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Perspective: Sun and Microsoft duke it out in court

The battle for control of the Java language and its surrounding technology gets underway with a bang of the gavel

By Eric Armstrong, JavaWorld.com, 10/01/98

Sun Microsystems contends that by failing to implement the Java Native Interface (JNI) in its virtual machine, Microsoft prevents valid Java programs from operating correctly. In addition, Sun claims that Microsoft's inclusion of three additional compiler directives (@DLL, @COM, and @SECURITY) and two additional keywords (DELEGATE and MULTICAST) produces an incompatible variant of the language. (For details on these issues, see Bill Day's accompanying article, "Java's creator discusses technology of Sun-Microsoft lawsuit.") In response to Sun's claims, Microsoft argues that the contract between the two parties gives it the right to make such extensions.

Background

As a fan of Java technology, I am on the side of truth, justice, and all things beautiful -- and the truth is, the computing world has long been badly fragmented into a hodgepodge of incompatible languages, language variants, and operating systems. Of all the utility programs I have written over the years, most are unusable now because they were written in various (incompatible) languages for various (incompatible) operating systems. Anything that can reverse this trend and undo this tower of babel is a good thing. I wish the Java platform had been there at the start of my career. If it had been, I could show up on a job site now with a huge collection of tools and utilities that I had written or acquired over the years, and be 10 times as productive. So, for me, if Java versions remain compatible, that would certainly be a thing of beauty.

I favor Java's promise of cross-platform compatibility, and I contract at Sun. But that doesn't stop me from criticizing the hell out of areas of the platform that need improvement! (You can browse The JBuilder2 Bible to gauge the truth of that statement.) But, as much as I wanted the outcome to favor compatibility, I had no idea whether the licensing contract between Sun and Microsoft actually obligated Microsoft to fully embrace cross-platform compatibility as Sun contends. Truth and beauty are one thing. Justice is another. It was with that question in mind that I entered the courtroom.

Let the battle begin

I've always thought courtroom proceedings would be dry and dull affairs. But at this one, I found myself sitting on the edge of my seat. Maybe it was the high stakes: on this day, in this room, the future of an entire industry was being decided. As the proceedings unfolded, my interest was also piqued by their combative nature. In cross-examination, the lawyers looked like champions of old -- jousting for their cause.

Each side had a total of four hours in which to make their case, plus a final 45 minutes for summary argument. (Summary arguments took place behind closed doors.) As a result, the lawyers worked under intense time pressure, like grandmaster chess players struggling to make all their moves in the allotted time.

In the opinion of this observer, Sun's efforts carried the day. Whether that conclusion is shared by the judiciary remains to be seen. The remainder of this article examines the main arguments made by each side. With this information in hand, you can reach your own conclusions.

 

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