Tom Ball's Blog

"Open Letter" or Extortion?

Today, Geir Magnusson Jr., the Apache Software Foundation's VP of Java Community Process, issued an "Open Letter" to Sun Microsystems, addressed to Jonathan Schwartz. I put "Open Letter" in quotes because it reads like an ultimatum demanding a license they like to the Java SE 5 technology compatibility kit within thirty days (or else).

This request/ultimatum seems to have come out of left field. Is Apache Harmony so close to completion that it's ready to officially pass the JCK? Not according to its project page, which states it has 95% of the Java API complete but not necessarily compatible. Now, 95% of the Java platform is a big milestone for which the Apache Harmony engineers deserve a lot of credit for their hard work, but how useful would several thousand JCK errors be to them at this point in the project cycle? If I were in their position, I would instead ask that the JCK's current read-only license be rescinded so that the Harmony engineers can compile and run the tests specific to whatever they are individually working on to see what issues remain. IMHO, the JCK shouldn't be modifiable (it helps define the Java platform), but anyone should be able to compile and run it without legal hindrance. But that isn't what Mr. Magnusson seems to be asking for.

I just looked at my calendar and noticed that thirty days from today is smack in the middle of JavaOne, two days after Jonathan Schwartz's keynote. Mystery solved! This isn't about the Apache Harmony team's ability to work effectively -- it's instead a classic JavaOne slimy marketing ploy Java engineers have to endure each year. With the JavaOne schedule moved up I guess the mud had to start being thrown sooner.

I'm disappointed that this sort of tactic was employed by an organization I respect so much. In my opinion it's a form of extortion -- do what we want or we'll destroy your new open-source credibility at your largest developer conference. You expect that sort of behavior from patent trolls, not an esteemed organization like Apache. My only hope is that Mr. Magnusson was working independently of the rest of the Apache organization on this issue.

Comments

• 
  Umh, did you read the letter?

  
  It is asking Sun to abide by the terms of the JSPA, an agreement and contract made five years ago.
  
  

  Posted by: brianm on April 10, 2007 at 05:07 PM

• Yes, I read the letter, and both its language and especially its timing really upset me. I am quite confident that the JCK will be released under a more reasonable license, but most of the Java community (outside of Apache Harmony, anyway) want the JDK released first. And the only ethical way to do this is the review all of the code to make sure we only release the IP that we have rights to, and not the IP of other contributors to the platform without their permission. The JDK team is working very hard to get this done quickly, but it's a big job and the JCK is even bigger.
  I am sure that Geir Magnusson understands these issues, which is why I think his letter is just a marketing ploy. If the true goal is to maximize publicity for the Harmony project, he couldn't have timed it better. As a coder I hate that sort of nonsense, regardless of what company is doing it.

  Posted by: tball on April 10, 2007 at 08:01 PM

• It is asking Sun to abide by the terms of the JSPA, an agreement and contract made five years ago.

  No, it is a statement of *one possible* interpretation of the JSPA in hopes of trying to push Sun into releasing the jck under terms favorable to them.

  From what I read into it, it seems they want to be able to certify things as Java without paying any licensing fees for doing so.

  While I think the jck license could be better, I think their confrontational attitude is a poor approach.

  Their approach seems to be one of an ultimatum, rather than a community member seeking redress.

  Posted by: binarycrusader on April 10, 2007 at 08:09 PM

• Dear Binary Crusade,

  Please read this:
  "Thus, to meet Apache's requirement, we have drafted a change to the JSPA that would require specification leads to provide no-cost access to the TCK implementations (without obligations for support) to qualified individuals, or not-for-profit or educational organizations engaged in efforst to create compatible implementations of JSRs."

  
  This is a quote by:

  Robert A. Gingell

  Sun Fellow & Vice President

  Chair of the Java Community Process

  Sun Microsystems, Inc.

  At the URL here:

  http://jcp.org/aboutJava/communityprocess/announce/LetterofIntent.html

  Are you saying that Mr Robert is totally clueless?

  thanks,
  dims

  Posted by: dims on April 10, 2007 at 09:17 PM

• tball,

  ASF is *NOT* asking Sun to release the JCK Source under ASL or anything like that. We just need the TCK binaries under a license that does not ask us to impose any conditions on our users. That's it.

  thanks,
  dims

  Posted by: dims on April 10, 2007 at 09:22 PM

• dims, in this disputation I'm substantially clueless as in most legal affairs... So I'm trying to make an opinion. Can you please explain which conditions are imposed on Apache users with today's TCK license? Thanks.

  Posted by: fabriziogiudici on April 10, 2007 at 11:34 PM

• The tone of that letter is really, really, poor. A serious escalation and misjudgement by the people behind Apache Harmony. I bet there were more than a few Apache people cringing when they read Geir's letter.

  Posted by: dgilbert on April 11, 2007 at 03:04 AM

• another IBM attempt to take control of Java. They failed to gain control over the JDK itself, so now they try to take control over the JLS through the JCK... And as usual they work through proxy.

  Posted by: jwenting on April 11, 2007 at 08:04 AM

• IBM is suggesting for a long time that SUN is dead and they will keep the Java community alive by their own forces.. No comments, dirty strategy from IBM - not surprisingly in the software market, but very frustrating coming from a big company with so good resources to fair play.
  A year ago I was working for a bank under an IBM service contract.. all consultants from the big blue always repeating the same speech about the imminent death of SUN and how IBM will support the community.. and also the constant warning against the usage of JEE5, since the main frame and other IBM platform is always based on obsolete code.. supposedly to avoid surprises..

