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Re:No Java 7, The End Game by bad_user on Tuesday October 12, 2010 @02:07AM (#1782482)
> Apache Harmony is not a VM, its an implementation of the standard library.

It's both, and Harmony is an implementation of Java SE.

Also note the following quote from JSR 270:

"""Nothing in the licensing terms will prevent open source projects from creating and distributing their own compatible open source implementations of Java SE 6, using standard open source licenses."""

That's a broken promise, although I don't think it is legally binding because the term "open source license" they could argue it is something that comes with code (since the trademark for "open source" could not be obtained by OSI).

But for me as a Java user, a broken promise is a broken promise.

I never viewed Java as being a dangerous platform, not even when OpenJDK didn't exist. That changed.

Re:No Java 7, The End Game by points on Tuesday October 12, 2010 @04:16AM (#1782693)
How is it a dangerous platform? It's still installed everywhere, it still works, it's still useful. Nothing has really changed IMHO
Re:No Java 7, The End Game by hga on Tuesday October 12, 2010 @08:23AM (#1783074)
Well, it's got a new steward, Oracle, that's not exactly engendering trust in certain areas such as hemorrhaging key employees and suing Google's Dalvik using VM patents (and the company does not exactly have a nice reputation). Plus as the grandparent noted, Sun's broken promise is clearly going to stay broken and I'll note that various Oracle positions have completely changed now that they own Java(TM).

On the other hand, one might say that shedding some of these employees is OK or better and finally getting decisive on moving forward on Java 7 is good ... and the two might not be entirely unrelated.

I don't know the inside story and who's to blame, but it's patently obvious that Sun's stewardship of Java was serious failing at the time of the acquisition and for some time before then. Java 7 wasn't converging on getting finished in the foreseeable future and as I understand it the JCP process wasn't being used for it. Note that in a couple of months it will have 4 years since the release of Java SE 6 (prior to 7 the releases 3 through 6 each took 2 years (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Java_version_history)).