are obliged to care for their bottom line to their share holders. They are not obliged to give stuff away for free if they can sell it.
I seems Sun is gonna change their license at this point so every Linux distribution can distribute the JRE and support Java out of the box.
Nope. The JRL only allows research use -> no distributions. The JDL only allows distributing after passing the costly test suite -> no (volunteer based) distributions. The JIUL will only allow *internal* use -> no distributions.
Even if I sign a contract, they can not enforce it in respect to me writing totally new code on my own time, even if I learned some skills from them. There are all kind of laws on the books to prevent that, like anti-slavery amendments, the fact that a contract should have considerations for both parties, and specific prohibition in California (where they are based) against restricting a person's future employment.
Good luck in the US court system. I heard they have 7*10**9 USD in cash to burn, so that should keep them going for a while.
Sure, Sun's claims are stretching the law in the same direction as SCO tries to do with IBM with one major difference: SCO has nothing in their licenses to back such nonsense up, Sun has it right there in front of you when you agree to the SCSL, and if you agree to the terms you are bound by them, unless you fight for your rights in court.
As I said, good luck. That's not a legal fundament I'd base any business on.
There are GCJ bindings in Kaffe that need a volunteer to update them to the latest GCJ version (4.0) that supports a binary compatibility ABI. That way, you could run Kaffe's JITs over GCJed class libraries and get the best of both worlds. Hop on the Kaffe mailing list if you are interested.
And, for that matter, if java were open-sourced, even at this late date, I would expect to see kaffe vanish almost instantly, and I wouldn't place any bets on gcj's long-term prospects.
Hardly. Kaffe already does a lot of things better than the non-free implementation does on a variety of platforms, and so does gcj. If there is *any* good, maintainable code in Sun's implementation after they hypothetically licensed it under an open source software license and the license was GPL compatible, then someone would merge it in, and make it work well.
Kaffe and gcj are not 'Java'. They are in a lot of ways better than the non-free implementations. And they are catching up quickly in those areas where they are not.
Sun's source code is simply getting more and more irrelevant every day. And that's a good thing for the Java platform, as it needs a second leg to stand on.
You can even study Sun's source code to learn general concepts for your own project as opposed to just "lifting" it.
No you can't. Read the fine license, in particular the definition of Modifications in SCSL 2.3. Sun claims copyright on any code independently implementing any portion of the SCSL-licensed technology *if* you agree to their license. So please don't look at their code if you intend to contribute to free runtimes in the future.
It's the same as Microsoft's Shared Source in a different wrapping.
cheers,
dalibor topic
Slashdot Mirror
Not that long, really :) The whole thing really started to take off one or two years ago, when free software written in the Java programming language started to become interesting to people outside the 'Java-only' community. In the last two years we've seen a massive improvement on both the class libraries and on the runtimes themselves. For example, this graph shows how quickly Kaffe alone developped in the last two years. The progress is certainly similar for gcj and other free runtimes.
GNU Classpath is already in many ways superior to Sun's implementation, and in those where it's still lacking behind, it could of course use a bit of help to get there faster. Jump on the lists and join in the fun. :)
cheers, dalibor topic
" 9. Termination for Infringement. Either party may terminate this Agreement immediately should any Software become, or in either party's opinion be likely to become, the subject of a claim of infringement of any intellectual property right."
Worst Case Scenario: Company A owns the rights to JRE. Company B sues company A for some claim of infringement of IP. Company A per JRE license immediately terminates all licenses to JRE to limit their liability. A settles with company B out of court. A offloads the cost of settlement current JRE customers by charging a certain amount for re-downloading the JRE with a current license. Conveniently, terms of the settlement could include passing on the list of registered JRE users to company B, so that B can go after those still violating their IP rights without having downloaded the new 'uninfringing' JRE for a small sum.
Oops. Is it likely? Who knows. Sun has been target of funny lawsuits before (see Kodak). So far they have not passed the costs on to consumers. But if they continue to be under fire by weird IP claims, chances are they will have to do a cost analysis, and cover the settlement costs somehow. The JRE license certainly explictely allows the JRE licensor to terminate the license even before a lawsuit to protect their interests.
cheers, dalibor topic.
My experience from dealing with Kaffe on several dozens of platforms, is that there are an awful lot of quirks that occur on all sorts of bizarre systems that occur nowhere else. That's what life is like when you build a VM on C, instead of taking a more platform-agnostic language. And Sun does C as well, for all I know about their code.
If you don't account for those things, by running an extensive regression test suite, and verifying that the things work as they should according to the specification, you've won nothing, except an illusion of compatibility that may come to bite you in the rear later.
cheers, dalibor topic
Back in the old days, everyone used to write free software on Sun's SunOS/Solaris, becuase it was pretty good, and came with a pretty good, free as in beer C compiler toolchain. And then someone at Sun figured they should charge money for the development tools.
Oops. Enter gcc :)
It has happened before with Sun, why should it not happen again? It's a company, companies are greedy by definition. If there is more money to be made by selling Java runtimes and development tools, rather than by giving them away gratis, be sure Sun will not hesitate to do that. They are obliged to care for their bottom line to their share holders. They are not obliged to give stuff away for free if they can sell it.
cheers, dalibor topic
Read the fine posts before you press Submit.
cheers, dalibor topic
Nope. The JRL only allows research use -> no distributions. The JDL only allows distributing after passing the costly test suite -> no (volunteer based) distributions. The JIUL will only allow *internal* use -> no distributions.
cheers, dalibor topic
Good luck in the US court system. I heard they have 7*10**9 USD in cash to burn, so that should keep them going for a while.
Sure, Sun's claims are stretching the law in the same direction as SCO tries to do with IBM with one major difference: SCO has nothing in their licenses to back such nonsense up, Sun has it right there in front of you when you agree to the SCSL, and if you agree to the terms you are bound by them, unless you fight for your rights in court.
As I said, good luck. That's not a legal fundament I'd base any business on.
cheers, dalibor topic
I do.
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cheers, dalibor topic
cheers, dalibor topic
For the class libraries, please go ahead and start sending patches for the 1.5 branch of GNU Classpath.
cheers, dalibor topic
Hardly. Kaffe already does a lot of things better than the non-free implementation does on a variety of platforms, and so does gcj. If there is *any* good, maintainable code in Sun's implementation after they hypothetically licensed it under an open source software license and the license was GPL compatible, then someone would merge it in, and make it work well.
Kaffe and gcj are not 'Java'. They are in a lot of ways better than the non-free implementations. And they are catching up quickly in those areas where they are not.
Sun's source code is simply getting more and more irrelevant every day. And that's a good thing for the Java platform, as it needs a second leg to stand on.
cheers, dalibor topic