11 ms·

Oracle sues Google over use of Java in Android

452 points by jbarham 16y ago

bborud 16y ago
http://blog.borud.no/2010/08/pull-yourself-together-larry-ellison.html http://blog.borud.no/2010/08/pull-yourself-together-larry-el... my 2 cents
tptacek 16y ago
"Java is the single most important software we've ever acquired," Oracle Chief Executive Larry Ellison said during a conference call [...] ... "and if you don't do everything I say, I'll blow up the moon! Ah-hahahahah!" How do you not love this guy? Somebody get him a black cape.
- gahahaha 16y ago
  He is just trying to save /more/ children in Africa. http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB10001424052748704017904575409193790337162.html http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB10001424052748704... Larry Ellison is a saint! ... and an asshole.
  - Timothee 16y ago
    The letter he wrote for the Giving Pledge website actually shows a bit of him being a saint and an asshole: http://givingpledge.org/#larry_ellison http://givingpledge.org/#larry_ellison To whom it may concern, Many years ago, I put virtually all of my assets into a trust with the intent of giving away at least 95% of my wealth to charitable causes. I have already given hundreds of millions of dollars to medical research and education, and I will give billions more over time. Until now, I have done this giving quietly – because I have long believed that charitable giving is a personal and private matter. So why am I going public now? Warren Buffett personally asked me to write this letter because he said I would be “setting an example” and “influencing others” to give. I hope he’s right. Larry Ellison On one hand, he is giving a lot, on the other, you can tell he couldn't care less about the pledge and the letter.
    - SoftwareMaven 16y ago
      My take on the letter is that he really doesn't like Buffet trying to push him around. I can understand wanting to give quietly; that is how I would prefer to give.
    - bhiggins 16y ago
      That's actually pretty rad.
    - MartinCron 16y ago
      This letter increased my admiration of the man greatly.
    - iambvk 16y ago
      I wonder how much did google give away till now...
      - sovande 16y ago
        Think "Google Summer of Code" for starters..
      - micrypt 16y ago
        "In 2004, when Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin wrote to prospective shareholders about their vision for the company, they outlined a commitment to contribute significant resources, including 1% of Google's equity and profits in some form, as well as employee time, to address some of the world's most urgent problems. That commitment became a range of giving initiatives including Google.org." - http://www.google.org/about.html http://www.google.org/about.html
    - gruseom 16y ago
      Why should he care about the pledge? Taking the letter at face value, he's already gone far further ("at least 95% of my wealth") than the pledgers, and he's done it in private. I can totally understand him not wanting to write such a letter and doing it only as a favour to Buffett, with a certain skepticism. Well-founded skepticism too. (Or maybe he's just pissed that he had to blow his cover as a supervillain.)
- davidw 16y ago
  I'd throw him to a hungry pack of grammar nazis just for the 'software' bit. Maybe he's irritated that Google has been getting all the 'evil' headlines lately and wanted to outdo them.
brettnak 16y ago
I feel a little naive for not expecting something like this. I thought all the Sun/Oracle nonsense would be around MySQL.
- mkramlich 16y ago
  MySQL: I bet that part is coming.
squidsoup 16y ago
This article is a bit light on detail - can anyone explain how the development of Android infringes on Oracle's IP?
- tzs 16y ago
  If they were talking about Oracle's patents, it would make sense. It's the talk of it being copyright infringement that has me confused. Android is basically, as far as I've read, a Linux kernel, with Google's own user space on top of that--their own equivalent of libc and their own windowing system. On top of that, they run their own JVM, which they wrote themselves and which is NOT even compatible with Oracle's at the byte-code level. Android apps are written in Java and compiled/JITed for Google's VM. So, unless the Java compiler itself takes code from Oracle's compiler, it is hard to see what in their would contain copies of Oracle code.
  - pohl 16y ago
    One thing missing from your list: the standard java libs like java.lang.* etc. Are those google's implementations?
    - jancona 16y ago
      They're from the Apache Harmony project, not from Sun's Java.
  - aneth 16y ago
    > So, unless the Java compiler itself takes code from Oracle's compiler, it is hard to see what in their would contain copies of Oracle code. This is about patent infringement, not copyright. Whether or not code was copied is irrelevant. UPDATE: Sorry, maybe both are at stake. The author of this article seems sadly ignorant of the difference between patent and copyright, as he seems to use them interchangeable. So who knows....
  - nl 16y ago
    If you read the complaint itself (http://www.scribd.com/doc/35811761/Oracle-s-complaint-against-Google-for-Java-patent-infringement http://www.scribd.com/doc/35811761/Oracle-s-complaint-agains...) it becomes clearer - see Count 8, copyright infringement: The Java platform contains a substantial amount of original material (including without limitation code, specifications, documentation and other materials) that is copyrightable subject matter under the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. so because the Android platform APIs also include the Java APIs Oracle thinks there is a case. I'm not aware of any precedents that would indicate the likelyhood of this succeeding, but its possible there could be a problem here. Note that http://developer.android.com/reference/packages.html http://developer.android.com/reference/packages.html contains the java.* API's, and in the past Sun was pretty strict about companies not hosting that Javadoc itself publicly (eg, they stopped one site that was building interlinked Javadoc references).
seldo 16y ago
Excuse the really really obvious question, but how can you sue somebody for intellectual property infringement on open-source software? Didn't you already give anybody the license to do what they wanted with it? If they've violated the license terms in some way, isn't that different from IP infringement?
- squidsoup 16y ago
  I'm struggling to understand this as well - I would have thought OSS licensing and software patents would be incompatible.
  - alanh 16y ago
    Sadly they are not. This is why the W3C has a patent policy [1] to prevent contributed software and specifications from being covered by patents. [1]: http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Patent-Policy-20040205/ http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Patent-Policy-20040205/ If this still does not make any sense, realize that patents and copyrights, while both forms of IP, are completely different, legally. Also recall how open source GIF implementations were still covered by the Unisys patent.
    - hga 16y ago
      Which is the sort of thing that did the other JEDEC members a fat lot of good when Rambus (spit) went on the warpath: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rambus#Lawsuits http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rambus#Lawsuits
  - el_chapitan 16y ago
    I believe that was the purpose of the GPL3. You know, the one that nobody uses because it is too draconian.
- tptacek 16y ago
  Of course you can. There'd be no such thing as an enforceable software patent if any company could just sponsor an open source project to implement each part of its product that infringed a patent. Presumably --- hopefully 'grellas will clear this up --- Oracle can measure damages incurred by Google supplanting Sun/Oracle Java with their own Java in terms of percentage points of global smartphone revenue. Here's some more context: http://blogs.gartner.com/brian_prentice/2009/08/06/google-open-source-patent-reform/ http://blogs.gartner.com/brian_prentice/2009/08/06/google-op...
cscotta 16y ago
The biggest issue I see with Oracle's lawsuit is not with Android itself, but the future of Java as an open platform. The claims are pretty serious, and Oracle is going straight for the jugular. It'll be interesting to see how it shakes out, but I've got to hope that Google will come out of this in good shape for the sake of Java. It's unfortunate that Oracle is interpreting Google's implementation of Dalvik and a Java-based system as a direct infringement upon their patents. Android aside, it raises some fairly serious questions around Java's future development as a platform vis a vis the uncertainty recently resolved between Microsoft and the Mono project. While Microsoft extended their "Community Promise" to Mono implementors and users, Oracle seems to be taking the opposite approach to companies developing alternate JVMs and Java-based devices. It'll be interesting to see Oracle's stance toward other alternate JVMs such as IBM's. If you're curious, the original complaint is here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/35811761/Oracle-s-complaint-against-Google-for-Java-patent-infringement http://www.scribd.com/doc/35811761/Oracle-s-complaint-agains... The patents upon which Oracle claims infringement are: - Protection domains to provide security in a computer system (6,125,447) - Controlling Access to a Resource (6,192,476) - Method and apparatus for pre-processing and packaging class files (5,966,702) - System and method for dynamic preloading of classes through memory space cloning of a master runtime system process (7,426,720) - Interpreting functions utilizing a hybrid of virtual and native machine instructions (6,910,205) - Method and system for performing static initialization (6,061,520)
- kingkilr 16y ago
  > Interpreting functions utilizing a hybrid of virtual and native machine instructions Are they serious? Unless I'm missing something this is a fantastic joke, JITs far predate Java.
  - tptacek 16y ago
    Careful. The name of a title and its actual claims are two very different things.
    - patrickaljord 16y ago
epochwolf 16y ago
Oh joy. I would like some details before I wave goodbye to java and the jvm.
tzs 16y ago
Google should switch to C# and Mono. Besides giving them a better language and VM, it would cause the most amusing set of rants from the anti-Mono crowd. Win/win.
- squidsoup 16y ago
  By better language, do you mean better than Java? The JVM supports many other great languages like Ruby, Clojure and Scala. I'd love to see Google provide GWT support for Scala, but that's another issue :)
  - whakojacko 16y ago
    JVM still has type erasure though :(. I agree GWT for scala would be awesome
  - binaryfinery 16y ago
    The JVM bytecode is shitty. It cannot support dynamic languages at the VM level (yet: http://jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=292 http://jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=292), the support for the C# equivalent of structs has been pushed back, and that makes any kind of hardware acceleration painful. Then theres type erasure - a total hack to get generics. I think Oracle is being beyond stupid here. If anyone has the power to come up with a language and toolchain to make Java utterly irrelevant, its Google.
