Harmony is a Java library designed to run on any good
Java VM, such as The
Oracle/Sun VM, the (former) MS JVM, the
(former) IBM VM, the GNU gcj/gij VM,
various failed VM
implementations that never made it past beta, or even
Google's Dalvik. But Harmony doesn't care much about which
exact VM is
used.
Compare this to PCs and CPUs. Harmony is a program you
can
install on any Java compatible computer and it should
run the same if the
computer works, though some computers
may be faster than others. Just like
Firefox is a program
you can install on a PC with an x86 compatible
CPU.
In this comparison, the patents are like patents on parts
of the
computer, with Oracle claiming that Google's computer
uses their patented
computer speedup tricks in their Dalvik
computer.
Oracle says that
violates their patents no matter what
program you run on Dalvik, even if that
program is Genuine
Oracle/Sun Java with no Harmony parts. Google says they
don't do exactly what the two patents say, so there is no
violation, still no
matter what program you run. This is
like Intel suing AMD claiming some detail
in AMD Turion
chips violate a patent on some detail in Xeon chips, except
that
these are virtual chips, not hardware chips.
The code that has been
discussed is the code that mangles
.class file Java bytecode into running .odex
file Dalvik
wordcode. Those did not come from Harmony. Oracle agrees
that
Google wrote those themselves, but that they used
Oracle's private non-secret
sauce even though it has a small
sign on its back that said "Oracle private
property, keep
out". The damages phase will discuss how hard it was for
Google to notice that keep out sign ("Marking").
Everybody in the trial
agree what the code does and what
the property deed to the idea (The patent
letter from the
USPTO) says. So they debate the meanings of words on the
property deed to determine if Google was trespassing, or
stayed off Oracle's
lot. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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