Java to Appear in Next-Gen DVD players

Ivan P. writes "Sun Microsystems's Java technology will be built into Blu-ray DVD players, executives said on Monday during Sun's JavaOne trade show, a development that advances the technology in the consumer electronics market for which Sun originally developed the software. 'Java will be used for control menus, interactive features, network services and games,' said Yasushi Nishimura, director of Panasonic's Research and Development Company of America. 'This means that all Blu-ray Disc player devices will be shipped equipped with Java.'" Next stop, annoying Flash intros.

thank god

[MatD]

That means it will take about a week for someone to write a crack to bypass all those annoying trailers we have to watch before we can actually watch the dvd we payed for.

The future is now.

[JonLatane]

Next stop, annoying Flash intros.

I believe they're already essentially here, in the form of previews - some of which are unskippable - before you can even get to the menu. (Not Flash, but obviously still something very, very wrong.)

Scope widening too far?

[Sv-Manowar]

After reading the article, it seems to me that these new media standards are pushing far beyond just new ways to store video. Gosling is quoted as saying "Part of the DVD standard is the players have network ports out of the back". This just smacks of network controlled DRM, and the ability to run java bytecode when the discs boot could allow a whole new range of lockdown facilities on the disks. Not to mention the amount of complexity having network & JVM functionality must be introducing to the end units. Surely even mass production wil struggle to bring such complex devices down to sane prices in the near future.

This would appear to be strongly pushing the bias of practicality toward the opposing HD-DVD camp, while attempting to strengthen Blu-Ray's position as technologically more advanced and superior.

Re:Scope widening too far?

[hsmith]

yeah, but you are forgetting, using java could allow easy reverse engineering of the player. java is cake to reverse engineer, it would take someone no time to pump out a solution that lacks the DRM features, or atleast come up with a way to cirumvent the DRM features (such as a fake server to "authenticate" against)

i see it as a great thing

Java DVD Player + network connection + Azureus

[Scott Swezey]

Damn, now we just need to get these things a network connection and a plugin for Azureus, then I can download new movies before their released, watch them on my TV, and maybe if its also one of those nifty VHS/DVD combo things, burn my new movie to a disk.

Re:One of my absolute top peeves

[Lisandro]

Same here, but the "most annoying DVD feature of all time" prize goes to (taaa-daah!) unskippable trailers/clips/FBI warnings/whatever. In some recent releases, it's downright infuriating - with up to three movie trailers you have to go through before you can even get to the content.

Publicists should be shot.

Re:Not Java but JVM.

[burnttoy]

As far as I understand it the .Net technologies and this are complimentary in that they tackle different but similar problems. Although .Net supplies a byte code interpreter of its own (CLR) it isn't necessary to use it (in fact most .Net apps are compiled to x86 machine language). .Net supplies a standard for language and API linkage data, representations of API's if you like. JVM supplies a binary level interface for execution of code. Also, it isn't that people aren't (they are just in very small numbers) writing JVM byte code in something other than Java the point is they _can_. There are, I believe, JVM back ends for GCC for example. In this case JVM is being used a little like XML. The syntax is there (the mark up language) but the tags and data mean nothing unless you know what they mean (XHTML for example). This is why I think information on the API is probably as interesting, if not more so, than the machine level programming model.

Re:Misconceptions, as usual

[Decaff]

But that doesnt remove the fact that java is here to stay and has proven itself more than enough in the enterprise. So why slashdot's hostility towards it remains is beyond me.

This hostility is so boring and extremely old fashioned and reactionary.

I have seen exactly the same thing in the 70s when developers were complaining about procedural code, and wanted to keep their 'GOTO's.

I have also seen the same thing in the 80s when the idea of using C or C++ in place of assembler was consider too innovative, slow, and demanding of memory.

And again, in the 90s, there was the same reaction against the use of OOP.

Now that procedural development, the use of high level languages, and OOP are now mainstream, the same old arguments are being used against safe and VM-based languages like Java.

Re:thank god

[delus10n0]

There is also the _free_ DVD43 program [dvd43.com].

Cool applications of this

[DickBreath]

Do I get this right?

A $50 box that is quiet, plugged into my TV, plugged into the Internet, and can run custom code from a custom disk that I burn?

Possible applications anyone?

A cheap slave box with a custom Java code that functions as an alternate type of MythTV front end, that streams video on demand from a MythTV backend?

Games? (Using only the remote control as an input device?)

A general porpoise Java app could be written that talks to a server, where the server "drives" the user interface on the TV screen. This general purpose DVD only needs to be released once. Applications can be written on your Linux box that present any type of user interface for any purpose. Home control menus and applications, for example. Show me the latest Slashdot headlines. (But the custom code for this is on the Linux box, the DVD is just a general remote driven user interface toolkit.) Show me the current weather map. Show me the front door security camera.