Oracle is still struggling to secure Java 7 left wide open to hackers since last October…. Apple and Mozilla have both decided to mark Java as MalWare on their respective systems.
Oracle to shutter sun.com
Its a race to see if the last of our Sun servers disappears before or after the domain.
Oracle kills Sun.com after starvation diet • The Register
Oracle is killing Sun.com, the online home of Sun Microsystems and one of the oldest dot-com domain names.
An entry on the Oracle’s OTN Garage says that sun.com will be decommissioned on June 1.
Java 7 for Mac OS X Project at OpenJDK
This is the future of Java on Mac. Learn to love it.
Open source Java 7 for Mac code appears • The Register
The OpenJDK project has released the first code for the Apple-backed open source version of Java Development Kit 7 for Mac OS X.
The initial code – a BSD port – is now available from the new Mac OS X Port Project on the OpenJDK website. The project already offers a mailing list and project wiki, and a bug reporter in on the way. The latest developments are available from the project status page.
Patent Trolls
Who sucked up the Novell patents? All the usual suspects.
Microsoft Forms a Patent Bloc With Apple, EMC, and Oracle | BNET
When Novell (NOVL) finally structured an acquisition deal for itself, part included the sale of 882 patents to a consortium backed by Microsoft MSFT). Thanks to a tip received by free and open source software (FOSS) expert Florian Mueller, we learn that Microsoft’s partners are Apple (AAPL), Oracle (ORCL), and EMC (EMC).
A few interesting Open Source JVM implementations
With Oracle poised to go Freemium on Java, directories of JVM alternatives are getting plentiful. But this one included some useful (if niche) alternatives. In addition to
all the usual suspects” there is a Java-to-C version, and a Mono/.Net compatible version listed near the end.
An open source collaborative network
JC Virtual machine converts Java class files to C source code. It could also compiles with GCC and loads them with built-in ELF loader. Additional to that, JC provides a complete Java runtime with optimization to increase performance.
JDK 7 milestones set by Oracle
Feature complete on Dec 16, release data is set for the end of next July. The article has some links to final feature lists. JDBC 4.1 is added.
Oracle names date for next Java • The Register
The next, immediate milestone for JDK 7 will be December 16, 2010. That’s when Oracle’s engineers have committed to have the development kit feature complete. You can read more here.
Apple punts Mac OS X Java over to Oracle
Apple will give Oracle a bunch of tools needed to implement Java SE 7 for Mac including (pointedly enough) “the foundation for a new graphical client”. This can’t be good news for the guys in Oracle’s cross-hairs.
Oracle and Apple Announce OpenJDK Project for Mac OS X | Business Wire
Apple also confirmed that Java SE 6 will continue to be available from Apple for Mac OS X Snow Leopard® and the upcoming release of Mac OS X Lion. Java SE 7 and future versions of Java for Mac OS X will be available from Oracle.
Update: The new graphics plan
the first drop will be effectively a “SoyLatte”-level implementation, but is packaged as a Universal Mac OS X .jdk bundle that can be dropped directly into /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines. Over the coming weeks and months, we will be adding pieces and parts of our Java SE 6 implementation to the public project, and will cut over from using an X11-based AWT to a Cocoa NSEvent-based one with a new OpenGL-backed graphics layer.
Java and Java-Lite
Oracle tee’s up its plan to start sqeezing more profit out of Java. Its the Freemium model, so now you can pay for your JDK (if you want it to work alright) or if you’d rather, you can take the free version, spuce it up yourself so that it does what you need and then get sued by Oracle anyway.
Oracle cooks up free and premium JVMs • The Register
Adam Messinger, Oracle vice president of development, told QCon that Oracle plans to offer a “premium” edition of the JDK in addition to the open-source JDK.
Both, it seems, will be based on a converged JRockit VM and the Hotspot JVM from Sun Microsystems. The converged JVM will be released under the OpenJDK project.
Apple Java Hits the Road
So I just had to post this (as seen on Slashdot). Apple decides to cut bait and get out of the Java business on Macs. The timing (following Oracle’s Java lawsuit against Google) as well as the announcement of the Mac OS X App Store yesterday can’t be a coincidence.
As background, Apple used to provide a JVM as part of Mac OS X, distributed so that it fit in with the rest of the system Frameworks. Although they were always a day late and a dollar short on having the latest vversion of Java available, Apple must have tried to make sure that adding a new Java release did not introduce any system instabilities in Mac OS X (or at least that’s the thinking) and then pushed the safe copy along with other system software through the Apple software update facility. Convenient!
Anywho, they probably started looking at what it would mean to sign up to supporting Java for the flood of Apps written for Android that would likely show up in the Mac Apps Store. Then looked again at what happened to Google when they fielded a slightly non-standard JVM for Android. And finally did the Math and saw that Java on the Mac was all risk to iPhone market share and exposure to Oracle’s legal department.
Java for Mac OS X 10.6 Update 3 and 10.5 Update 8 Release Notes: New and Noteworthy
New and Noteworthy
This chapter lists high-profile features in these releases.
Java Deprecation
As of the release of Java for Mac OS X 10.6 Update 3, the version of Java that is ported by Apple, and that ships with Mac OS X, is deprecated.
This means that the Apple-produced runtime will not be maintained at the same level, and may be removed from future versions of Mac OS X. The Java runtime shipping in Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, and Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, will continue to be supported and maintained through the standard support cycles of those products.
Update:
Mozilla man accuses Jobs of ‘bypass the web’ scheme • The Register
As revealed by one Mac developer, the store forbids “beta”, “demo”, “trial” and “test” apps, and if an app crashes or so much as “exhibits a bug” – yes, exhibits a bug – it will be rejected as well.
Jobs also bars apps that use Java and other “deprecated or optionally installed technologies.” And all apps must use the “appropriate Mac OS X APIs for modifying user data stored by other apps”. And so on and so forth.
Update 2: Good analysis over at JavaLobby: developers are not Apple’s demographic.
Apple Shuns Java in Mac OS X | Javalobby
IDEs
In the next year or two, we may not see Eclipse on Macs anymore. This slow death could begin if Apple doesn’t ship a JVM in Lion. The other major IDEs, NetBeans and IntelliJ IDEA, will have an even tougher time staying on the OS because they rely directly on AWT and Swing. A port of OpenJDK might use X11 instead of native OSX windowing components.
OpenOffice gives LibreOffice splitters the boot.
Open is as Open does. Here’s the new Oracle OpenOffice being about as open as you’d expect.
Oracle wants LibreOffice members to leave OOo council
“Your role in the Document Foundation and LibreOffice makes your role as a representative in the OOo CC untenable and impossible. [I]t causes confusion, it is a plain conflict of interest, as TDF split from OOo,” he told TDF members during a council meeting that took place on an IRC channel. “If the TDF members do not disassociate themselves from the [Document Foundation] then they must resign by Tuesday.”
Scotsman on a Horse 