6 ms·

Ask HN: Anyone rewriting Java code due to new license costs?

26 points by brij0102 7y ago

With Oracle’s new terms for commercial Java license, are commercial software being rewritten to another language? Time to bring back C :-)

thedevindevops 7y ago
I don't actually write in Java but I keep hearing about: https://openjdk.java.net/ https://openjdk.java.net/
- umen 7y ago
  no good at all .. its Red Hat product now , which they can decide to not support it any more when it not going to meet their business model
  - jetti 7y ago
    It's open source, so if Red Hat stops supporting it then others can pick it up. On top of that, there are 8 other groups that are offering builds which means you can just switch.
- baud147258 7y ago
  We're using it when compiling our code, but our software deliveries are bundled with the amazon Corretto (because we already have a contract with Amazon because of AWS, so getting security updates shouldn't be an issue) and our installer offer the option to use another JRE, so our clients can use any JRE 11; but for Oracle 11 JRE, they'll have to pay Oracle themselves. To answer the OP, we didn't rewrite anything, just switched to a no-cost JRE. And since we did it at the same time of the Java 8 -> 11 switch, there were no extra dev costs.
umen 7y ago
Im interested very much in this subject also , what is the future of java . as java dev for 15 years i don't know what will be with java in about 10 years .
nullwasamistake 7y ago
Not here, we've migrated to OpenJDK binaries maintained by Red Hat and Azul (depending on OS). They're still FOSS so it hasn't affected us, yet at least. I have never seen an issue from switching Java SE->OpenJDK. We did the whole company in one day without outages. I'm convinced that incompatiblies don't exist in practice.
- kwhat4 7y ago
  There are some incompatibilities. The com.sun.net packages come to mind.
adl 7y ago
No need to rewrite anything. There is an excellent summary here: https://medium.com/@javachampions/java-is-still-free-2-0-0-6b9aa8d6d244 https://medium.com/@javachampions/java-is-still-free-2-0-0-6... the tl;dr is that there are multiple OpenJDK vendors now, Oracle just happens to charge for their JDK distribution, but you can choose from several vendors (Azul, Red Hat, IBM, AdoptOpenJDK, Amazon Correto, etc)
icedchai 7y ago
It's probably cheaper to just use OpenJDK.
- mywittyname 7y ago
  The past two companies I've worked for are forcing teams to move to OpenJDK and one was far more diligent about conducting audits for this than they were for GDPR.
  - icedchai 7y ago
    I'm mostly ignoring it, myself. If it becomes a problem I'll switch.
    - nullwasamistake 7y ago
      If it becomes a problem it will be too late to not pay Oracle huge fees/fines for using it against the license. Oracle is known for their license enforcement, it might even bankrupt your company.
      - icedchai 7y ago
        We hardly have any servers and are using an old version of JDK 8 under the old license. It does not keep me up at night.
        nullwasamistake 7y ago
        In that case you're fine. I would still be wary of people accidentally updating. We IP blocked Oracle download servers from corporate network lol
theandrewbailey 7y ago
I hardly ever write Java for work anymore, but the situation has inspired me to start looking into .net for the first time since college. Unfortunately, the ASP.net ecosystem on Linux is still a bit lacking compared to JavaEE (or is it JakartaEE yet?).
kevinherron 7y ago
Just use OpenJDK, Azul, Corretto, etc... There's absolutely no reason to pay for Oracle's JDK unless you want Oracle's support. It was probably intentional, but Oracle really fucked up the marketing on this change and as a result a bunch of FUD has been spread throughout the Java ecosystem.
- nullwasamistake 7y ago
  Oracle really screwed themselves here. Everyone is jumping ship to other JDK vendors, making them even less likely to pay for Oracle support
astaunton 7y ago
No need to change to another language, as has been pretty much outlined by previous posts Java is driven by the changes added to OpenJDK. Even Oracles commercial binaries use the OpenJDK code repository, compile it and add some support. Use one of the other vendors (Corretto by Amazon is freely available)
sanjamia 7y ago
Yes. Goodbye, Java. It was a fun ride. Given dead end for iOS and Oracle’s licensing strategy, I will use compile-to-native languages for all new projects.
lastofus 7y ago
Even if there were no free alternatives to Oracle's JDK (there are plenty), who looks at the cost of engineering time, opportunity costs, and thinks "yeah, this is way cheaper than paying Oracle"?
muzani 7y ago
I'm surprised nobody mentioned Kotlin. It's similar but better, simple enough that reading/writing code is close to pseudocode. Google has moved towards officially supporting Kotlin instead of Java for Android development.
- mpetkevicius 7y ago
  What do you mean by "instead"? It seems to me they support both languages as equals (the Android documentation contains examples in both languages) and have no plans of ditching Java.
  - Someone 7y ago
    A month ago (https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2019/05/google-io-2019-empowering-developers-to-build-experiences-on-Android-Play.html https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2019/05/google-io-...): ”Today we’re announcing another big step: Android development will become increasingly Kotlin-first. Many new Jetpack APIs and features will be offered first in Kotlin. If you’re starting a new project, you should write it in Kotlin” “Just use Kotlin” doesn’t help for the licensing issue, though, if you keep using Oracle’s JVM.
tmaly 7y ago
I know of companies that are paying because too much money is on the line. My good friend is a senior Oracle sales person and he felt like they stabbed him in the back when they did it. He spent years developing good relationships and now this.