    - jdc 16y ago
      Bingo
    - rayvega 16y ago
      History will repeat itself. Sun sued Microsoft over their implementation of Java. In response, MS drops Java and creates its own language (C#), framework (.NET), and VM (CLR) which now solidly competes with Java in the enterprise software space. If MS was able to accomplish all of that, then imagine what Google could create if they decided to drop Java altogether ('Go' language might be the preview.) That would be a huge win for the software industry while a big (long term) loss for Oracle as Java further wans in popularity. (Hmm....if Oracle can sue Google over the non-Java VM they created for Android couldn't they sue MS for their "JVM-like" CLR? This is another reason why their patent lawsuit is so ridiculous.) No matter how you slice it, Google has the advantage in the long run while patent trolls like Oracle have the most to lose in the long term.
noelchurchill 16y ago
Aren't Larry Ellison and Steven Jobs best friends?
- parenthesis 16y ago
  A source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/01/14/MNGS649LVB1.DTL http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/ar... "Ellison's best friend … Steve Jobs … did double duty as the wedding photographer [at Ellison's wedding]." Also Ellison was on Apple's board for a few years after the second coming of Jobs.
noonespecial 16y ago
It just goes to show that whatever company-de-jour promises about enforcing the patents that they are granted today, all bets are off when they fall on hard times and are acquired tomorrow. Serious about openness? Skip the "patent and promise" dance and just release the damn thing BSD.
- jancona 16y ago
  How would BSD help? It doesn't include a patent license.
  - noonespecial 16y ago
    Skip the "patent and promise" dance and just release the damn thing BSD and forget about patents. (Implied, should have specified)
    - wmf 16y ago
      If you already have patents (as Sun did in this case) you can't just forget about them. Saying nothing about patents is equivalent to saying "some day we'll change our mind and start suing". If you want to make something really open you really need some kind of irrevocable license or promise not to sue.
- pquerna 16y ago
  That is why you would license it under the Apache License, because it has explicit patent clauses, rather than something like the BSD license.
- technomancy 16y ago
  The BSD license would be useless here. Preventing this kind of thing is the whole point of the third revision of the GPL; to my knowledge there are no other software licenses that do this.
  - astrange 16y ago
    See LGPLv2 section 11.
bitsai 16y ago
What implications, if any, does this have for the future of JVM languages like Scala, Clojure, etc.?
- bconway 16y ago
  Seconded. If Oracle is going to turn Java into a minefield, it's going to have big repercussions in future uptake.
  - recoil 16y ago
    I think this is much bigger than just Java. The patents in question relate to the whole field of VM implementation, not simply Java VM implementation. On the surface this really appears to have very little to do with Java the language. For a start, Dalvik is not a JVM implementation at all, in fact it's quite a different beast. See, e.g.: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_application_virtual_machines http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_application_virtu... which lists Dalvik as a register machine rather than a stack machine: definitely not a trivial difference. Google's toolchain converts from JVM bytecode to Dalvik bytecode, which is probably what Oracle are going after with #5,966,702 but the rest of the patents are much more general. If anything Oracle are turning VM implementation in general into a patent minefield, not Java alone.
- michaelfairley 16y ago
  It looks like the patents that Oracle is claiming are being infringed upon focus on the actual JVM itself, not on the code run on it. Google making their own JVM is what's brought them into the crosshairs.
  - hga 16y ago
    Which could be rather bad if you need a JVM tuned in a non-standard way. Anyway you look at it, Oracle has enabled a lot of FUD to be thrown at Java, and if your observation is correct, andyone who's working on any sort of non-Oracle derived JVM (and there are a bunch) had just been handed a lot of legal uncertainty. Side note: I don't need hearing this shortly after learning about the RightHaven atrocity factory.
hugh4life 16y ago
I bet the mono people are laughing their asses off now... I think Sun suing Microsoft was a mistake too for the Java platform... the write once, run everywhere ideology made Java the native platform of the server... write once, run everywhere should be the default, but it should be easier and encouraged to escape...
- megablast 16y ago
  Microsoft were destroying Java with their own implementation, which was not compatible with normal Java. They were changing the language, just as they tried to do with HTML in internet explorer and active-x, so we still see people having to use ie6. Sun had to sue Microsoft, before they changed Java so much it was no longer platform agnostic (or it was way less agnostic).
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  - MartinCron 16y ago
    I wonder what would have happened, though. Would the market decide that being platform-agnostic is more important than using MS dev tools? Would developers just have to work (around) with an incompatible platform, as they do with IE. I wonder if the MS rift caused more harm to Java than letting Microsoft change its implementation.
- KirinDave 16y ago
  I'm pretty sure the Mono people are worried. These patents are things that are fairly fundamental and important to any sort of mobile device that has competent security.
  - binaryfinery 16y ago
    No I'm pretty sure they aren't. The CLR is totally different to the JVM.
    - 16y ago
macemoneta 16y ago
As background, from WikiPedia: "On November 13, 2006, Sun released much of Java as open source software under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL). On May 8, 2007, Sun finished the process, making all of Java's core code available under free software/open-source distribution terms, aside from a small portion of code to which Sun did not hold the copyright." If Sun willingly made the code GPL licensed, and Google isn't using anything outside the GPL code, even if some of the technologies were covered by patents I don't see Oracle having a case. Right now, this sounds very much like the SCO - Linux suit that dragged on forever and went nowhere.
- albertzeyer 16y ago
  Exactly this is the core question here. I am really curious about how the law sees this. And I would really wonder if they decide against Google. It looks almost like a trap of Sun/Oracle then, kind of "hey, here, use our code, it is open source now grin". Or to put it different: Why did they use the GPL licence?
- nl 16y ago
  Google is using NONE of the Sun code. They use their own VM, and use the Apache Harmony class libraries. That's why it isn't called "Java" The Sun release has some weird field-of-use restrictions associated with it.
- avar 16y ago
  Giving out software under the GPL v2 does not mean that you grant others a patent license, that isn't within the scope of the GPL v2.
  - ori_b 16y ago
    That's not true. See section 7 of the GPL. In part: For example, if a patent license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Program by all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the Program. However, it seems Sun can relicence the software under whatever they want, and the current versions of it wouldn't be under GPL anymore. I am not a lawyer, so I don't know exactly what this implies.
mmorris 16y ago
I'm sure there would be speed issues, but Google is really supportive of Python right? Wink wink, nudge nudge. (I've heard about the Android Scripting Environment, but it sounds like that is not as fully supported as might be ideal).
- statictype 16y ago
  I believe its already possible package python programs as .apk bundles right?
dangrossman 16y ago
Sun released the majority of Java under the GPL. How can you claim that someone you licensed the code to is infringing both its copyright and its patent? I'm looking forward to some more detail when Google publishes a response.
- patrickaljord 16y ago
  But Google's android does not use Sun's GPLed Java, it uses their own Java called "Dalvik" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalvik_(software) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalvik_(software)
  - brisance 16y ago
    Technically incorrect... Dalvik is a VM, and the implementation of it, according to Oracle's claim, is infringing on Sun's patents.
  - jbarham 16y ago
    Note that Dalvik is essentially just an alternate stack-based virtual machine for bytecode that's been converted from the standard stack-based JVM bytecode. You still need a standard Java SDK to develop Android applications in order to compile the Java source code to JVM bytecode. So far Google has been able to get the best of both worlds by leveraging the vast Java tools ecosystem but then in the final step they convert the standard JVM bytecode to run on their own Dalvik VM which means they don't have to pay license fees for the standard Java runtime. IMO this is what is really annoying Oracle. (To be fair there are also good technical reasons why they created Dalvik.) I can understand where Oracle is coming from legally, but business-wise I think this lawsuit is bound to backfire. Google has the resources to defend themselves and move away from Java in the long term, but in the meantime Oracle has created serious uncertainty about the openness of the Java platform which will scare technically innovative players away from Java that don't have the financial and legal resources that Google does. So Oracle turns Java into the new COBOL, a technically moribund backwater that is only kept alive for legacy purposes.
    - artsrc 16y ago
RexRollman 16y ago
If I didn't detest software patent suits so much, I would say this is karma for Google's recent actions regarding network neutrality and wireless broadband.
obluda 16y ago
goodbye java ?
gojomo 16y ago
What an excellent occasion to try the homoglyph hoax attack on friends and enemies! (See http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1571984 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1571984 .) http://www.google.com/search?q=οraclе http://www.google.com/search?q=οraclе Your search - οraclе - did not match any documents.
- rodh257 16y ago
  now it returns this comment on hacker news which explains that its a hoax, heh
  - gojomo 16y ago
    Indeed, impressive on Google's part. There are surely dozens of other plausible homoglyphs that might work for a short time, though. Stay wary!
- statictype 16y ago
  Actually, you now get one page - this one. Isn't there some prize for doing a google search that nets only a single result? Incidentally, these homoglyph attacks are pretty hard to catch. Even Vim (which normally chokes on 8+ bit characters in my setup) didn't seem to show anything different until I checked the hex codes.
