On Monday 13 November 2006 16:45, Temlakos wrote: > Kurt Wall wrote: > > On Mon, Nov 13, 2006 at 05:36:12PM -0500, Ric Moore wrote: > >>>On Monday 13 November 2006 19:05, temlakos@xxxxxxxxx wrote: > >>>>Sun did it! They released all versions of Java under GNU GPL v2. Read > >>>>this article for the details. Now: what will happen to the GNU Compiler > >>>>for Java (gcj)? Will they be able to use Sun's own Java code to make > >>>> the project fully compatible with all the Java applications built with > >>>> Sun's version? Or will gcj give way completely to the presently built > >>>> Java Development Kit? Will a fully Sun-compatible Java development > >>>>environment be available for Fedora Core 7? 6? > >> > >>Praise GAWD! <gibbers thankfully> Ric > > > > I'm simply stunned. Delighted, to be sure, but stunned. Not that Ric > > is gibbering thankfully -- he usually gibbers with little provocation -- > > but that Sun actually released Java under the GPL. > > > > Kurt > > Well, you can believe it. The news came to me from eWeek, and they don't > usually miss. I'm waiting with bated breath for Steve Vaughn-Nichols to > comment on this. > > I agree--this is H-U-G-E. > > The analysts can't seem to make out why Sun acted as it did. But in fact > Sun has been working on this for a long, /long/ time. They had to square > everything with current copyright owners. In some cases, they "settled" > with those owners. My guess is that they bought the copyrights for them, > so that they could release everything to the "intellectual common" that > the GPL creates. > > The analysts also said that they chose GPL for a very good reason: that > it is the most widely-used of all FOSS licenses. > > You cannot imagine how this pleases me. I am trying right now to develop > a Java client application for a PostgreSQL database. Having to create a > Sun-friendly Java development environment has been my worst obstacle to > continuing to upgrade to newer versions of Fedora. Sorry, but gcj just > doesn't cut it. It leaves out too many things. > > But now that the original code is out under GPL, one of two things can > happen: > > 1. The gcj project developers and maintainers can now fix gcj to handle > everything that the current version of Java can handle. > > 2. The present JDK gets ported as-is to Linux. > > I can't recommend for or against either option. I don't really know how > close gcj is to being a complete implementation of Java--and I > appreciate the effort that the gcj developers made at least to /try/ to > give us an unencumbered Java runtime and development environment. > > I do, however, have a lot of recommendations to make to whoever will now > maintain Java now that it is under GPL license: > > 1. Allow us to pass user-defined objects by value and not by reference > only. > > 2. Allow us to overload operators. Today a Java developer can overload > functions but not operators. Why should I not be allowed to define, say, > a date object, and be able to write: > > Date Today = new Date(system.currentTimeMillis()); > TimeInterval Week = new TimeInterval(); > Week.setDays(7); > Date NextWeek = Today + Week; > Date LastWeek = Today - Week; > TimeInterval Fortnight = NextWeek - LastWeek; > > Now wouldn't that be far simpler than having to define each operation as > a function taking an argument? That's what overloaded operators can do > for you. > > C++ developers know all about overloaded operators. We Java developers > ought to have that freedom. also this guy has a grudge against bill gates http://www.nndb.com/people/137/000026059/ > > Temlakos
