From the Editors: Business as usual at the JCP

By SD Times News Team

July 1, 2008 — (Page 1 of 2)
Ever since Sun formed the Java Community Process in 1998, other companies have complained that the Silicon Valley company excessively controls Java Specification Requests. Indeed, SD Times has covered many instances in which other companies have urged Sun to play nice and to run the JCP more democratically.

However, there’s no reason for Sun to do so. Java, after all, is Sun’s technology and a core part of its business strategy. Maintaining control over Java’s present and future is essential to Sun’s market position. The JCP is Sun’s sandbox. Other companies can join the JCP or they can create technologies that work with Java, but they do so on Sun’s terms.

Sun with Java is no different than Microsoft with .NET or Apple with the iPhone. That most, if not all, JCP staff are Sun employees should make it very clear: It’s Sun’s baby, it’s Sun’s vision and it’s Sun’s direction.

Take the latest outbreak, regarding the proposed JSR 277 Java Module System, which seeks to extend the existing Java Archive systems with a better packing scheme for applications and resources. Critics contend that there’s a perfectly good modular-deployment system already available from the OSGi Alliance and that Sun is going out of its way to ensure that JSR 277 is incompatible with OSGi.

Is that what Sun’s up to? It’s hard to know whether JSR 277 and OSGi will ultimately be incompatible. We’re not sure if JSR 277’s scheme is better or worse than OSGi—it’s too soon to tell. As for its motivation, the company claims that the development of JSR 277 will be transparent and that Sun will consider feedback from the outside world.

What’s going to happen with JSR 277? We don’t know. However, we support Sun’s right to develop specifications in the way that it sees best. The Java Community Process isn’t really a community; that was never its intent. It’s a way for Sun to encourage its partners to collaborate with it on the Sun specs. But the decision about what to put in Java ultimately lies with Sun. Let’s hope the company’s spec leads decide wisely.

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