  Posted by: felipegaucho on April 11, 2007 at 08:28 AM

• Your hypocrasy is really funny accusing Geir Magnusson of "mud slinging" and then resorting to it yourself calling what hes done "Extortion" and a "slimy marketing ploy". Especially when you have no facts to back this up coming to your conclusion based only on the "tone" and "timing" of the letter.

  The letter states that hes been trying to obtain a suitable JCK license since August 2006 - thats 7 months!!!! - so IMO the tone is understanable.

  Since you don't address the "meat" of the complaint in the letter - I assume one of two things: 1) You don't understand the issue or 2) You would rather throw mud yourself than address the real issue. If its that latter then your readers will I'm sure draw their own conclusion as to why

  Posted by: niallp on April 11, 2007 at 09:45 AM

• Who said anything about facts? I'm not a reporter or legal expert, I'm a software engineer who is expressing my personal opinion. "Suitable license" doesn't necessarily mean "reasonable license" -- if your neighbor wanted to "suitably license" your car for free, my guess is you would hold out for more than seven months, or at least ask that they put some gas in occasionally.
  In this case, my guess is that "suitable license" these days means "not the GPL 2 with ClassPath Exception", and there are a lot of valid open-source source projects which are therefore not suitably licensed from this perspective. My limited legal understanding is that this new Java license prevents teams from making improvements without sharing them with the rest of the community, and I strongly support that openness. But that is just my opinion.

  Posted by: tball on April 11, 2007 at 10:12 AM

• This has nothing to do with GPL. Its a simple issue - Sun is offering the JCK conditional on a "Field of Use" restriction being included with the Harmony JDK which conflicts with the ASF license. If you look at the promise on the JCP site that The JSPA must require that a JSR spec license cannot prohibit a compatible open source (Apache-style license minimum) implementation of a JSR. - then Sun is breaking its agreement. In fact if you read Simon Phipps's Blog - then its also an issue for OpenJDK under GPL.

  Posted by: niallp on April 11, 2007 at 10:34 AM

• my guess is you would hold out for more than seven months, or at least ask that they put some gas in occasionally.

  You talk as if Sun has asked ASF to hold on while they solve internal issues (like the IP review you mentioned), but from the ASF letter/FAQ, it seems that Sun simply ignored these requests....

  Posted by: felipeal on April 11, 2007 at 10:48 AM

• I have no idea what Sun's and ASF's communications were -- I was responding to niallp's first comment.

  Posted by: tball on April 11, 2007 at 10:53 AM

• If you are looking for an expert Sun position on the issue, Simon Phipps is definitely the person to listen to. I'm just another Java software engineer with an opinion.

  Posted by: tball on April 11, 2007 at 10:56 AM

• I wish I was such "just another Java software engineer" :-)

  Posted by: felipeal on April 11, 2007 at 11:00 AM

• Im trying to figure out if Harmony fits in as a vital piece of the Java ecosystem. There is so much doom and gloom about something that may not be measurable, yet is Harmony part of the ground from which this thing springs forth?

  Im still trying to understand what restrictions the JCK is placing on their customers. Do they want Harmony to be used in nuclear reactors or something?

  leouser

  Posted by: leouser on April 11, 2007 at 12:24 PM

• "If you are looking for an expert Sun position on the issue, Simon Phipps is definitely the person to listen to. I'm just another Java software engineer with an opinion."

  I get the feeling that you don't want to argue about their actual complaint - if the ASF has a valid complaint then calling it extortion (i.e. the ASF is using public pressure to get something they don't deserve) is, to put it mildly, unfair. So IMO you should back your opinion up with some arguments/facts othewise its baseless and you're just mud slinging.

  P.S. I didn't think much of your car analogy...so heres one from me:
  You invite a bunch of people to help you design a car with the promise that if they do so they can go off and build their own to do with what they want, only to tell them when its 95% built that they can only have a road worthiness certiticate if they place restrictions on where people using the car are allowed to drive it.

  So in other words - they don't want to borrow Sun's car 'coz they built their own, they (and many others) already put in the gas by contributing to the JCP and they just want the means to certify it so that they are allowed to call it a car and distribute it as such for others to use - as Sun promised they could.

  Posted by: niallp on April 11, 2007 at 12:33 PM

• So IMO you should back your opinion up with some arguments/facts othewise its baseless and you're just mud slinging.
  I did base it on the fact that JavaOne is a month away -- it is the timing of the letter I objected to, not whether the JCP needs to be better licensed. As I originally wrote, it needs to be made more available.
  Your analogy sucks as badly as mine does (perhaps all analogies of this situation do). Sun doesn't determine "road worthiness", the developer community does. Kaffe is a great JVM alternative, for example, and they aren't trying to dictate what license the JCK should use. What the JCP does is certify that a JVM is close enough to the standard that it can use the Java trademark. Only the ASF can decide how its software can be appropriately used -- it doesn't have to use the "Java" trademark to be useful to people. Soon the JCK license will be changed (according to Simon Phipps, whom I believe), but until then nothing is stopping anyone from running Harmony. This is a trademark issue, not a technical one, and I don't like to see a technical conference used as a negotiating tactic in a trademark issue. I come to JavaOne to hang with other engineers and talk about technology, not trademark nonsense.

  Posted by: tball on April 11, 2007 at 12:50 PM

• Seriously.. it seems like a trivial compliaint.

  Posted by: firefight on April 11, 2007 at 01:06 PM

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