  - joshwa 16y ago
    >> Isn't there some prize for doing a google search that nets only a single result? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googlewhack http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googlewhack
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- sp332 16y ago
  Maybe it would work better with a <noindex> tag like this: οrасlе http://www.google.com/search?q=οrасlе http://www.google.com/search?q=οrасlе </noindex>
donaq 16y ago
I'm sorry, but I just don't understand this decision. Is Oracle in need of cash or something? Why did they become patent trolls? I mean, they're not even in the smart phone business, and it's not like Google is going to put a DBMS into Android. How are they being threatened in any way by Google?
- wmf 16y ago
  Oh, but they are in the phone business; every phone that includes Java pays license fees to Oracle... except Android phones aren't paying.
  - zmmmmm 16y ago
    This may be true but it would be amazingly bone headed of them. Android is the best thing to happen to Java in the last 5 years, and the perception (at least) that people using Java have less to worry about as far as patents go is one of the few things really giving it a strong advantage over .NET. This is a remarkably effective way of destroying several of Java's strengths all in one go....
    - Calamitous 16y ago
      You're assuming they a) care about Java, and b) care about what's good for the smartphone market. If you flip those assumptions, it's not boneheaded at all. Just very, very slimy...
    - gamble 16y ago
      Sun went out of business making decisions that made Java popular, but not lucrative. Oracle has a reputation as a place where people would climb over their own mothers to get a sale; they won't make the same mistake. Moreover, Android is a threat to Oracle's Java revenue, not an asset. Mobile JVM licenses were one of the few things Sun made money on with Java. Android is destroying that business. I'm pretty sure that Oracle would prefer a slice of a smaller pie to no share in a larger pie.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
hugh4life 16y ago
Google just bought Instantiations... and Google is getting to release their GUI designers for Swing, SWT, and GWT... http://www.infoq.com/news/2010/08/eclipse4-released http://www.infoq.com/news/2010/08/eclipse4-released """"" "You said..."it is expected that GWT Designer will make an appearance via the GWT Blog in the coming months" Actually, we are in the process of Googlizing all of our products; not just GWT Designer. They will all be made available again fairly soon and the announcement will be made on the GWT blog. """""
jarin 16y ago
The headline should read "Oracle sues Google over literally the only thing keeping Java relevant".
- keefe 16y ago
  except for all the high quality libraries for doing hard things
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
- shadowfox 16y ago
  I think you might be surprised at the amount of enterprise software in Java these days
  - cookiecaper 16y ago
    Practically everything that is not .NET
- gphil 16y ago
  Maybe the only thing keeping Java relevant to consumers. It's also the de facto standard platform for just about all recent enterprise software projects.
- zmmmmm 16y ago
  I don't necessarily agree about relevance, but I do find it quite mind boggling that Oracle would strike out against what is clearly a massive growth opportunity for Java. If they want to destroy the Java brand the fastest way possible then definitely the right thing to do is start suing people who are using Java. The million dollar question is why would anybody in their right mind do this?
  - extension 16y ago
    What good is Java to them if they can't control it? They don't have a monopoly on expertise.
rjurney 16y ago
Oracle CEO Larry Ellison are good friends, best man at your wedding kind of friends. Ellison was once on Apple's board of directors after Jobs returned to Apple. Oracle suing Google over Java patent infringements in Android sure plays well for Apple... Apple vs (Google vs (Facebook && Oracle))
- jws 16y ago
  … and if you rearrange the letters of "spicy acorn" it even spells "conspiracy"!.
  - pohl 16y ago
    That's the beauty of quid pro quo: it's plausibly deniable and you can poke fun at those who suspect it.
  - rjurney 16y ago
    I'm not suggesting a conspiracy, just an alliance :)
patrickaljord 16y ago
According to this thread on the Android mailing list, Oracle tried to settle privately with Google but Google refused. This may mean that Google has a strong case against those patents: http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers/browse_thread/thread/a0d97347e53e94?hl=en http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers/browse_thr...
binaryfinery 16y ago
And needless to say, at least patent 6,125,447 has prior art.
Eliezer 16y ago
I like this headline because if we sent it back in time 30 years it wouldn't make any sense at all.
- bdr 16y ago
  "Using coffee as robot fuel will lead to certain doom! If only I could make them understand -- all 10^100 of them!", said the prophet.
- caf 16y ago
  Fantastic observation ;)
- pjscott 16y ago
  Looking over the front page, I wonder what the people thirty years ago would have made of some of the other headlines: "Making GitHub More Open: Git-backed Wikis" "Twitter Polling in the Cloud in 30s using PiCloud" or, my favorite: "Burning man defeats PayPal" (I envision something like the Biblical story of Jesus driving money-changers out of a temple, but this time, Jesus lights himself on fire first. It's very intimidating.)
  - thelibrarian 16y ago
    "Making GitHub More Open: Git-backed Wikis" wouldn't have made sense even 15 years ago. "Twitter Polling in the Cloud in 30s using PiCloud" wouldn't have made sense only 5 years ago.
  - jemfinch 16y ago
    > Looking over the front page, I wonder what the people thirty years ago would have made of some of the other headlines People thirty years ago? Heck, I wonder what my in-laws would make of those headlines :)
- teilo 16y ago
  Oh, that made my day. I'm still going to laugh every time I think about this days from now.
billmcneale 16y ago
The biggest issue for Oracle is that Sun's previous CEO publicly congratulated Google about Android: http://beust.com/weblog/2010/08/12/oracle-is-suing-google-over-java-theres-just-one-tiny-problem/ http://beust.com/weblog/2010/08/12/oracle-is-suing-google-ov... Good luck defending your trademark after the CEO declares it's not really interested in doing so.
- btilly 16y ago
  Intellectual property divides into 3 fields with 3 different sets of rules. Anything you learn about how copyrights, trademarks and patents work is more likely than not to be wrong about the other two. You're thinking trademark law. This lawsuit is under patent law. It doesn't matter what Jonathan Schwartz publicly said.
  - _delirium 16y ago
    It's not as strong as with trademark law, but patent law does have some notion of estoppel--- if you know someone is using a patent of yours, and publicly congratulate them for it, and then years later turn around and sue them, your job in pulling off the U-turn is at least a bit harder. Among other things, they can argue detrimental reliance on your public acquiescence to their usage.
stephenjudkins 16y ago
It seems like defending against software patent claims are a cost of doing anything interesting now days. Create a novel, popular platform or tool, and someone somewhere will probably sue you over infringing on their patents. Google can probably dig into its mountain of cash and come out OK, but the precedent is chilling to smaller companies. It's also ironic that it's Dalvik that got hit, given the amount of anti-Microsoft hysteria that has surrounded the Mono project.
- phaedrus 16y ago
  I'm reminded of a comment a Mono developer made about the hullabaloo over whether Mono is a Microsoft Trojan Horse: "I can only imagine the C++ developers are laughing their heads off at us."
bdwalter 16y ago
I expect this to be the first of many lawsuits from "the larry" surrounding Sun IP.
dminor 16y ago
Google's an engineering company and I think they should fight back as such. Get together a team of your best and brightest, take Postgres, and turn it into a drop-in replacement for Oracle. And be very public about your efforts.
- houseabsolute 16y ago
  Because Oracle doesn't own any patents on the implementation of relational databases that they couldn't also sue Google over . . . The most engineer-ish thing to do is a back of the envelope calculation: 1. Estimate how much it'd cost to fight the suit. 2. Estimate the probability of winning. 3. Estimate the damages if you lose. 4. Estimate Oracle's ask for licensing the patents. If (1 + 2 * 3) < 4, fight, else settle. They probably have pretty good numbers on one, three, and four considering they likely discussed this with Oracle before fisticuffs began. The only perilous part is estimating two.
  - tezza 16y ago
    I agree with your analysis... another factor I guess is that Google will want to ensure that Oracle cannot repeat this trick whenever Oracle wants in the future (breach of license, not re-infringement). My work has had bad experiences with Oracle license chenanigans. Of course Google probably has better lawyers than my work does!
    - houseabsolute 16y ago
      Oracle would not want to "kill the golden goose" as it were. Assuming Google is infringing, the lawsuit is probably just a tactic to get a greater amount of licensing fees out of them than they would have been willing to pay without compulsion. It does Oracle no good to completely kill off Android, so any fees will certainly not be large enough to make the ecosystem unprofitable for Google.
      - gamble 16y ago
        Exactly, though any amount of licensing fees or control by Oracle cuts to the heart of Android's appeal to handset manufacturers.
guelo 16y ago
My dream for wrestling my profession away from the lawyers and CEOs is the formation of a programmer's union. The union would mainly be concerned with issues like these patents. A strike would be called on any company that tried to use software patents. A strike would mean not only that the programmers of that company would stop working, but also all programmers nationwide would refuse to work on that company's products and platforms. If such a union existed it would immediately stop the use of software patents. The union could also lobby congress for the elimination of software patents and could work on other programmer related laws, establish standards bodies, etc. IOW, give programmers some say in the industry that is currently driven by the suits.
- snth 16y ago
  > If such a union existed it would immediately stop the use of software patents. Or companies would just hire overseas programmers...
  - Raphael 16y ago
    Global union, man.
    - kragen 16y ago
      They tried that back in the 1800s. That's where the USSR came from.
- loewenskind 16y ago
  If you drop the patent stuff and focus on fair pay I'm in.
  - francoisdevlin 16y ago
    Fair pay for developers? Quit your whining.
    - loewenskind 16y ago
