On the role of the SCA

[Mario Torre]

Il giorno lun, 09/05/2011 alle 09.36 -0700, mark.reinhold at oracle.com ha
scritto:
> 2011/5/9 5:21 -0700, gnu_andrew at member.fsf.org:
> > ...
> > 
> > As I mentioned in the previous thread, much of this could be sorted
> > out if Oracle simply cleaned up their binaries so that there was a
> > clear GPL component with proprietary blobs to plug in.  That's both
> > technically and legally possible AFAICS, ...
> 
> No, it is not.
> 
> Oracle has long-term contractual commitments to deliver JDK source code
> under a proprietary commercial license to various partner companies who
> would not, under any circumstances, accept GPL-licensed code.
> 
> These partners are vital members of the overall Java ecosystem: They do
> the heavy lifting of porting the JDK to a wide variety of architectures
> and operating systems.  This work is of value to themselves and their
> customers, obviously, but it indirectly benefits everyone by ensuring
> the ubiquity of the Java platform.
> 
> - Mark

Hi Mark,

You, of course, are talking (among others) about Nokia and IBM and their
contractors here, with the very locked and closed Java ME.

This is acceptable, after all, they did pay to get the TCK. Although I
strongly disagree on the "They do the heavy lifting of porting the JDK
to a wide variety of architectures and operating systems", because this
is happening anyway, outside the TCK, people just don't call it Java.

Then suddenly something like Android comes and literally shakes the
market (which is good in some sense, but...).

I was always of the opinion that having a simpler and more open sets of
rules would have avoided the Android treat, and I speak as one of the
guys that would love to see Android being just a cool Java framework and
not an alternative to java, perhaps governed by a JSR. Ah, and that
brings yet another issue...

Cheers,
Mario
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