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A comment on Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight. Parent comment

Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by pjmlp on Saturday November 16, 2019 @05:11AM (#21551918)
The current state of Java support on Android proves that Google has achieved their own variant of J++, forcing Java library authors to write Android Java, if they wish to support the platform.

"James Gosling Triangulation's Interview on Google vs. Sun"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYw3X4RZv6Y&feature=youtu.be...

Google should face the same penalty as Microsoft did, plain and simple.

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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by monocasa on Saturday November 16, 2019 @12:07PM (#21553635)
About the only IP this trial hasn't covered is trademarks, so I'm not sure how the Microsoft decision applies.
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by pjmlp on Sunday November 17, 2019 @02:21AM (#21556935)
The way to get there isn't the same, the impact on Java library authors it is.

Even Jake Wharton already complained about this publicly, and he is now working at Google, go figure.

> Happy Tuesday Android developers! Java 13 out today. Java 8 is now 5½ years old. Here's your bi-yearly reminder that Android is holding back the Java library and language ecosystem.

https://twitter.com/JakeWharton/status/1174020113466568704

> The Android platform is on the cusp of holding Kotlin back. New bytecodes not being available both in the Dalvik set but also on devices in the ecosystem means Kotlin is forced to target older Java bytecode versions which can hinder new language functionality.

https://twitter.com/JakeWharton/status/1017597264225857536

> Kotlin is great but there's no reason anyone should need to target Java 6 bytecode and APIs in 2019. IntelliJ platform switched to 8 in 2016.1 and 11 in 2019.1. Servers are mostly 8 trending towards 11.

https://twitter.com/JakeWharton/status/1174024747400777729

So we are just in the same position as if J++ would be kept being a product, any Java library author that wants to have market share on Android needs to constrain themselves to the Android's view of what means to be Java.

And I have to bow to Jake as he is doing a very good job adding support to R8 and D8, to at very least desugar modern Java features into Android Java.

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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by curt15 on Sunday November 17, 2019 @05:51AM (#21557370)
But by that logic, any large organization using an old JVM version and requiring developers to target that version would be holding back the Java ecosystem.
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by pjmlp on Monday November 18, 2019 @02:25AM (#21562519)
Exactly, with the small detail that almost everyone else does provide support for more recent versions on their Java implementations.
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by icebraining on Monday November 18, 2019 @05:08AM (#21563101)
> any Java library author that wants to have market share on Android

Had Google used a completely different language instead, this market wouldn't exist at all, and Java library authors wouldn't even have the option of choosing to target it.

I don't disagree that Google's handling of the language is bad, but that doesn't mean it should be illegal. Creating a bad legal precedent harms us all.

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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by pjmlp on Monday November 18, 2019 @10:09AM (#21564843)
The same could be argued as defence for J++, but naturally Google gets free pass, because it isn't Microsoft.
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by icebraining on Monday November 18, 2019 @10:24AM (#21564960)
Microsoft's actions weren't ruled illegal, they had to pay because they broke a contract.
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by lightgreen on Sunday November 17, 2019 @10:25AM (#21558302)
> there's no reason anyone should need to target Java 6 bytecode and APIs in 2019

Java 7 byte code was a big mistake. People complained but Oracle didn’t listen. As always.

http://chrononsystems.com/blog/java-7-design-flaw-leads-to-h...

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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by pjmlp on Monday November 18, 2019 @02:21AM (#21562506)
Yet everyone else on the Java world doesn't have an issue having up to date Java implementations.
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by lightgreen on Wednesday November 20, 2019 @02:42AM (#21581881)
IDE, debuggers, bytecode libraries, build systems, profilers, all of them had to deal with “up to date Java implementations”. Which hurts adoption.

Not just because of this issue, but because of tons of other mistakes made by Oracle: users shouted, Oracle ignored.

The net result is inertia is high, but Java is stable declining. Existing projects continue to be developed in Java, new projects often choose something else.

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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by monocasa on Monday November 18, 2019 @12:51PM (#21566389)
That's not true. BD-J is limited similarly for instance.

They forked the shit out of it too with tons of base functionality being in org.dvb. and javax.tv.

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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by icebraining on Monday November 18, 2019 @05:02AM (#21563083)
Microsoft signed an agreement with Sun and advertised the fact that they were Java compatible. "Forcing Java library authors to write multiple versions" was never a factor in either lawsuits.
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by greggman2 on Saturday November 16, 2019 @10:53AM (#21553218)
why does matter? it's a serious question. it sounds like if they just renamed it Jawa instead of Java your complaint would disappear?
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by pjmlp on Sunday November 17, 2019 @02:06AM (#21556899)
Only if they rewrite the world in Jawa and stop advertising compatibility with the Java eco-system, then they can use Jawa, Dart, Kotlin/Native, whatever they fell like.
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by greggman2 on Sunday November 17, 2019 @11:03PM (#21561797)
I don't really get your argument. gcc has lots of non-standard extensions. Should gcc not be able to call itself a c++ compiler?
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Re:Supreme Court to Hear Google-Oracle Copyright Fight by pjmlp on Monday November 18, 2019 @02:31AM (#21562546)
Android Java is a subset of cherry picked features of Java and its standard library, with support varying across Android version.

GCC is an ISO C++ and ISO C compliant compiler, plus a set of language extensions.

Any ISO C++ or ISO C code will compile under GCC.

Not every piece of standard compliant Java code will compile under Android Java.

Not only this produces a burden writting portable Java libraries, it creates a false perception to many developers that learned Java via Android and assume Android Java == Java.

The later point is usually used by Google when they sell how Kotlin fares against Java, because naturally if they would compare it against a proper up to date version, some of the plus points wouldn't uphold.

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