waldrews 16y ago
What does this mean for the almost-but-not-quite-JVM implementation in GAE?
- pjscott 16y ago
  Do you have a link that explains more? The GAE docs say they use "the Java 6 virtual machine (JVM)." http://code.google.com/appengine/docs/java/overview.html http://code.google.com/appengine/docs/java/overview.html
- waldrews 16y ago
  I guess I'm referring to http://www.itworld.com/open-source/66329/suns-open-source-boss-slams-app-engines-java-support http://www.itworld.com/open-source/66329/suns-open-source-bo... - not-quite-JRE might be a more precise way to put it.
deleted 16y ago
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Encosia 16y ago
I was reviewing some of Ellison's pre-acquisition talk about Java and found this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Dtqe1e0tXg#t=7m10s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Dtqe1e0tXg#t=7m10s Interesting and relevant.
bliss 16y ago
As a developer, I'm getting scared off the Java platform here. I know it's the JVM that's at issue, but I hate the kind of lock in that this implies - I think they'll do serious long term harm here.
thebootstrapper 16y ago
This sucks. Android is one the best thing happened to Java in recent times. And this actually means the Apache Harmony people wont get the TCK now. Sucks even more.
jchonphoenix 16y ago
The most worrisome factor in this lawsuit is how this will impact java as a language and a platform. If Google loses this lawsuit, java as a language and platform could easily die. Many companies would refuse to use it, just to be on the safe side and avoid litigation from Oracle. Oracle probably doesn't realize the massive damage it has done to the java platform just by going forward with this suit. Due to the looming threat of Oracle closing the java platform, startups and companies may begin avoiding the java platform in the same way they avoid the Microsoft stack. In fact, I can't see any reason why I WOULDN'T choose the .NET framework over java if both are so closed. At least C# has lambdas...
- bad_user 16y ago
  > At least C# has lambdas... And an open-source alternative which compared to other open-source Java efforts, is in pretty good shape, and also has a pledge from Microsoft. I feel attracted by .NET, but every time I end up using it I wish I didn't ... it's like every year I wish for summer to go to the beach, but when it's finally summer and I'm at the beach ... it's too hot, it's too crowded, the water is dirty and I don't want to be there :)
- loup-vaillant 16y ago
  If you like lambdas, you'd probably like F# better: lighter syntax, types are inferred, and it looks like it's quite well supported by Microsoft. But of course, if you consider F#, you may want to use the more free and open Ocaml.
  - bruceboughton 16y ago
    You can like lambdas without wanting to go fully functional... just like you can like objects without wanting to go fully object-oriented.
    - gaius 16y ago
      Those are called structs ;-)
js4all 16y ago
As a side note, there is something cooking. In the last weeks, Oracle has been replacing Sun's copyright messages with their own all over in Java. This even effected Eclipses startup code.
- rue 16y ago
  This is probably because Sun no longer exists.
Confusion 16y ago
What I don't understand and can't find anywhere: what is in it for Oracle? Do they want licensing fees? Do they want to destroy Android? Do they want Google to grant them licenses to certain patents Google owns?
anigbrowl 16y ago
Interesting. Please note, I'm not an attorney or expert on Java. The complaint is quite vague overall, perhaps deliberately. It lists the various patents, says what they are, and alleges that Google infringed upon each one. It also suggests that Sun/Oracle owns heaps of Java source code which has been used by Google, thereby breaching copyright. Oh, and since I own an Android phone I too am infringing on their patents, but fortunately they lay the blame for this at Google's feet. Whew! Nowhere in the complaint is there any explanation of what licensing obligations were applicable or which govern the distribution of Java. Nor is it clear when Oracle alleges this infringement began in relation to each patent, or why or how they consider it to be infringed upon by Android. The complaint mentions the Dalvik VM specifically. Looking through the licensing information on the phone itself, there's a bunch of stuff from Sun under a 1993-4 license which is very short and confers the right to use, modify and distribute the software without reservation. Most of the rest is under the Apache Harmony license, and a sprinkling of others. Well, I suppose if google were deliberately infringing, they would hardly mention the fact in their licensing statements. So where is the problem? 14. On information and belief, Google has been aware of Sun’s patent portfolio, including the patents at issue, since the middle of this decade, when Google hired certain former Sun Java engineers. A good ZDnet article suggests the engineers in question may be 'Lars Bak, Robert Griesemer, and Frank Yellin, all former Sun employees who now work for Google on Java and Web browser technologies, and all of whom appear as inventors on one or more of the patents in question.' http://www.zdnet.com/blog/burnette/oracle-uses-james-gosling-patent-to-attack-google-and-android-developers/2035 http://www.zdnet.com/blog/burnette/oracle-uses-james-gosling... Also (possibly, IMHO) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Bloch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Bloch I don't know what Oracles chances are. On the surface it looks like rather weak sauce, with some of the patents being questionable because of prior art...but like I said, that's an amateur perspective. Oracle appears to be saying the bare minimum necessary at this time. Google will likely move for a summary judgment of dismissal, denying that there is any substance to Oracle's claims, and at that point Oracle may have to make some more specific allegations.
- wccrawford 16y ago
  Whenever someone says 'You infringe on my patents! Pay me! ... No, I won't tell you how you infringe,' I immediately think they're just spreading FUD.
timinman 16y ago
"A Google spokesman said the company hasn't yet been served with the lawsuit, and is therefore unable to comment. An Oracle spokeswoman declined to comment." With Oracle knowing obviously knowing this could damage their largest asset, it makes me wonder if they're still in talks. Someone who knows more law than I do could probably tell us. How hard is it do withdraw a suit once filed. How expensive is it to file a lawsuit your not certain you'll follow through on?
deleted 16y ago
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korch 16y ago
Google choosing Java: <nelson> Ha-Ha! </nelson>
dkskalwd 16y ago
I am happy about this. This demonstrate that patents and copyright in the IT field can kill the innovation. So a hard war in this field can contribute to abolish copyright. Small developers are very vulnerable, let's see what happen when the giants eat each other.
loewenskind 16y ago
Does this have anything to do with the GPL? I mean, is Oracle trying to enforce Java's GPL license on Google?
- wmf 16y ago
  No, because Java isn't GPLed. OpenJDK is GPLed, but this suit has nothing to do with OpenJDK.
serichsen 16y ago
Is Oracle faring so bad? Last I looked, a company actively suing for patent infringement meant that they have no real product, so it's their only hope of "generating" "income". It is a sure sign of imminent corporate decline.
arghnoname 16y ago
Can someone remind me why Google didn't buy Sun when it was on the market? The culture seems like it would have been a relatively good fit and their use of Java related technologies (obviously now) would have made ownership of those technologies useful. Had they bought Sun and then sold off the hardware side of the business they would have bought a lot of solid engineers and IP.
- el_chapitan 16y ago
  In hindsight, it might have been cheaper to buy them outright than to litigate a battle like this. Then again, they're going to have some undisclosed settlement, so we'll never really know how it ends up. I'm guessing they didn't buy them because of the business they were in. Selling workstations + Solaris was only part of their business. I think the services part of their work was bringing in more money towards the end. As far as I'm aware, Google doesn't do much in the services realm, which probably factored big into their decision not to buy.
deleted 16y ago
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c1sc0 16y ago
Steve Jobs must be laughing from his evil genius lair about this. You know, two dogs fighter over a bone and stuff ...
dstein 16y ago
Oracle is sending a very clear message every programmer, young and old. "If you use Java to make something valuable, we're gonna sue the crap out of you". This will have long term consequences for Oracle.
- joeyh 16y ago
  "Java: Write once, run anywhere, be sued by Oracle"
  - nivertech 16y ago
    "Java: Write once, run anywhere and hide from Oracle"
BenoitEssiambre 16y ago
I thought we were supposed to use java instead of c# to avoid getting into the this exact situation :-S
openfly 16y ago
I hope this leads to Google getting rid of Java from android entirely. Possibly even removing Dalvik.
drv 16y ago
This bit at the end was interesting: [...] any software found to be in violation of Oracle's copyrights "be impounded and destroyed." How does one go about rounding up all the copies of something as ephemeral and easily duplicated as software? Is this common wording in software litigation?
rquirk 16y ago
Oracle must be pretty sure of victory, or a positive outcome at least, otherwise why would they go after Google right away? They could have gone after HTC, as Apple did. That would have been a more likely victory, which Oracle could have used as leverage against Google.
- caf 16y ago
  On the other hand, why didn't they go after HTC and the other device manufacturers at the same time?
InclinedPlane 16y ago
Oracle may do what no other company, even MS, has managed to do: kill java. They are currently making an excellent case that it's time to move on to a new technology, not just open source but actually free to use.
elblanco 16y ago
Amazing, Oracle's strategy seems to be to purchase good technology (MySQL, JAVA,...) and then strangle off and alienate users of that entire business line by being douches. There must be some kind of business school thing I'm missing here.
c00p3r 16y ago
That is good for Android community and not so good for Java community. First of all, we should praise Google for making so good decisions, to re-use wast community of Java developers and Eclipse (without which they cannot program ^_^) and avoid bloated and corporative-centered JVM or Java ME, that it resulted in such ridiculous lawsuit about .jar files. ^_^ They also got a lot of buzz and the reputation of not doing evil and even being a victim of a corporate monster and patent trolls. btw, it looks a lot like an Apples decision about dropping Flash (yet another outdated artificial tumor) just because it simply does not work. Google'd rewrote VM, while Apple invested in LLVM. So, it is a good news.

