On Sun, Nov 7, 2010 at 12:27 AM, James McKenzie <jjmckenzie51@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On 11/3/10 10:31 PM, Fernando Cassia wrote: >> Hi there, >> >> Now, having said that, I didn´t like the hysteria surrounding >> OpenOffice.org, and I think Oracle will do an OK job advancing the >> open source project going forward. >> > The 'hysteria' surrounding 'OpenOffice.org' is not what you state it > is. Oracle bought Sun, Oracle does not subscribe to the 'OpenSource is > better' mantra that Sun did. Oh really? Why have they stated that: 1. They are releasing JavaFX 2.0 controls as GPL? 2. Why have they stated that they´ll contribute back JDK7 and JDK8 back to the OpenJDK project?. 3. Why did they fund (not cancel) this years OpenOffice.org conference in Europe? > RedHat and other distributions > realize that OpenOffice.org will soon become 'pay as you go' software > under the StarOffice label and have decided to embrace LibreOffice. Wrong and uninformed. StarOffice as a brand ceased to exist a long time ago. There´s two products now: OpenOffice.org, the GPL project, and "Oracle Open Office" (notice the space and lack of .org), the commercial product with formal tech support and a price tag, just as StarOffice was. See http://www.sun.com/staroffice redirects to the "Oracle Open Office" commercial product page. and see how http://www.openoffice.org shows the GPL project. Unifying the brand names was the right thing to do, IMHO, otherwise it suffered from what I call the "Netscape Syndrome", by which no matter what Netscape did with its 6.x or 7.x packaging of Mozilla, people always talked about Mozilla.org. > Too bad. The had the best directory service that I've worked with just > because of that: It worked and was universal rather than the 'Active > Directory' crap that Microsoft foists on the unsuspecting. Yes, I agree. NDS is nice. Argentina´s largest telco ran it, until someone convinced one of its managers that Microsoft´s solutions were better. Of course I say "convinced" with suspicion-filled quotes around them. OpenOffice.org will remain free... "Oracle Open Office" is just the rebranding of the commercial build that was StarOffice. http://www.sys-con.com/node/1554770 DOOMSDAY PREDICTION: "Oracle might kill OpenOffice" "Oracle may well kill OpenOffice and MySQL" http://www.zdnetasia.com/could-oracle-fracture-open-source-community-62202707.htm Result: Killing of OpenOffice never happened, Oracle sponsored the OpenOffice.org conference in Budapest earlier this year http://blogs.oracle.com/office/2010/09/live_from_the_openofficeorg_conference_in_budapest.html Would they do that if they intented to kill the project or turn it proprietary?. Are they stupid? 2nd DOOMSDAY PREDICTION: Oct 2009 - "some fear that Oracle will bury or weaken MySQL" http://www.computerworlduk.com/toolbox/open-source/open-source-business/news/index.cfm?newsid=17331&tsb=email RESULT: Didn´t happen. Oracle is INVESTING in MySQL April 2010: Oracle boosts investment in MySQL, targets Microsoft http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE63C3DV20100413 And then you see who is behind the criticism... Ingres.... Ingres criticises Oracle investment strategy for MySQL http://www.computing.co.uk/computing/news/2261291/database-giant-insists-strategy Yeah another database vendor criticising Oracle, a competitor, for "not investing enough" It makes my head spin... Instead, Oracle so far has: - Confirmed that work on the new Java 7 and Java 8 versions will be contributed back as open source, as part of the OpenJDK project (@mreinhold on Twitter) - Is backing Netbeans with lots of investments (despite the fact that Oracle had another, propietary IDE, Oracle JDeveloper). http://java.dzone.com/articles/oracles-roadmap-sun - Says it will release JavaFX 2.0 as open source when 2.0 is completed (without the MPEG4 codecs that are patent-encumbered by the MPEG-LA). http://www.drdobbs.com/blog/archives/2010/09/javafx_open_sou.html - Is backing the open source Glassfish J2EE server, with two new releases planned for next year. So, was it right to spit in the face of Oracle, and then "invite" them to come "join" the new independent body?. Sounds like more "forcing their hand" to me. Like I said, it seems that for some, Oracle must prove they´re not guilty of future crimes, that it might commit, sometime in the future, when nobody´s looking. If there isn´t good faith from one of the parties, no long lasting relationship can be established. Then you have stupid journalists that confuse open source and the GPL with "public domain" ** http://www.crn.com/news/applications-os/227500492/oracle-promises-to-keep-java-tools-in-the-public-domain.htm And others who claim Java ME was never released under a GPL license, plus they confuse a runtime environment with an "operating system": http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/oracle-isnt-completely-wrong-sue-google-over- "Although parts of Java are open-source under GPL2, __Java ME, Sun's embedded operating system, was not__" Well, gee, I guess what Sun´s PhoneME project is http://mobilepit.com/11/phoneme-open-source-java-me-j2me-implementation.html ... and how PhoneME (J2ME open source) for Windows CE was created... http://davy.preuveneers.be/phoneme/ Too much FUD going around, and the usual suspects that wanted a piece of Sun´s pie (Novell, IBM, Microsoft) rejoycing... > You can always add OO.o to your system. However, RedHat and others will > not be including it in their packages for a number of reasons, most of > them legal. > > Also, in the spirit of FOSS, this is a 'good thing'. OpenOffice.org was > a Sun thing. It is NOT an 'Oracle' thing. > > James McKenzie Believe me: corporations can learn from their mistakes, and spitting someone in the face and saying "you ARE EVIL, I don´t want to have anything to do with you!" and then "but you´re welcome to join our Foundation, if you behave" is surely to have the totally opposite outcome: the other party becomes rightly offended and won´t come to your dinner/party/organization. What facts have shown me, is that 1. Oracle wants to displace and beat Microsoft 2. That Ellison has supported Linux for over a decade, starting with its "Think NIC" thin client computer which sold for $399-$499 and ran Linux booting from a CD. Of course, it failed, being a product ahead of its time 3. That contrary to anti-Oracle FUD, OpenJDK is alive and kicking, Netbeans is not dead but being actively developed, along with Glassfish, and MySQL is being heavily invested on. 4. Not to mention the diferent FOSS projects and contributions hosted and worked on by Oracle even before the Sun acquisition http://oss.oracle.com/projects/ That´s my view. Of course, as someone said, this thread has been going nowhere for a while. So I take it as a "no", that Fedora won´t give users a choice and that there´s no chance of OpenOffice.org being part of the repos. Don´t take me wrong, this is not an indictment, or complaint, I´m just stating the obvious. Thanks, FC ** The article headline has been apparently fixed to read "open source" yet the URL remains with the original story title that made it to Google News, which read "Public domain". -- users mailing list users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/users Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines
