On Thu, 14 Mar 2002 07:51, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> On Thu, 14 Mar 2002, Peter Donald wrote:
> > > They still include the jaxp source code, in xml-commons.
> > > But it's a clean-room implementation, made directly from the spec.
> >
> > The "directly from the spec" is where the problem lies. It uses suns IP
> > and thus must the TCK. We don't and thus we are in violation of the
> > license and thus Apache and every user is open to being sued if sun
> > chooses to do so.
>
> This is getting intersting...

Thats one way of describing it ;)

> To be honest, I allways believed that Jaxp, and all are 'open standards'.
> ( i.e. they allow clean room implementation )

Nope ;(

> Again, we need a lawyer here - but if this is the case I think we
> should do something. There are plenty of open standards ( too many even
>
> :-), and if a spec is not open, it shouldn't be used -
>
> but an alternative (  or a new open standard ).
>
> I hear many java APIs are cloned to .net, and that a lot of .net is
> 'open standard' - I'm pretty sure it has a lot of APIs that could do
> the same thing as the non-open ones, and we can clone them in java. An
> open API/standard should be used whenever possible.

Its sad when you start thinking microsofts platform is more open :/

I think this may be an avenue depending on how the revision of the JCP goes. 
If it doesn't go well and someone with enough "political correctness" was 
willing to go for it I think it would be a very good way to progress. 

It would first be a matter of establishing relationships with other big 
players in Java world that have clout and are sympathetic to our situation. 

ie If we could set up a decent process and work with other standards 
organizations (ECMA, IEEE, W3C), have a relatively formal participation 
contract (and thus *safe* from eyes of corporate/IP lawyers) and finally make 
allies of organisations like IBM, Apple and whoever else then it would be 
viable for many things. We could even join up with existing opensource 
organizations to cross-pollinate ideas. Apache + GNU + Eclipse + Netbeans + 
JBoss would make an impressive opensource shard. IBM + Apple + others would 
make a fairly convincing commercial shard. Join em together and we have a new 
Java standards body.

It still would be difficult to do anything with respect to the real core as 
Sun controls the source to a large degree. However for many of the other 
components/add-ons then it would be quite viable to do this. Especially if 
tools like JDiff+XDoclet could auotmate most API testing and functional 
testing could be done with JUnit or some other custom framework.

It is not so much a technical problem but a marketing one. Given the right 
environment I think it could happen - best to wait and see how JCP reorg 
turns out though.

-- 
Cheers,

Pete

--------------------------------------------------
"An intellectual is someone who has been educated 
beyond their intelligence."
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