452 points by jbarham 16y ago

http://blog.borud.no/2010/08/pull-yourself-together-larry-ellison.html http://blog.borud.no/2010/08/pull-yourself-together-larry-el... my 2 cents

tptacek 16y ago

"Java is the single most important software we've ever acquired," Oracle Chief Executive Larry Ellison said during a conference call [...] ... "and if you don't do everything I say, I'll blow up the moon! Ah-hahahahah!" How do you not love this guy? Somebody get him a black cape.

gahahaha 16y ago
He is just trying to save /more/ children in Africa. http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB10001424052748704017904575409193790337162.html http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB10001424052748704... Larry Ellison is a saint! ... and an asshole.
- Timothee 16y ago
  The letter he wrote for the Giving Pledge website actually shows a bit of him being a saint and an asshole: http://givingpledge.org/#larry_ellison http://givingpledge.org/#larry_ellison To whom it may concern, Many years ago, I put virtually all of my assets into a trust with the intent of giving away at least 95% of my wealth to charitable causes. I have already given hundreds of millions of dollars to medical research and education, and I will give billions more over time. Until now, I have done this giving quietly – because I have long believed that charitable giving is a personal and private matter. So why am I going public now? Warren Buffett personally asked me to write this letter because he said I would be “setting an example” and “influencing others” to give. I hope he’s right. Larry Ellison On one hand, he is giving a lot, on the other, you can tell he couldn't care less about the pledge and the letter.
  - SoftwareMaven 16y ago
    My take on the letter is that he really doesn't like Buffet trying to push him around. I can understand wanting to give quietly; that is how I would prefer to give.
  - bhiggins 16y ago
    That's actually pretty rad.
  - MartinCron 16y ago
    This letter increased my admiration of the man greatly.
  - iambvk 16y ago
    I wonder how much did google give away till now...
    - sovande 16y ago
      Think "Google Summer of Code" for starters..
    - micrypt 16y ago
      "In 2004, when Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin wrote to prospective shareholders about their vision for the company, they outlined a commitment to contribute significant resources, including 1% of Google's equity and profits in some form, as well as employee time, to address some of the world's most urgent problems. That commitment became a range of giving initiatives including Google.org." - http://www.google.org/about.html http://www.google.org/about.html
  - gruseom 16y ago
    Why should he care about the pledge? Taking the letter at face value, he's already gone far further ("at least 95% of my wealth") than the pledgers, and he's done it in private. I can totally understand him not wanting to write such a letter and doing it only as a favour to Buffett, with a certain skepticism. Well-founded skepticism too. (Or maybe he's just pissed that he had to blow his cover as a supervillain.)
davidw 16y ago
I'd throw him to a hungry pack of grammar nazis just for the 'software' bit. Maybe he's irritated that Google has been getting all the 'evil' headlines lately and wanted to outdo them.

brettnak 16y ago

I feel a little naive for not expecting something like this. I thought all the Sun/Oracle nonsense would be around MySQL.

mkramlich 16y ago
MySQL: I bet that part is coming.

squidsoup 16y ago

This article is a bit light on detail - can anyone explain how the development of Android infringes on Oracle's IP?

tzs 16y ago
If they were talking about Oracle's patents, it would make sense. It's the talk of it being copyright infringement that has me confused. Android is basically, as far as I've read, a Linux kernel, with Google's own user space on top of that--their own equivalent of libc and their own windowing system. On top of that, they run their own JVM, which they wrote themselves and which is NOT even compatible with Oracle's at the byte-code level. Android apps are written in Java and compiled/JITed for Google's VM. So, unless the Java compiler itself takes code from Oracle's compiler, it is hard to see what in their would contain copies of Oracle code.
- pohl 16y ago
  One thing missing from your list: the standard java libs like java.lang.* etc. Are those google's implementations?
  - jancona 16y ago
    They're from the Apache Harmony project, not from Sun's Java.
- aneth 16y ago
  > So, unless the Java compiler itself takes code from Oracle's compiler, it is hard to see what in their would contain copies of Oracle code. This is about patent infringement, not copyright. Whether or not code was copied is irrelevant. UPDATE: Sorry, maybe both are at stake. The author of this article seems sadly ignorant of the difference between patent and copyright, as he seems to use them interchangeable. So who knows....
- nl 16y ago
  If you read the complaint itself (http://www.scribd.com/doc/35811761/Oracle-s-complaint-against-Google-for-Java-patent-infringement http://www.scribd.com/doc/35811761/Oracle-s-complaint-agains...) it becomes clearer - see Count 8, copyright infringement: The Java platform contains a substantial amount of original material (including without limitation code, specifications, documentation and other materials) that is copyrightable subject matter under the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. so because the Android platform APIs also include the Java APIs Oracle thinks there is a case. I'm not aware of any precedents that would indicate the likelyhood of this succeeding, but its possible there could be a problem here. Note that http://developer.android.com/reference/packages.html http://developer.android.com/reference/packages.html contains the java.* API's, and in the past Sun was pretty strict about companies not hosting that Javadoc itself publicly (eg, they stopped one site that was building interlinked Javadoc references).

seldo 16y ago

Excuse the really really obvious question, but how can you sue somebody for intellectual property infringement on open-source software? Didn't you already give anybody the license to do what they wanted with it? If they've violated the license terms in some way, isn't that different from IP infringement?

squidsoup 16y ago
I'm struggling to understand this as well - I would have thought OSS licensing and software patents would be incompatible.
- alanh 16y ago
  Sadly they are not. This is why the W3C has a patent policy [1] to prevent contributed software and specifications from being covered by patents. [1]: http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Patent-Policy-20040205/ http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Patent-Policy-20040205/ If this still does not make any sense, realize that patents and copyrights, while both forms of IP, are completely different, legally. Also recall how open source GIF implementations were still covered by the Unisys patent.
  - hga 16y ago
    Which is the sort of thing that did the other JEDEC members a fat lot of good when Rambus (spit) went on the warpath: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rambus#Lawsuits http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rambus#Lawsuits
- el_chapitan 16y ago
  I believe that was the purpose of the GPL3. You know, the one that nobody uses because it is too draconian.
tptacek 16y ago
Of course you can. There'd be no such thing as an enforceable software patent if any company could just sponsor an open source project to implement each part of its product that infringed a patent. Presumably --- hopefully 'grellas will clear this up --- Oracle can measure damages incurred by Google supplanting Sun/Oracle Java with their own Java in terms of percentage points of global smartphone revenue. Here's some more context: http://blogs.gartner.com/brian_prentice/2009/08/06/google-open-source-patent-reform/ http://blogs.gartner.com/brian_prentice/2009/08/06/google-op...

cscotta 16y ago

The biggest issue I see with Oracle's lawsuit is not with Android itself, but the future of Java as an open platform. The claims are pretty serious, and Oracle is going straight for the jugular. It'll be interesting to see how it shakes out, but I've got to hope that Google will come out of this in good shape for the sake of Java. It's unfortunate that Oracle is interpreting Google's implementation of Dalvik and a Java-based system as a direct infringement upon their patents. Android aside, it raises some fairly serious questions around Java's future development as a platform vis a vis the uncertainty recently resolved between Microsoft and the Mono project. While Microsoft extended their "Community Promise" to Mono implementors and users, Oracle seems to be taking the opposite approach to companies developing alternate JVMs and Java-based devices. It'll be interesting to see Oracle's stance toward other alternate JVMs such as IBM's. If you're curious, the original complaint is here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/35811761/Oracle-s-complaint-against-Google-for-Java-patent-infringement http://www.scribd.com/doc/35811761/Oracle-s-complaint-agains... The patents upon which Oracle claims infringement are: - Protection domains to provide security in a computer system (6,125,447) - Controlling Access to a Resource (6,192,476) - Method and apparatus for pre-processing and packaging class files (5,966,702) - System and method for dynamic preloading of classes through memory space cloning of a master runtime system process (7,426,720) - Interpreting functions utilizing a hybrid of virtual and native machine instructions (6,910,205) - Method and system for performing static initialization (6,061,520)

kingkilr 16y ago
> Interpreting functions utilizing a hybrid of virtual and native machine instructions Are they serious? Unless I'm missing something this is a fantastic joke, JITs far predate Java.
- tptacek 16y ago
  Careful. The name of a title and its actual claims are two very different things.
  - patrickaljord 16y ago

epochwolf 16y ago

Oh joy. I would like some details before I wave goodbye to java and the jvm.

tzs 16y ago

Google should switch to C# and Mono. Besides giving them a better language and VM, it would cause the most amusing set of rants from the anti-Mono crowd. Win/win.

