A Brief History of Sun by Groklaw's grouch (Groklaw)
I think Sun is not the same as it was 5 years ago, or even 3 years ago. How long has it been since Schwartz blogged about Red Hat being "proprietary"? Even RMS got tired of all the noise Sun made about setting Java free, someday, but then Sun actually did it. That was shockingly different."
Posted May 6, 2008 18:11 UTC (Tue)
by tomd (guest, #881)
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I stopped reading Groklaw ages ago - maybe it's improved recetly, but when I last bothered looking the reporting of the SCO case was wincingly hyperbolic and the coverage of anyone who didn't adopt the True GPL Way was pathetic. The criticisms of Sun for daring to release code under their own FOSS license were astounding. For example (from this article): Yes, how dare they offer a competing open source operating system. What a dastardly act. I long for the day when Linux has something functionally equivalent to Solaris Zones. Competition in features is a very good thing. This is not an article on the history of Sun, but is merely a history of Groklaw's reporting of Sun. Brace yourselves.
Posted May 6, 2008 22:47 UTC (Tue)
by dowdle (subscriber, #659)
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Posted May 7, 2008 9:31 UTC (Wed)
by NigelK (guest, #42083)
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Posted May 6, 2008 18:48 UTC (Tue)
by ncm (guest, #165)
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Posted May 6, 2008 19:06 UTC (Tue)
by khim (subscriber, #9252)
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If Java is not important for Sun, then why grab symbol? If you don't want to control it then why deny Apache Harmony certification? No, the situation is vastly different: GJC was becoming usable for Java development, Harmony promised full replacement and Sun felt loss of control. Very different motivation from "we don't need it anymore, let's fee it". Now free developers can have "original" and hopefully will feel no need to support alternatives. Some loss of control (Java can be forked now since it's truly opened), but better then alternative (see XFree86 for example).
Posted May 7, 2008 1:18 UTC (Wed)
by ncm (guest, #165)
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Posted May 7, 2008 5:22 UTC (Wed)
by shalem (subscriber, #4062)
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Posted May 7, 2008 9:41 UTC (Wed)
by mjw (subscriber, #16740)
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And that is precisely what they did. The used the GPL (plus the GNU Classpath exception for selected libraries) as used by almost all the libre java efforts out there (except Harmony, but that is another story, you cannot blame them for the mistakes made by the ASF). Look at IcedTea, the mixup of gcj, GNU Classpath and OpenJDK, for a fun collaboration project. This allows all the GNU/Linux distros to ship OpenJDK as completely Free Software. Recently Planet Classpath and PlanetJDK mashed together. Sun hired one of the prominent Kaffe and GNU Classpath hackers, Dalibor Topic, to help them make all this a success. Yes, all this isn't easy on either community, and yes, Sun does think they deserve some control, but all the code is out there, and everybody is respecting the GPL and the fun experiments that come from that. Yes, there are now multiple code bases out there, which you might call a shame, it was a lot of work. We cannot change that fact, but those code bases and communities can and do intermingle.
There is an older LWN article, Piecing together free java , describing some of the ups and downs of the new libre java world (disclaimer I wrote that and I am the GNU Classpath maintainer).
Posted May 7, 2008 21:15 UTC (Wed)
by spot (guest, #15640)
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Posted May 8, 2008 17:53 UTC (Thu)
by TRS-80 (guest, #1804)
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Oh-oh...
[Some positive about Sun snipped.] On the other hand, they still offer OpenSolaris as a competing product [to Linux].
Linux Zones?
OpenVZ and Linux-VServer come close to zones. Your opinion?
As you may know, container/cgroup features are making their way into the mainline kernel...
starting with 2.6.24, then 2.6.25 and it continues in 2.6.26.
Oh-oh...
I think it's a useful history of how Sun was and is regarded by FSF and Groklaw, together with
Sun realising they can "play" the louder Free Software advocates (and their followers) to
their advantage - such as dangling GPL-ing ZFS in return for screwing - I mean sueing -
NetApp.
Java
You can't conclude much about Sun's attitude toward Free Software from their freeing up their
Java codebase. It's been a long time since Java had any strategic value for them. The
inconvenience of keeping it locked up just got to be more bother than the code is worth.
In the meantime, the whole Java circus has harmed Free Software far more than it ever
inconvenienced Sun's rivals Microsoft, IBM, and HP. Everybody who joined that circus helped
them and Sun at the expense of Free Software. The only saving grace is that it drew off the
worst programmers (along with a few good ones) into dead-end projects where they would do
little lasting damage.
Java IS importaqnt for Sun
Java important for Sun?
Strategic value isn't the same as PR value. "Java(TM)" smells of the money spent promoting it.
(Stepanov described Java aptly as a "money-oriented language".) The name change smacks of
desperation, which is not especially strategic.
Yes, Gcj and Harmony threatened to make Sun even less relevant. Freeing their own code is an
attack on those projects. How, exactly, is that supposed to imply a desire to work with the
Free Software, excuse me, the Open Source community? If they really cared to join, they could
use a license that's compatible with those projects, so code could be freely exchanged with
them.
Free, open, or what-have-you, as far as I'm concerned, it's all dead code. It has no reason
to exist.
Java important for Sun?
Erm
They did choose a license which is _fully_ compatible with gcj (with classpath that is), they
actually _copied_ the classpath license.
As for harmony not being compatible with the classpath license, thats harmonies fault not
SUN's for all the good the apache foundation does they should have recognised the great value
classpath has and for once not force the use of their own license.
Freeing their own code is an attack on those projects. How, exactly, is that supposed to imply a desire to work with the Free Software, excuse me, the Open Source community? If they really cared to join, they could use a license that's compatible with those projects, so code could be freely exchanged with them.
Relax, care for some IcedTea :)
Relax, care for some IcedTea :)
Indeed, Sun's handling of Java was a definite improvement, even if it was several years later
than it should have been.
If only they would have handled the opening of the Solaris code in the same fashion... :/
Sun is definitely improving their open source efforts, but they still have a way to go. Also, the various parts of Sun have varying levels of integration with their communities - the best ones are where Sun didn't contribute most of the original code, JDS gets along very well with GNOME for example. On the other hand you have OpenOffice, which despite being LGPL for 5 years, has major features in ooo-build, ready for upstream integration, that are just ignored. And let's not get started on trademarks, although the OpenJDK(tm) license seems somewhat sane.
A Brief History of Sun by Groklaw's grouch (Groklaw)