[clyde asbury]

ping

[N3WBI3]

One force is the demand for Sun to open up Java, and the other is concern for compatibility. "This is something for us to go figure out," he said.

I am not in the 'sun should open source java' camp. Frankly compatibility of Java should be #1!

Sun announced the Operating System Distributor's License for Java, which is designed to make it easier to bundle the desktop Java Runtime Environment with Linux.

As far as I am concerned this is all Sun had to do I don't see a benefit to Java itself being open source but I do see a benefit in making it easier for RedHat, Novell, and other to implement JRE's in their product.

[Kaylee Frye]

Cool! There are so many great Open-source technologies, glad to see Java joining the fold! I was just thinking the other day about the "two big camps" of programmers I've seen lately. It seems to me that Java programmers are typically very Open-source oriented and very open to Open-source technologies. This is vs .Net/Microsoft types, which seem very oriented towards big business models... But maybe that's just my own experience in the industry. And before anyone chimes in with their own group, these are just the two large user groups I've seen.

[Golden Eagle]

Foolish move by Sun, as OSI license means the ability to fork off a new version of Java by their competitors. Maybe they're counting on their patents preventing that, but someone like IBM might not be scared of Sun's patent threat.

They also better realize they have long time customers like myself who use Sun products in secure environments who very well might switch away if they actually eventually open source everything they have. Thankfully I don't see any mention yet of the commercial Solaris or Java Web Server.

http://www.sun.com/software/products/web_srvr/security.xml