squidsoup 16y ago
By better language, do you mean better than Java? The JVM supports many other great languages like Ruby, Clojure and Scala. I'd love to see Google provide GWT support for Scala, but that's another issue :)
- whakojacko 16y ago
  JVM still has type erasure though :(. I agree GWT for scala would be awesome
- binaryfinery 16y ago
  The JVM bytecode is shitty. It cannot support dynamic languages at the VM level (yet: http://jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=292 http://jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=292), the support for the C# equivalent of structs has been pushed back, and that makes any kind of hardware acceleration painful. Then theres type erasure - a total hack to get generics. I think Oracle is being beyond stupid here. If anyone has the power to come up with a language and toolchain to make Java utterly irrelevant, its Google.
  - jdc 16y ago
    Bingo
  - rayvega 16y ago
    History will repeat itself. Sun sued Microsoft over their implementation of Java. In response, MS drops Java and creates its own language (C#), framework (.NET), and VM (CLR) which now solidly competes with Java in the enterprise software space. If MS was able to accomplish all of that, then imagine what Google could create if they decided to drop Java altogether ('Go' language might be the preview.) That would be a huge win for the software industry while a big (long term) loss for Oracle as Java further wans in popularity. (Hmm....if Oracle can sue Google over the non-Java VM they created for Android couldn't they sue MS for their "JVM-like" CLR? This is another reason why their patent lawsuit is so ridiculous.) No matter how you slice it, Google has the advantage in the long run while patent trolls like Oracle have the most to lose in the long term.

noelchurchill 16y ago

Aren't Larry Ellison and Steven Jobs best friends?

parenthesis 16y ago
A source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/01/14/MNGS649LVB1.DTL http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/ar... "Ellison's best friend … Steve Jobs … did double duty as the wedding photographer [at Ellison's wedding]." Also Ellison was on Apple's board for a few years after the second coming of Jobs.

noonespecial 16y ago

It just goes to show that whatever company-de-jour promises about enforcing the patents that they are granted today, all bets are off when they fall on hard times and are acquired tomorrow. Serious about openness? Skip the "patent and promise" dance and just release the damn thing BSD.

jancona 16y ago
How would BSD help? It doesn't include a patent license.
- noonespecial 16y ago
  Skip the "patent and promise" dance and just release the damn thing BSD and forget about patents. (Implied, should have specified)
  - wmf 16y ago
    If you already have patents (as Sun did in this case) you can't just forget about them. Saying nothing about patents is equivalent to saying "some day we'll change our mind and start suing". If you want to make something really open you really need some kind of irrevocable license or promise not to sue.
pquerna 16y ago
That is why you would license it under the Apache License, because it has explicit patent clauses, rather than something like the BSD license.
technomancy 16y ago
The BSD license would be useless here. Preventing this kind of thing is the whole point of the third revision of the GPL; to my knowledge there are no other software licenses that do this.
- astrange 16y ago
  See LGPLv2 section 11.

bitsai 16y ago

What implications, if any, does this have for the future of JVM languages like Scala, Clojure, etc.?

bconway 16y ago
Seconded. If Oracle is going to turn Java into a minefield, it's going to have big repercussions in future uptake.
- recoil 16y ago
  I think this is much bigger than just Java. The patents in question relate to the whole field of VM implementation, not simply Java VM implementation. On the surface this really appears to have very little to do with Java the language. For a start, Dalvik is not a JVM implementation at all, in fact it's quite a different beast. See, e.g.: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_application_virtual_machines http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_application_virtu... which lists Dalvik as a register machine rather than a stack machine: definitely not a trivial difference. Google's toolchain converts from JVM bytecode to Dalvik bytecode, which is probably what Oracle are going after with #5,966,702 but the rest of the patents are much more general. If anything Oracle are turning VM implementation in general into a patent minefield, not Java alone.
michaelfairley 16y ago
It looks like the patents that Oracle is claiming are being infringed upon focus on the actual JVM itself, not on the code run on it. Google making their own JVM is what's brought them into the crosshairs.
- hga 16y ago
  Which could be rather bad if you need a JVM tuned in a non-standard way. Anyway you look at it, Oracle has enabled a lot of FUD to be thrown at Java, and if your observation is correct, andyone who's working on any sort of non-Oracle derived JVM (and there are a bunch) had just been handed a lot of legal uncertainty. Side note: I don't need hearing this shortly after learning about the RightHaven atrocity factory.

hugh4life 16y ago

I bet the mono people are laughing their asses off now... I think Sun suing Microsoft was a mistake too for the Java platform... the write once, run everywhere ideology made Java the native platform of the server... write once, run everywhere should be the default, but it should be easier and encouraged to escape...

megablast 16y ago
Microsoft were destroying Java with their own implementation, which was not compatible with normal Java. They were changing the language, just as they tried to do with HTML in internet explorer and active-x, so we still see people having to use ie6. Sun had to sue Microsoft, before they changed Java so much it was no longer platform agnostic (or it was way less agnostic).
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- MartinCron 16y ago
  I wonder what would have happened, though. Would the market decide that being platform-agnostic is more important than using MS dev tools? Would developers just have to work (around) with an incompatible platform, as they do with IE. I wonder if the MS rift caused more harm to Java than letting Microsoft change its implementation.
KirinDave 16y ago
I'm pretty sure the Mono people are worried. These patents are things that are fairly fundamental and important to any sort of mobile device that has competent security.
- binaryfinery 16y ago
  No I'm pretty sure they aren't. The CLR is totally different to the JVM.
  - 16y ago

macemoneta 16y ago

As background, from WikiPedia: "On November 13, 2006, Sun released much of Java as open source software under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL). On May 8, 2007, Sun finished the process, making all of Java's core code available under free software/open-source distribution terms, aside from a small portion of code to which Sun did not hold the copyright." If Sun willingly made the code GPL licensed, and Google isn't using anything outside the GPL code, even if some of the technologies were covered by patents I don't see Oracle having a case. Right now, this sounds very much like the SCO - Linux suit that dragged on forever and went nowhere.

albertzeyer 16y ago
Exactly this is the core question here. I am really curious about how the law sees this. And I would really wonder if they decide against Google. It looks almost like a trap of Sun/Oracle then, kind of "hey, here, use our code, it is open source now grin". Or to put it different: Why did they use the GPL licence?
nl 16y ago
Google is using NONE of the Sun code. They use their own VM, and use the Apache Harmony class libraries. That's why it isn't called "Java" The Sun release has some weird field-of-use restrictions associated with it.
avar 16y ago
Giving out software under the GPL v2 does not mean that you grant others a patent license, that isn't within the scope of the GPL v2.
- ori_b 16y ago
  That's not true. See section 7 of the GPL. In part: For example, if a patent license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Program by all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the Program. However, it seems Sun can relicence the software under whatever they want, and the current versions of it wouldn't be under GPL anymore. I am not a lawyer, so I don't know exactly what this implies.

mmorris 16y ago

I'm sure there would be speed issues, but Google is really supportive of Python right? Wink wink, nudge nudge. (I've heard about the Android Scripting Environment, but it sounds like that is not as fully supported as might be ideal).

statictype 16y ago
I believe its already possible package python programs as .apk bundles right?

dangrossman 16y ago

Sun released the majority of Java under the GPL. How can you claim that someone you licensed the code to is infringing both its copyright and its patent? I'm looking forward to some more detail when Google publishes a response.

patrickaljord 16y ago
But Google's android does not use Sun's GPLed Java, it uses their own Java called "Dalvik" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalvik_(software) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalvik_(software)
- brisance 16y ago
  Technically incorrect... Dalvik is a VM, and the implementation of it, according to Oracle's claim, is infringing on Sun's patents.
- jbarham 16y ago
  Note that Dalvik is essentially just an alternate stack-based virtual machine for bytecode that's been converted from the standard stack-based JVM bytecode. You still need a standard Java SDK to develop Android applications in order to compile the Java source code to JVM bytecode. So far Google has been able to get the best of both worlds by leveraging the vast Java tools ecosystem but then in the final step they convert the standard JVM bytecode to run on their own Dalvik VM which means they don't have to pay license fees for the standard Java runtime. IMO this is what is really annoying Oracle. (To be fair there are also good technical reasons why they created Dalvik.) I can understand where Oracle is coming from legally, but business-wise I think this lawsuit is bound to backfire. Google has the resources to defend themselves and move away from Java in the long term, but in the meantime Oracle has created serious uncertainty about the openness of the Java platform which will scare technically innovative players away from Java that don't have the financial and legal resources that Google does. So Oracle turns Java into the new COBOL, a technically moribund backwater that is only kept alive for legacy purposes.
  - artsrc 16y ago

RexRollman 16y ago

If I didn't detest software patent suits so much, I would say this is karma for Google's recent actions regarding network neutrality and wireless broadband.

obluda 16y ago

goodbye java ?

gojomo 16y ago

What an excellent occasion to try the homoglyph hoax attack on friends and enemies! (See http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1571984 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1571984 .) http://www.google.com/search?q=οraclе http://www.google.com/search?q=οraclе Your search - οraclе - did not match any documents.

rodh257 16y ago
now it returns this comment on hacker news which explains that its a hoax, heh
- gojomo 16y ago
  Indeed, impressive on Google's part. There are surely dozens of other plausible homoglyphs that might work for a short time, though. Stay wary!
statictype 16y ago
Actually, you now get one page - this one. Isn't there some prize for doing a google search that nets only a single result? Incidentally, these homoglyph attacks are pretty hard to catch. Even Vim (which normally chokes on 8+ bit characters in my setup) didn't seem to show anything different until I checked the hex codes.
- joshwa 16y ago
  >> Isn't there some prize for doing a google search that nets only a single result? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googlewhack http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googlewhack
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sp332 16y ago
Maybe it would work better with a <noindex> tag like this: οrасlе http://www.google.com/search?q=οrасlе http://www.google.com/search?q=οrасlе </noindex>

donaq 16y ago

I'm sorry, but I just don't understand this decision. Is Oracle in need of cash or something? Why did they become patent trolls? I mean, they're not even in the smart phone business, and it's not like Google is going to put a DBMS into Android. How are they being threatened in any way by Google?

