6 ms·

Running Oracle JDK on Docker? You're Breaking the Law

38 points by tkfx 11y ago

StreamBright 11y ago
I wasn't aware of this, thanks for sharing. The lean JVM installation script is also useful (I won't re-distributed the image built that way though).
dragandj 11y ago
The title is misleading. It should state "Oracle JDK" instead of "Java". As proposed in the text, with OpenJDK, you are just fine.
- dang 11y ago
  Ok, we'll s/Java/Oracle JDK/ above.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - pvg 11y ago
    The whole thing is misleading and mostly clickbait. Merely running Oracle's JDK on docker does not violate the license nor break any law.
    - dang 11y ago
      In such a case, it's best to flag the story (as users indeed have).
      - pvg 11y ago
        Oh I did. Was just sticking to the first rule of flag club.
kisstheblade 11y ago
Or just download the jdk normally, accept license, create your own docker image with the jdk fully installed and you are ready to go. Not breaking any laws here (or even licence agreements, there's a difference you know!), so please change the silly headline.
- tkfx 11y ago
  If you're distributing your image in any way / creating copies etc. then you do
  - twic 11y ago
    If you're giving copies to other people, that's distribution, which is dicey, but if you're making copies for your own use, that's reproduction, which is fine.
    - dogma1138 11y ago
      Is there an actual legal distinction between the two? Even if there is it seems like in a corporate world that could be quite messy because the corporation it self could be split into multiple legal entities so if you have a group wide IT department that provides the images for developers to use it could still count as distribution.
    - Leon 11y ago
      I'm agreeing with you because the alternative would make deployment processes of snapshotting built images for faster startup time against the law. If you couldn't use AMIs in AWS because the Oracle JRE is installed but instead are forced to install at launch time then that makes Oracle largely irrelevant to use in the cloud - no one wants to limit their startup time by a multiple minutes to download and install for a scaling event (and barring any network issues on their servers if hosting the installer package is seen as distribution as well). I haven't heard of any issues with moving around your own internally built virtual images with Oracle Java if you have accepted the licensing agreement for during the build and snapshot process, and using docker seems no different.
kodablah 11y ago
These days is there any great benefit to Oracle JDK over Zulu? It can be deployed with Docker easily [1]. 1 - https://www.azul.com/products/zulu/docker/ https://www.azul.com/products/zulu/docker/
- pron 11y ago
  The main advantage is the monitoring/profiling tools, and in particular the awesome Java Flight Recorder. It doesn't make a difference in practice (assuming you don't want to pay for JFR, though many would), as JFR is free for use only in a development environment and not in production.
caboteria 11y ago
We switched from the Oracle JDK to OpenJDK a couple of months back and it's going fine. It's nice to "yum install openjdk" and not have to worry about license gotchas. What are the advantages to the Oracle JDK that we're missing?
- LaSombra 11y ago
  I believe the only worth feature missing is Flight Recorder/Mission Control. You gain debug symbols that can help you investigate JVM crashes.
atgreen 11y ago
For what it's worth, Red Hat's OpenJDK release is validated with the TCK. So not all OpenJDK builds are equal... https://access.redhat.com/articles/1299013 https://access.redhat.com/articles/1299013
gmuslera 11y ago
Should not be exclusive to Docker. Vagrant boxes, AWS AMIs and other premade OS images with (Oracle) Java preinstalled could fall into the same problem.

38 points by tkfx 11y ago

I wasn't aware of this, thanks for sharing. The lean JVM installation script is also useful (I won't re-distributed the image built that way though).

dragandj 11y ago

The title is misleading. It should state "Oracle JDK" instead of "Java". As proposed in the text, with OpenJDK, you are just fine.

dang 11y ago
Ok, we'll s/Java/Oracle JDK/ above.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- pvg 11y ago
  The whole thing is misleading and mostly clickbait. Merely running Oracle's JDK on docker does not violate the license nor break any law.
  - dang 11y ago
    In such a case, it's best to flag the story (as users indeed have).
    - pvg 11y ago
      Oh I did. Was just sticking to the first rule of flag club.

kisstheblade 11y ago

Or just download the jdk normally, accept license, create your own docker image with the jdk fully installed and you are ready to go. Not breaking any laws here (or even licence agreements, there's a difference you know!), so please change the silly headline.

tkfx 11y ago
If you're distributing your image in any way / creating copies etc. then you do
- twic 11y ago
  If you're giving copies to other people, that's distribution, which is dicey, but if you're making copies for your own use, that's reproduction, which is fine.
  - dogma1138 11y ago
    Is there an actual legal distinction between the two? Even if there is it seems like in a corporate world that could be quite messy because the corporation it self could be split into multiple legal entities so if you have a group wide IT department that provides the images for developers to use it could still count as distribution.
  - Leon 11y ago
    I'm agreeing with you because the alternative would make deployment processes of snapshotting built images for faster startup time against the law. If you couldn't use AMIs in AWS because the Oracle JRE is installed but instead are forced to install at launch time then that makes Oracle largely irrelevant to use in the cloud - no one wants to limit their startup time by a multiple minutes to download and install for a scaling event (and barring any network issues on their servers if hosting the installer package is seen as distribution as well). I haven't heard of any issues with moving around your own internally built virtual images with Oracle Java if you have accepted the licensing agreement for during the build and snapshot process, and using docker seems no different.

kodablah 11y ago

These days is there any great benefit to Oracle JDK over Zulu? It can be deployed with Docker easily [1]. 1 - https://www.azul.com/products/zulu/docker/ https://www.azul.com/products/zulu/docker/

pron 11y ago
The main advantage is the monitoring/profiling tools, and in particular the awesome Java Flight Recorder. It doesn't make a difference in practice (assuming you don't want to pay for JFR, though many would), as JFR is free for use only in a development environment and not in production.

caboteria 11y ago

We switched from the Oracle JDK to OpenJDK a couple of months back and it's going fine. It's nice to "yum install openjdk" and not have to worry about license gotchas. What are the advantages to the Oracle JDK that we're missing?

LaSombra 11y ago
I believe the only worth feature missing is Flight Recorder/Mission Control. You gain debug symbols that can help you investigate JVM crashes.

atgreen 11y ago

For what it's worth, Red Hat's OpenJDK release is validated with the TCK. So not all OpenJDK builds are equal... https://access.redhat.com/articles/1299013 https://access.redhat.com/articles/1299013

gmuslera 11y ago

Should not be exclusive to Docker. Vagrant boxes, AWS AMIs and other premade OS images with (Oracle) Java preinstalled could fall into the same problem.