Google, Sun Headed for Showdown Over Android

narramissic writes "There may be trouble brewing between Google and Sun. Google has written its own virtual machine for Android, 'most likely as a way to get around licensing issues with Sun.' If Google used any of Sun's intellectual property to build Dalvik, Sun could sue Google for patent infringement. But here's where it gets interesting - Sun is a vocal advocate for open source and it would 'hardly appease the open source community to sue Google over an open source software stack.'"

To put it bluntly.

[LWATCDR (28044)]

So reporter thinks that Sun might sue Google for forking Java all the while over looking the fact that Sun has GPLed Java and that other groups have produced versions of Java with out getting sued. Google and Sun both are saying that they are working together.
In other words a none story.

Re:

[by Anonymous Coward]

No, it's not a non-story.

OK, mini-rant about Sun and Java's naming. Java is three distinct things that Sun has helpfully lumped into one name:

1. The virtual machine.
2. The collection of libraries.
3. The language itself.

Google is using #3, the Java language. They are not using #1, the virtual machine, and using only some subset of #2, the collection of libraries.

Now given the way that Sun sued Microsoft over changing parts of Java in the past, it's almost guaranteed that they'll do it again over Google not u

Change the name.

[SanityInAnarchy (655584)]

There used to be something like this with JavaScript, though I don't think Sun ever owned that -- wasn't it Netscape? Ah, well...

I remember Microsoft re-implemented it from scratch, but because someone owned the name "JavaScript", they simply called it "JScript".

So, Google is now selling the brand "Android", which is a shift from the pseudo-codename "gPhone". It seems like they're in an ideal position to say "Fine, we won't call it Java." And they will be careful to refer to it only as the "Android language

Re:Change the name.

[ClassMyAss (976281)]

Jonathan Schwartz's blog post seems to indicate that Sun would prefer to milk this for the publicity rather than cause a fuss over it. Whatever happened behind the scenes, I took that post as a white flag from Sun, basically saying, "Look, we're not on board for a bunch of reasons, but we've got no beef here, let's all try to get along and spin this to each of our needs."

Even if the VM is not officially Java, you're still ending up with a whole lot of development energy invested in Java, which is good for Sun. I really hope there's no way they are stupid enough to bring this to court just to make a few bucks...

Re:

[Bill, Shooter of Bul (629286)]

Yes, it is a non story. Sun sued Microsoft years before they open sourced java. Micorosft has also signed a license saying that they would not fork java, but they did anyways. In this case Sun says its cool, then its cool. I don't know how true your assertions about Java ME are, but they are not true of Java in general. GuI interfaces are usually done horribly in Java, because its easy to screw them up. The unresponsive Gui (see zend framework) often makes people think that Java is slow.

Re:To put it bluntly.

[Actually, I do RTFA (1058596)]

GuI interfaces are usually done horribly in Java, because its easy to screw them up. The unresponsive Gui (see zend framework) often makes people think that Java is slow.

Unresponsive is slow. From a user's (and my) POV, I don't care if code executes in 10ms or 299ms if the GUI refreshes every 300ms. Why, because I use a program to do things, not to marvel at the effiency of the algorithim (unless I'm examining the code).

Additionally, a lack of progress bars leads to killing processes and restarting them, making them slower in reality.

Re:

[Pollardito (781263)]

Now given the way that Sun sued Microsoft over changing parts of Java in the past, it's almost guaranteed that they'll do it again over Google not using their virtual machine or library.

but did they just take away things from the library and not add new features to the core? it's one thing to release a new platform that doesn't support all of the java libraries, that just means that existing programs aren't completely portable to your new device and is really your own loss. it's another to do what MS did and that is to add language features (method pointers for callbacks), release a developer suite for your bastardized version of the language, and encourage people to develop programs us

Re:To put it bluntly.

[fm6 (162816)]

Pretty much. But it's worth noting that many companies in Sun's position would sue Google. Not only did Google clone Sun's Java technology, they hired some of Sun's best Java people to do it. Of course, suing wouldn't accomplish much, but some ego-driven CEOs wouldn't let that stop them.

Re:

[cromar (1103585)]

It's not the CEOs. It's the PR and legal depts.

it's a real issue

[m2943 (1140797)]

while over looking the fact that Sun has GPLed Java

Releasing software under the GPL wouldn't give Google patent rights, since Google is not basing their software on Sun's.

and that other groups have produced versions of Java with out getting sued

Quite to the contrary: all conforming Java implementations that have ever been produced are produced under license from Sun, and Sun has used legal threats to ensure that.

There are a bunch of non-conforming implementations where Sun has chosen not to press the issue

A bigger story - BSD libc + Linux

[btarval (874919)]

Well, I wouldn't quite say that it's a non-story. But IMHO there's a bigger story which has been missed. Namely, that Google decided to take a BSD-derived libc and include it as a part of their Android effort. This is running on top of Linux.

This is a blow aimed squarely at the Free Software Foundation, and RMS's efforts to establish GPLv3. Good luck in trying to square that one away.

Now, why in the world Google would do this is beyond me. IHMO it smacks of too much money, and too many engineers with not enough relevant things to do. But hey, if Google's goal is to try to minimize both versions of the GPL, well, I can think of no better effort.

Re:A bigger story - BSD libc + Linux

[DavidNWelton (142216)]

No, it was aimed squarely at having a smaller libc than glibc, according to the google guy who was hanging out on #android. It is an "embedded device" with space constraints, you know!

Does Sun make any money from Java on phones?