wmf 16y ago
Oh, but they are in the phone business; every phone that includes Java pays license fees to Oracle... except Android phones aren't paying.
- zmmmmm 16y ago
  This may be true but it would be amazingly bone headed of them. Android is the best thing to happen to Java in the last 5 years, and the perception (at least) that people using Java have less to worry about as far as patents go is one of the few things really giving it a strong advantage over .NET. This is a remarkably effective way of destroying several of Java's strengths all in one go....
  - Calamitous 16y ago
    You're assuming they a) care about Java, and b) care about what's good for the smartphone market. If you flip those assumptions, it's not boneheaded at all. Just very, very slimy...
  - gamble 16y ago
    Sun went out of business making decisions that made Java popular, but not lucrative. Oracle has a reputation as a place where people would climb over their own mothers to get a sale; they won't make the same mistake. Moreover, Android is a threat to Oracle's Java revenue, not an asset. Mobile JVM licenses were one of the few things Sun made money on with Java. Android is destroying that business. I'm pretty sure that Oracle would prefer a slice of a smaller pie to no share in a larger pie.
deleted 16y ago
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hugh4life 16y ago

Google just bought Instantiations... and Google is getting to release their GUI designers for Swing, SWT, and GWT... http://www.infoq.com/news/2010/08/eclipse4-released http://www.infoq.com/news/2010/08/eclipse4-released """"" "You said..."it is expected that GWT Designer will make an appearance via the GWT Blog in the coming months" Actually, we are in the process of Googlizing all of our products; not just GWT Designer. They will all be made available again fairly soon and the announcement will be made on the GWT blog. """""

jarin 16y ago

The headline should read "Oracle sues Google over literally the only thing keeping Java relevant".

keefe 16y ago
except for all the high quality libraries for doing hard things
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
shadowfox 16y ago
I think you might be surprised at the amount of enterprise software in Java these days
- cookiecaper 16y ago
  Practically everything that is not .NET
gphil 16y ago
Maybe the only thing keeping Java relevant to consumers. It's also the de facto standard platform for just about all recent enterprise software projects.
zmmmmm 16y ago
I don't necessarily agree about relevance, but I do find it quite mind boggling that Oracle would strike out against what is clearly a massive growth opportunity for Java. If they want to destroy the Java brand the fastest way possible then definitely the right thing to do is start suing people who are using Java. The million dollar question is why would anybody in their right mind do this?
- extension 16y ago
  What good is Java to them if they can't control it? They don't have a monopoly on expertise.

rjurney 16y ago

Oracle CEO Larry Ellison are good friends, best man at your wedding kind of friends. Ellison was once on Apple's board of directors after Jobs returned to Apple. Oracle suing Google over Java patent infringements in Android sure plays well for Apple... Apple vs (Google vs (Facebook && Oracle))

jws 16y ago
… and if you rearrange the letters of "spicy acorn" it even spells "conspiracy"!.
- pohl 16y ago
  That's the beauty of quid pro quo: it's plausibly deniable and you can poke fun at those who suspect it.
- rjurney 16y ago
  I'm not suggesting a conspiracy, just an alliance :)

patrickaljord 16y ago

According to this thread on the Android mailing list, Oracle tried to settle privately with Google but Google refused. This may mean that Google has a strong case against those patents: http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers/browse_thread/thread/a0d97347e53e94?hl=en http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers/browse_thr...

binaryfinery 16y ago

And needless to say, at least patent 6,125,447 has prior art.

Eliezer 16y ago

I like this headline because if we sent it back in time 30 years it wouldn't make any sense at all.

bdr 16y ago
"Using coffee as robot fuel will lead to certain doom! If only I could make them understand -- all 10^100 of them!", said the prophet.
caf 16y ago
Fantastic observation ;)
pjscott 16y ago
Looking over the front page, I wonder what the people thirty years ago would have made of some of the other headlines: "Making GitHub More Open: Git-backed Wikis" "Twitter Polling in the Cloud in 30s using PiCloud" or, my favorite: "Burning man defeats PayPal" (I envision something like the Biblical story of Jesus driving money-changers out of a temple, but this time, Jesus lights himself on fire first. It's very intimidating.)
- thelibrarian 16y ago
  "Making GitHub More Open: Git-backed Wikis" wouldn't have made sense even 15 years ago. "Twitter Polling in the Cloud in 30s using PiCloud" wouldn't have made sense only 5 years ago.
- jemfinch 16y ago
  > Looking over the front page, I wonder what the people thirty years ago would have made of some of the other headlines People thirty years ago? Heck, I wonder what my in-laws would make of those headlines :)
teilo 16y ago
Oh, that made my day. I'm still going to laugh every time I think about this days from now.

billmcneale 16y ago

The biggest issue for Oracle is that Sun's previous CEO publicly congratulated Google about Android: http://beust.com/weblog/2010/08/12/oracle-is-suing-google-over-java-theres-just-one-tiny-problem/ http://beust.com/weblog/2010/08/12/oracle-is-suing-google-ov... Good luck defending your trademark after the CEO declares it's not really interested in doing so.

btilly 16y ago
Intellectual property divides into 3 fields with 3 different sets of rules. Anything you learn about how copyrights, trademarks and patents work is more likely than not to be wrong about the other two. You're thinking trademark law. This lawsuit is under patent law. It doesn't matter what Jonathan Schwartz publicly said.
- _delirium 16y ago
  It's not as strong as with trademark law, but patent law does have some notion of estoppel--- if you know someone is using a patent of yours, and publicly congratulate them for it, and then years later turn around and sue them, your job in pulling off the U-turn is at least a bit harder. Among other things, they can argue detrimental reliance on your public acquiescence to their usage.

stephenjudkins 16y ago

It seems like defending against software patent claims are a cost of doing anything interesting now days. Create a novel, popular platform or tool, and someone somewhere will probably sue you over infringing on their patents. Google can probably dig into its mountain of cash and come out OK, but the precedent is chilling to smaller companies. It's also ironic that it's Dalvik that got hit, given the amount of anti-Microsoft hysteria that has surrounded the Mono project.

phaedrus 16y ago
I'm reminded of a comment a Mono developer made about the hullabaloo over whether Mono is a Microsoft Trojan Horse: "I can only imagine the C++ developers are laughing their heads off at us."

bdwalter 16y ago

I expect this to be the first of many lawsuits from "the larry" surrounding Sun IP.

dminor 16y ago

Google's an engineering company and I think they should fight back as such. Get together a team of your best and brightest, take Postgres, and turn it into a drop-in replacement for Oracle. And be very public about your efforts.

houseabsolute 16y ago
Because Oracle doesn't own any patents on the implementation of relational databases that they couldn't also sue Google over . . . The most engineer-ish thing to do is a back of the envelope calculation: 1. Estimate how much it'd cost to fight the suit. 2. Estimate the probability of winning. 3. Estimate the damages if you lose. 4. Estimate Oracle's ask for licensing the patents. If (1 + 2 * 3) < 4, fight, else settle. They probably have pretty good numbers on one, three, and four considering they likely discussed this with Oracle before fisticuffs began. The only perilous part is estimating two.
- tezza 16y ago
  I agree with your analysis... another factor I guess is that Google will want to ensure that Oracle cannot repeat this trick whenever Oracle wants in the future (breach of license, not re-infringement). My work has had bad experiences with Oracle license chenanigans. Of course Google probably has better lawyers than my work does!
  - houseabsolute 16y ago
    Oracle would not want to "kill the golden goose" as it were. Assuming Google is infringing, the lawsuit is probably just a tactic to get a greater amount of licensing fees out of them than they would have been willing to pay without compulsion. It does Oracle no good to completely kill off Android, so any fees will certainly not be large enough to make the ecosystem unprofitable for Google.
    - gamble 16y ago
      Exactly, though any amount of licensing fees or control by Oracle cuts to the heart of Android's appeal to handset manufacturers.

guelo 16y ago

My dream for wrestling my profession away from the lawyers and CEOs is the formation of a programmer's union. The union would mainly be concerned with issues like these patents. A strike would be called on any company that tried to use software patents. A strike would mean not only that the programmers of that company would stop working, but also all programmers nationwide would refuse to work on that company's products and platforms. If such a union existed it would immediately stop the use of software patents. The union could also lobby congress for the elimination of software patents and could work on other programmer related laws, establish standards bodies, etc. IOW, give programmers some say in the industry that is currently driven by the suits.

snth 16y ago
> If such a union existed it would immediately stop the use of software patents. Or companies would just hire overseas programmers...
- Raphael 16y ago
  Global union, man.
  - kragen 16y ago
    They tried that back in the 1800s. That's where the USSR came from.
loewenskind 16y ago
If you drop the patent stuff and focus on fair pay I'm in.
- francoisdevlin 16y ago
  Fair pay for developers? Quit your whining.
  - loewenskind 16y ago

waldrews 16y ago

What does this mean for the almost-but-not-quite-JVM implementation in GAE?

