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| Authored by: Ian Al on Saturday, April 21 2012 @ 04:13 PM EDT |
The issue with OpenJDK is that you can use bits of it, but cannot call that
Java.
However, Google are very successfully using bits of the Harmony code without
calling that Java.
If they lose the case they cannot use either. If they win they can use both, but
the Harmony code is already just fine, so, why change?
---
Regards
Ian Al
Software Patents: It's the disclosed functions in the patent, stupid![ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, April 21 2012 @ 04:30 PM EDT |
Google switching to GPL would not require that the downstream vendors GPL their
code, unless their code is a derivative work of the GPL portions. Mostly
vendors add extra things, rather than muck about in the "37" at issue
here. Because of the classpath exception, the GPL should not propagate to
vendor ad-ons, or even most of Google's android code.
Google switching to GPL for the 37 would however require downstream vendors to
comply with the commercial distribution requirements of the GPL, ie, offer
source for that in addition to their current obligations to offer kernel source.
Pragmatically this would cause some passing concern on vendor boards, but
Android is probably entrenched enough now that having to do what they are
already doing for the kernel sources for one more archive would probably not be
a deal breaker.
OTOH, a finding that APIs are copyrightable would be disastrous for the software
industry as a whole. I'd actually be quite surprised if amongst Oracle's own
products there isn't some work-alike reimplementation of someone else's API
which could fall victim to claims under such a precedent.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: xtifr on Saturday, April 21 2012 @ 07:29 PM EDT |
As I understand it, Oracle's story currently* is that they allowed Project
Harmony to proceed because they believed that Apache intended to apply for
certification, and when the two companies couldn't come to an agreement over the
terms of certification, Oracle told Apache they had to shut the project down,
and they did.
Now I think there's enough holes in this story to drive a
truck through. For one thing, I have a hard time believing that Sun and Apache
had had a meeting of minds all along about Apache releasing code under a
non-Apache license. For another, the implied causality of that last bit (Oracle
told them to stop and they did) seem extremely suspicious. If Oracle had
actually told them to stop, I'm pretty sure Apache would have notified newsmedia
everywhere, as they did with their original open letter to Sun.
(Note that the open letter confirms my earlier skepticism about the meeting of
minds.)
And finally, if Apache had stopped work on Project Harmony
because they no longer thought they had a license, then I'm pretty sure
I wouldn't have been able to download the source code, minutes ago, from this page. Yes, the project
is marked as retired, but the source has not been withdrawn. It's simply no
longer being actively developed.
But of course, I'm not the one Oracle
is trying to confuse convince, because I'm neither the judge
nor a member of the jury in this case.
* It's always important to check
what the current story is with companies like SCO and Oracle, where the
story seems to change on a regular basis.
---
Do not meddle in the
affairs of Wizards, for it makes them soggy and hard to light. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, April 27 2012 @ 12:50 AM EDT |
<p>GPL, GPL+classpath, LGPL and Apache-2 are all free software
copyright licenses, but only the former 3 are strong copyleft
licenses. That is the difference.</p>
<p>Please do not confuse people by claiming that only FSF
licenses are free, that is as dishonest as Oracle-speak.</p>
[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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