[NickCatal (865805)]

Anyone know how much a cell phone manuf has to pay Sun to include the J2ME VM in their product?

Re:Does Sun make any money from Java on phones?

[ricegf (1059658)]

I don't know for sure, but since it's Slashdot, I'll happily speculate. ;-)

Java is GPLed. A manufacturer is free to tweak Java for his machine and ship it... with the source code. Or, he can pay Sun a nominal fee for a non-GPL license and tweak to his heart's content, and keep his tweaks to himself.

This is precisely the dual-license model used for QT, and it works pretty well. Free software gets to use the technology for free. Proprietary software pays for a proprietary license, but they're charging their customers anyway. Everybody's happy. Well, except for BSD advocates... ;-) ;-)

Re:

[kripkenstein (913150)]

This is precisely the dual-license model used for QT, and it works pretty well. Free software gets to use the technology for free. Proprietary software pays for a proprietary license, but they're charging their customers anyway. Everybody's happy.

Well, I'm not sure Qt is such a good example. In fact many (including me) believe that the reason GTK+ has been popular in recent years (used on all major desktop distros - Ubuntu, Fedora, SUSE; Nokia devices; etc.) is precisely the licensing issue. Imagine if Linux itself (the kernel) used that licensing model - GPL for free, pay up otherwise. Would Linux be as popular today? I doubt it.

The general model of GPL for apps, LGPL for frameworks that apps run on top of, makes sense. You want to extend the k

Re:Does Sun make any money from Java on phones?

[mhall119 (1035984)]

Sun has or is in the process of open-sourcing their implementations of JavaSE [java.net], JavaME [java.net] and JavaEE [java.net], as well as their JVM [java.net] and Java compiler [java.net].

Sun does make money licensing their Java code to third parties, but that isn't a requirement for providing Java support. The Java language specification is freely available, anybody can create their own implementation, but for most companies it is cheaper to reuse Sun's implementation than make their own. Sun even provides financial assistance for small businesses or open-source projects to take the Java compatibility test. Heck, they've even open-sources the test harness for the compatibility test.

nothing to see here

[doktorjayd (469473)]

FTA:

While Sun declined to comment directly for this story, it pointed to some public statements from company executives. Jonathan Schwartz, president and CEO of Sun, wrote a blog post congratulating Google on the day of Android's launch. Notably, he refers to Android as a "Java/Linux" platform

where is the trouble? the article is pure beat-up.

the reason for dalvik is entirely technical. check out the youtube presentations, it makes it pretty clear that you develop in pretty much pure java, but the runtime needed a little more than the standard jme could provide.

move on..

FUD

[mritunjai (518932)]

Sun and Google are good partners, and I don't see them getting into legal minefield over this issue. Heck, Sun has never been a litigious, two main cases being MIcrosoft (bastardizing Java) and NetApp (counter-suing them... in California vis-a-vis NetApp filing in lower Texas court).

However, there *definitely* would be issues raised by Sun over this issue. You can fork and modify their Java implementation all nilly-willy you want but you CANNOT call it Java unless it passes *all* the certification tests.

So

Slashdot is being sensational

[bogaboga (793279)]

The article that Slashdot links to is headed: "Google and Sun may butt heads over Android." Key word: "May".

Then Slashdot modifies the headline to say: "Google, Sun Headed for Showdown Over Android."

Question is: Does anyone of these reporters work for either company in order to have this seemingly serious situation? I doubt it.

J2ME

[notknown86 (1190215)]

IMHO, Android fills a void in Java Mobile applications by providing API to build richer applications (lcdui, in particular, is limiting) - more useful for Smart Phones which contain the ability to provide these types of functionalities. If J2ME filled every void, Android as an API wouldn't be needed (though Android as an OS could still fill a void). According to the article, JME requires a licencing fee. Android does not - this precludes building on the existing platform (unless, of course, Sun actually did waive the fee). Regardless, isn't it possible that this is a fragmentation where the positives outweigh the negatives?

Ahhhh, Slashdot

[ZombieRoboNinja (905329)]

Title: "Google, Sun Headed for Showdown"
Summary: There MAY be trouble brewing between Google and Sun...
TFA: Google COULD get in trouble with Sun, according to some analyst (but both parties declined to comment)
Reality: Move along, nothing to see here...

Re:

[bladesjester (774793)]

Sun uses death star to kill google

Let's not get AT&T involved in this.

honest to god

[pugugly (152978)]

I read this for a second as "Google, Sun Headed for Showdown Over Asteroid", and thought Google *might* be overreaching - .

Pug

headline is kind of cool

[JeanBaptiste (537955)]

A number which is 10 followed by 100 zeros in a cage match against a hydrogen fusion reactor which accounts for 99.8% of the mass of our solar system. The whole thing happened over a misunderstanding regarding a robot designed to have human features.

Re:

[mhall119 (1035984)]

Java on web browsers has possibly gotten worse with years.

Java 6 update 3 contains improvements to both install and startup of the JVM within web browsers.

Current multi-media web dev is relegated to Flash, but I'm sure that there are many skilled programmers out there that would be glad to have a lean Java VM & API working in web browsers. Sun gave up long time ago, Google could take over and make it ubiquitous.

A new spec for easily embedded media components is in the works, hopefully it will make it into Java 7, and will be a good compliment to Java FX script on the web. There is talk about plugging it into existing media frameworks like GStreamer or VLC, to bring in all of their supported formats. Sun may have deglected multi-media, but it's not quite forgotten yet.