pjscott 16y ago
Do you have a link that explains more? The GAE docs say they use "the Java 6 virtual machine (JVM)." http://code.google.com/appengine/docs/java/overview.html http://code.google.com/appengine/docs/java/overview.html
waldrews 16y ago
I guess I'm referring to http://www.itworld.com/open-source/66329/suns-open-source-boss-slams-app-engines-java-support http://www.itworld.com/open-source/66329/suns-open-source-bo... - not-quite-JRE might be a more precise way to put it.

deleted 16y ago

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Encosia 16y ago

I was reviewing some of Ellison's pre-acquisition talk about Java and found this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Dtqe1e0tXg#t=7m10s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Dtqe1e0tXg#t=7m10s Interesting and relevant.

bliss 16y ago

As a developer, I'm getting scared off the Java platform here. I know it's the JVM that's at issue, but I hate the kind of lock in that this implies - I think they'll do serious long term harm here.

thebootstrapper 16y ago

This sucks. Android is one the best thing happened to Java in recent times. And this actually means the Apache Harmony people wont get the TCK now. Sucks even more.

jchonphoenix 16y ago

The most worrisome factor in this lawsuit is how this will impact java as a language and a platform. If Google loses this lawsuit, java as a language and platform could easily die. Many companies would refuse to use it, just to be on the safe side and avoid litigation from Oracle. Oracle probably doesn't realize the massive damage it has done to the java platform just by going forward with this suit. Due to the looming threat of Oracle closing the java platform, startups and companies may begin avoiding the java platform in the same way they avoid the Microsoft stack. In fact, I can't see any reason why I WOULDN'T choose the .NET framework over java if both are so closed. At least C# has lambdas...

bad_user 16y ago
> At least C# has lambdas... And an open-source alternative which compared to other open-source Java efforts, is in pretty good shape, and also has a pledge from Microsoft. I feel attracted by .NET, but every time I end up using it I wish I didn't ... it's like every year I wish for summer to go to the beach, but when it's finally summer and I'm at the beach ... it's too hot, it's too crowded, the water is dirty and I don't want to be there :)
loup-vaillant 16y ago
If you like lambdas, you'd probably like F# better: lighter syntax, types are inferred, and it looks like it's quite well supported by Microsoft. But of course, if you consider F#, you may want to use the more free and open Ocaml.
- bruceboughton 16y ago
  You can like lambdas without wanting to go fully functional... just like you can like objects without wanting to go fully object-oriented.
  - gaius 16y ago
    Those are called structs ;-)

js4all 16y ago

As a side note, there is something cooking. In the last weeks, Oracle has been replacing Sun's copyright messages with their own all over in Java. This even effected Eclipses startup code.

rue 16y ago
This is probably because Sun no longer exists.

Confusion 16y ago

What I don't understand and can't find anywhere: what is in it for Oracle? Do they want licensing fees? Do they want to destroy Android? Do they want Google to grant them licenses to certain patents Google owns?

anigbrowl 16y ago

Interesting. Please note, I'm not an attorney or expert on Java. The complaint is quite vague overall, perhaps deliberately. It lists the various patents, says what they are, and alleges that Google infringed upon each one. It also suggests that Sun/Oracle owns heaps of Java source code which has been used by Google, thereby breaching copyright. Oh, and since I own an Android phone I too am infringing on their patents, but fortunately they lay the blame for this at Google's feet. Whew! Nowhere in the complaint is there any explanation of what licensing obligations were applicable or which govern the distribution of Java. Nor is it clear when Oracle alleges this infringement began in relation to each patent, or why or how they consider it to be infringed upon by Android. The complaint mentions the Dalvik VM specifically. Looking through the licensing information on the phone itself, there's a bunch of stuff from Sun under a 1993-4 license which is very short and confers the right to use, modify and distribute the software without reservation. Most of the rest is under the Apache Harmony license, and a sprinkling of others. Well, I suppose if google were deliberately infringing, they would hardly mention the fact in their licensing statements. So where is the problem? 14. On information and belief, Google has been aware of Sun’s patent portfolio, including the patents at issue, since the middle of this decade, when Google hired certain former Sun Java engineers. A good ZDnet article suggests the engineers in question may be 'Lars Bak, Robert Griesemer, and Frank Yellin, all former Sun employees who now work for Google on Java and Web browser technologies, and all of whom appear as inventors on one or more of the patents in question.' http://www.zdnet.com/blog/burnette/oracle-uses-james-gosling-patent-to-attack-google-and-android-developers/2035 http://www.zdnet.com/blog/burnette/oracle-uses-james-gosling... Also (possibly, IMHO) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Bloch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Bloch I don't know what Oracles chances are. On the surface it looks like rather weak sauce, with some of the patents being questionable because of prior art...but like I said, that's an amateur perspective. Oracle appears to be saying the bare minimum necessary at this time. Google will likely move for a summary judgment of dismissal, denying that there is any substance to Oracle's claims, and at that point Oracle may have to make some more specific allegations.

wccrawford 16y ago
Whenever someone says 'You infringe on my patents! Pay me! ... No, I won't tell you how you infringe,' I immediately think they're just spreading FUD.

timinman 16y ago

"A Google spokesman said the company hasn't yet been served with the lawsuit, and is therefore unable to comment. An Oracle spokeswoman declined to comment." With Oracle knowing obviously knowing this could damage their largest asset, it makes me wonder if they're still in talks. Someone who knows more law than I do could probably tell us. How hard is it do withdraw a suit once filed. How expensive is it to file a lawsuit your not certain you'll follow through on?

deleted 16y ago

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korch 16y ago

Google choosing Java: <nelson> Ha-Ha! </nelson>

dkskalwd 16y ago

I am happy about this. This demonstrate that patents and copyright in the IT field can kill the innovation. So a hard war in this field can contribute to abolish copyright. Small developers are very vulnerable, let's see what happen when the giants eat each other.

loewenskind 16y ago

Does this have anything to do with the GPL? I mean, is Oracle trying to enforce Java's GPL license on Google?

wmf 16y ago
No, because Java isn't GPLed. OpenJDK is GPLed, but this suit has nothing to do with OpenJDK.

serichsen 16y ago

Is Oracle faring so bad? Last I looked, a company actively suing for patent infringement meant that they have no real product, so it's their only hope of "generating" "income". It is a sure sign of imminent corporate decline.

arghnoname 16y ago

Can someone remind me why Google didn't buy Sun when it was on the market? The culture seems like it would have been a relatively good fit and their use of Java related technologies (obviously now) would have made ownership of those technologies useful. Had they bought Sun and then sold off the hardware side of the business they would have bought a lot of solid engineers and IP.

el_chapitan 16y ago
In hindsight, it might have been cheaper to buy them outright than to litigate a battle like this. Then again, they're going to have some undisclosed settlement, so we'll never really know how it ends up. I'm guessing they didn't buy them because of the business they were in. Selling workstations + Solaris was only part of their business. I think the services part of their work was bringing in more money towards the end. As far as I'm aware, Google doesn't do much in the services realm, which probably factored big into their decision not to buy.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

c1sc0 16y ago

Steve Jobs must be laughing from his evil genius lair about this. You know, two dogs fighter over a bone and stuff ...

dstein 16y ago

Oracle is sending a very clear message every programmer, young and old. "If you use Java to make something valuable, we're gonna sue the crap out of you". This will have long term consequences for Oracle.

joeyh 16y ago
"Java: Write once, run anywhere, be sued by Oracle"
- nivertech 16y ago
  "Java: Write once, run anywhere and hide from Oracle"

BenoitEssiambre 16y ago

I thought we were supposed to use java instead of c# to avoid getting into the this exact situation :-S

openfly 16y ago

I hope this leads to Google getting rid of Java from android entirely. Possibly even removing Dalvik.

drv 16y ago

This bit at the end was interesting: [...] any software found to be in violation of Oracle's copyrights "be impounded and destroyed." How does one go about rounding up all the copies of something as ephemeral and easily duplicated as software? Is this common wording in software litigation?

rquirk 16y ago

Oracle must be pretty sure of victory, or a positive outcome at least, otherwise why would they go after Google right away? They could have gone after HTC, as Apple did. That would have been a more likely victory, which Oracle could have used as leverage against Google.

caf 16y ago
On the other hand, why didn't they go after HTC and the other device manufacturers at the same time?

InclinedPlane 16y ago

Oracle may do what no other company, even MS, has managed to do: kill java. They are currently making an excellent case that it's time to move on to a new technology, not just open source but actually free to use.

elblanco 16y ago

Amazing, Oracle's strategy seems to be to purchase good technology (MySQL, JAVA,...) and then strangle off and alienate users of that entire business line by being douches. There must be some kind of business school thing I'm missing here.

c00p3r 16y ago

That is good for Android community and not so good for Java community. First of all, we should praise Google for making so good decisions, to re-use wast community of Java developers and Eclipse (without which they cannot program ^_^) and avoid bloated and corporative-centered JVM or Java ME, that it resulted in such ridiculous lawsuit about .jar files. ^_^ They also got a lot of buzz and the reputation of not doing evil and even being a victim of a corporate monster and patent trolls. btw, it looks a lot like an Apples decision about dropping Flash (yet another outdated artificial tumor) just because it simply does not work. Google'd rewrote VM, while Apple invested in LLVM. So, it is a good news.