26 points by brij0102 7y ago

With Oracle’s new terms for commercial Java license, are commercial software being rewritten to another language? Time to bring back C :-)

thedevindevops 7y ago

I don't actually write in Java but I keep hearing about: https://openjdk.java.net/ https://openjdk.java.net/

umen 7y ago
no good at all .. its Red Hat product now , which they can decide to not support it any more when it not going to meet their business model
- jetti 7y ago
  It's open source, so if Red Hat stops supporting it then others can pick it up. On top of that, there are 8 other groups that are offering builds which means you can just switch.
baud147258 7y ago
We're using it when compiling our code, but our software deliveries are bundled with the amazon Corretto (because we already have a contract with Amazon because of AWS, so getting security updates shouldn't be an issue) and our installer offer the option to use another JRE, so our clients can use any JRE 11; but for Oracle 11 JRE, they'll have to pay Oracle themselves. To answer the OP, we didn't rewrite anything, just switched to a no-cost JRE. And since we did it at the same time of the Java 8 -> 11 switch, there were no extra dev costs.

umen 7y ago

Im interested very much in this subject also , what is the future of java . as java dev for 15 years i don't know what will be with java in about 10 years .

nullwasamistake 7y ago

Not here, we've migrated to OpenJDK binaries maintained by Red Hat and Azul (depending on OS). They're still FOSS so it hasn't affected us, yet at least. I have never seen an issue from switching Java SE->OpenJDK. We did the whole company in one day without outages. I'm convinced that incompatiblies don't exist in practice.

kwhat4 7y ago
There are some incompatibilities. The com.sun.net packages come to mind.

adl 7y ago

No need to rewrite anything. There is an excellent summary here: https://medium.com/@javachampions/java-is-still-free-2-0-0-6b9aa8d6d244 https://medium.com/@javachampions/java-is-still-free-2-0-0-6... the tl;dr is that there are multiple OpenJDK vendors now, Oracle just happens to charge for their JDK distribution, but you can choose from several vendors (Azul, Red Hat, IBM, AdoptOpenJDK, Amazon Correto, etc)

icedchai 7y ago

It's probably cheaper to just use OpenJDK.

mywittyname 7y ago
The past two companies I've worked for are forcing teams to move to OpenJDK and one was far more diligent about conducting audits for this than they were for GDPR.
- icedchai 7y ago
  I'm mostly ignoring it, myself. If it becomes a problem I'll switch.
  - nullwasamistake 7y ago
    If it becomes a problem it will be too late to not pay Oracle huge fees/fines for using it against the license. Oracle is known for their license enforcement, it might even bankrupt your company.
    - icedchai 7y ago
      We hardly have any servers and are using an old version of JDK 8 under the old license. It does not keep me up at night.
      - nullwasamistake 7y ago
        In that case you're fine. I would still be wary of people accidentally updating. We IP blocked Oracle download servers from corporate network lol

theandrewbailey 7y ago

I hardly ever write Java for work anymore, but the situation has inspired me to start looking into .net for the first time since college. Unfortunately, the ASP.net ecosystem on Linux is still a bit lacking compared to JavaEE (or is it JakartaEE yet?).

kevinherron 7y ago

Just use OpenJDK, Azul, Corretto, etc... There's absolutely no reason to pay for Oracle's JDK unless you want Oracle's support. It was probably intentional, but Oracle really fucked up the marketing on this change and as a result a bunch of FUD has been spread throughout the Java ecosystem.

nullwasamistake 7y ago
Oracle really screwed themselves here. Everyone is jumping ship to other JDK vendors, making them even less likely to pay for Oracle support

astaunton 7y ago

No need to change to another language, as has been pretty much outlined by previous posts Java is driven by the changes added to OpenJDK. Even Oracles commercial binaries use the OpenJDK code repository, compile it and add some support. Use one of the other vendors (Corretto by Amazon is freely available)

sanjamia 7y ago

Yes. Goodbye, Java. It was a fun ride. Given dead end for iOS and Oracle’s licensing strategy, I will use compile-to-native languages for all new projects.

lastofus 7y ago

Even if there were no free alternatives to Oracle's JDK (there are plenty), who looks at the cost of engineering time, opportunity costs, and thinks "yeah, this is way cheaper than paying Oracle"?

muzani 7y ago

I'm surprised nobody mentioned Kotlin. It's similar but better, simple enough that reading/writing code is close to pseudocode. Google has moved towards officially supporting Kotlin instead of Java for Android development.

mpetkevicius 7y ago
What do you mean by "instead"? It seems to me they support both languages as equals (the Android documentation contains examples in both languages) and have no plans of ditching Java.
- Someone 7y ago
  A month ago (https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2019/05/google-io-2019-empowering-developers-to-build-experiences-on-Android-Play.html https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2019/05/google-io-...): ”Today we’re announcing another big step: Android development will become increasingly Kotlin-first. Many new Jetpack APIs and features will be offered first in Kotlin. If you’re starting a new project, you should write it in Kotlin” “Just use Kotlin” doesn’t help for the licensing issue, though, if you keep using Oracle’s JVM.

tmaly 7y ago

I know of companies that are paying because too much money is on the line. My good friend is a senior Oracle sales person and he felt like they stabbed him in the back when they did it. He spent years developing good relationships and now this.