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Sun Releases GPL Java Today
URL: ZdNet
At 1:09 AM on Nov 13, 2006, Michael Urban wrote:
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Richard Stallman of the FSF has endorsed the move, and will appear on a live web cast with Sun CEO Johnathan Schwartz and software chief Rich Green.
The license that GPL Java will be released under includes a classpath exception, which allows linking against the Java class libraries without open sourcing your code, so the GPL licensing will not affect the ability of Java developers to produce closed source applications with Java.
In addition, Sun will offer dual licensing of Java, so there will also be a commercial port still available which is fully certified to be standards compliant.
"This is a milestone for the whole industry," said Rich Green. "Not only are we making an influential and widely used software platform for the Web available under an open-source license, it also underscores Sun's commitment to changing the whole industry model for how software is enhanced and developed."
154 replies so far (
Post your own)
Re: Sun Releases GPL Java Today
I've been waiting for this for a long time. I didn't expect that Sun would use the GPL, let alone v2. I seriously expected that CDDL would be the blessed license.Oh well.... at least with RMS and Eben Moglen on board this announcement should really prove that Sun is genuine.
Re: Sun Releases GPL Java Today
Fantastic news!http://www.jfree.org
Another link
http://blogs.sun.com/mr/entry/one_giant_leaphttp://www.jfree.org
Re: Sun Releases GPL Java Today
With Mono's future looking seriously questionable, this is great timing by Sun. This is the first time for quite a while a large company has given me some faith in them, well done Sun.Re: Sun Releases GPL Java Today
Thank you, Sun! Now Java doesn't have to be a second-class language -- or worse -- on Linux, and can get right there in the main respository component on the next Ubuntu release.I've been waiting five or six years for this, and really didn't expect Sun to use the GPL, which is absolutely the right choice at this point. I mean, there are already so many forks of Java that the old fork argument against open-sourcing it was just starting to sound silly. The GPL can help save Java from fragmentation, and more importantly, get the Sun implementation into every Linux distribution.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, Sun!
John Neffenger
Whoo Hoo.
And I told you so.Now we will get to see if those members of javalobby who swore that they would stop using java if it was GPLed are men of honor or lying sacks of sh*t.
Re: Whoo Hoo.
This is the worst thing that could happen to Java, the gpl licence.I will NEVER use the gpl version but go for the non gpl version.
:(
Too late...
> this is great timing by Sun.IMHO, this is way too late. It should have been done 5 years sooner. Imagine where Java would be then. Imagine how good Java would be today. This is not the case today and there were probably good business reasons. But as a developper I think they wasted time.
> well done Sun.
Now I fully agree that it is a very good move, excellent news, etc. Better late than never.
PS: Open sourcing Java won't clean the badly designed APIs.
Re: Sun Releases GPL Java Today
Thanks!Although I always hoped for I never really thought Sun would choose the GPL. (Ok in fact I never thought they would really open source java).
This also opens the field for broader contributions. Man am I excited
lg Clemens
GPL with exception != GPL
GPL with exception (Classpath one) is a lot less GPLish than even LGPL. To be honest, I'm surprised that rms allows to call it GPL at all, given his attitude towards 'Lesser' GPL.I'm perfectly happy with GPL with exception - it is reasonable 'give bugfixes back to us' license.
Re: Too late...
IMHO, this is way too late. It should have been done 5 years sooner. Imagine where Java would be then. Imagine how good Java would be today.Well of course, no-one can say for sure. Would it have been a success, or would we all just be using the Windows version? Would it be improving, or would developers just spend their time trying to cobble bits together to offer some level of compatibility with the Windows Java?
Would we be enjoying a better Java, or would be reading that Sun had agreed to pay MS a sum for each JDK downloaded, because Redmond found some dodgy bit of their IP in the Java stack?
Any 'what might have been?' arguments are pure speculation now I'm afraid.
Still, they have found a way to satisfy just about everybody with the dual license. Folks who want to be sure they're using the 'standard' Java can continue to use the Sun version. Since you have always been free to build your own Java implementation anyway, then now at least you have a better chance of true compatibility since you can now look at the code without fear of 'tainting' yourselves.
But if all they were going to do was introduce a dual license, why did it take so long?
Re: Too late...
> > this is great timing by Sun.> IMHO, this is way too late. It should have been done
> 5 years sooner. Imagine where Java would be then.
> Imagine how good Java would be today. This is not the
> case today and there were probably good business
> reasons. But as a developper I think they wasted
> time.
> > well done Sun.
> Now I fully agree that it is a very good move,
> excellent news, etc. Better late than never.
>
>
> PS: Open sourcing Java won't clean the badly designed
> APIs.
I would beg to differ
No other platforms/languages are in better shape than Java right now, when you take all in account (number of programmers, number of schools teaching it, number of big players supporting it, number of enterprises using it, number of features, quality of platform itself etc.)
This will be a boost, although a not huge one (Java actually doesn't have a lots of space to grow, with its current acceptance) especially in areas where Java had little or no presence at all (it can now be ported anywhere, with me especially waiting for PS3 port
The best part of it is, of course, Linux connection. Linux is in a dire need of a bit simpler and more modern programming platform, it was long speculated that Mono will took that place, however (thankfully) it never happened, and now we have a winner
And yes, some of API's are maybe subpar, and opensourcing won't change that, however, aren't there always some bad designed API's? And, like with all API's they CAN be redesigned, and if one is into backwards compatibility (like Sun for sure is), and those APIs are causing soooo much trouble, they can be deprecated during several releases.
All in all, thnks Sun, when we went Java (late 98) I actually thought it was opensource
Re: Whoo Hoo.
Now we will get to see if those members of javalobby who swore that they would stop using java if it was GPLed are men of honor or lying sacks of sh*t... or they could just carry on using the commercial standards compliant version from Sun.
Re: Whoo Hoo.
> Now we will get to see if those members of> javalobby who swore that they would stop using java
> if it was GPLed are men of honor or lying sacks of
> sh*t.
>
> .. or they could just carry on using the commercial
> standards compliant version from Sun.
Which will be exactly the same as GPLed one