A few weeks ago I discussed Oracle's crowded IDE picture, then noted that Google's new IDE, aimed at non-programmers, made quite a splash. Google seems to be trying to get itself into the "real" tooling market with its acquisition of Instantiations, which, amongst other things, makes a highly regarded GUI designer for the Java-backed Google Web Toolkit.

Most observers seem to think that this was in fact the driver behind Google's buy. The question that arises is, what exactly does Google plan to do with this new tool? Instantiations makes other Java tooling products, and Google got all of them (the company's Smalltalk business will be spun off under the original ownership), though they don't seem directly relevant to Google. It would be interesting Google plans to support its own series of tools to support its own stable of technologies -- TechCrunch's MG Siegler speculates that Instantiations' Java tools could be adopted specifically for Android. Google might be seeking, if not the level of lock-in Microsoft has with Visual Studio, then at least an ecosystem that it can control that is closely aligned with developers' work on apps for Google platforms. Seeing which products from this company Google promotes and continues work on might be a good bellwether for the company's Java ambitions.