"In developing Android, Google knowingly, directly and repeatedly infringed Oracle’s Java-related intellectual property," said Oracle spokesperson Karen Tillman. "This lawsuit seeks appropriate remedies for their infringement."

TechCrunch obtained the following statment from Google on the matter:

"We are disappointed Oracle has chosen to attack both Google and the open-source Java community with this baseless lawsuit. The open-source Java community goes beyond any one corporation and works every day to make the web a better place. We will strongly defend open-source standards and will continue to work with the industry to develop the Android platform."

Kara Swisher has the entire complaint in a Scribd document:

The complaint deals with a total of seven patents. Jason Kincaid notes that Sun Microsystems was able to get $1.6 billion out of Microsoft related to patent disputes and antitrust issues.

As MG Siegler (who first reported the news) points out, the company is known for its Google Web Toolkit designer, which is likely the reason for the acquisition.

Instantiations greets its site visitors with the following message:

No word yet from Google on this. Perhaps they’re waiting until tomorrow to announce it along with the reported Slide acquisition. You have to wonder if any other acquisition announcements are in store from the company.

The price tag on Instantiations is as of yet unknown.

Other parts of the new Noop homepage (which is hosted by Google Code) explain that Noop "in source form looks similar to Java.  The goal is to build dependency injection and testability into the language from the beginning, rather than rely on third-party libraries as all other languages do."

Then, "Immutability and minimal variable scope are encouraged by making final/const behavior the default and providing easy access to a functional style.  Testability is encouraged by providing Dependency Injection at the language level and a compact constructor injection syntax."

The Noop website is pretty well built out if you’d like more information.  Google’s developers provided all sorts of details about the current state of things and where Noop may go, as well as a place or two in which folks can give feedback.

It’ll be interesting to see what sort of traction this Google-y venture into programming languages gets.  Reactions seem a bit muted so far.

Hat tip goes to Darryl K. Taft.

Google lists the following new features in a post on the Official Google Blog:

- App Engine’s early look at Java™ language support includes a Java runtime, integration with the new Google Web Toolkit 1.6, and a Google Plugin for Eclipse

- The Google Secure Data Connector enables centrally-managed access to on-premise data from Google Apps

- The database import tool makes it easier to move gigabytes of data into App Engine (and export functionality is coming within the month)

- Cron support can execute scheduled tasks like report generation and DB clean-up at regular intervals

App engine is a year old, and Google has realized that it is too hard to build applications and wanted to make it easier.

"You spend more time being a Sysadmin than actually building your next great web app," Google says. The new features should make it easier.

The deal is part of Microsoft’s strategy to capture more of the search market that is dominated by Google. Users downloading Sun’s Java platform will have the option to download the MSN Toolbar and have access to Live Search features.

"This agreement with Sun Microsystems is another important milestone in our strategy to secure broad-scale distribution for our search offering, enabling millions more people to experience the benefits of Live Search," said Yusuf Mehdi, senior vice president of the Online Audience Business at Microsoft.

"With the vast array of Java software-based Web applications that are downloaded every month, this deal will expose Live Search to millions more Internet users and drive increased volume for our search advertisers."

Microsoft reached a similar deal with Hewlett-Packard earlier this year to allow the globes largest personal computer maker to place a toolbar on new PCs in the United States and Canada beginning in January.

Java is used by more than 6.5 million software developers around the world and is one of the most popular software platforms present on 91 percent of Internet-connected PCs globally.

"With over 800 million Java desktop users around the world, our goal is to provide Java users with compelling and immersive business and consumer solutions powered by Java technology and value-added solutions from world-class software partners," said Rich Green, executive vice president of Software at Sun Microsystems.

Terms of the search agreement were not disclosed.
 

Snow is falling outside the lead-lined writers’ room at WebProNews, a chilly enough afternoon that one’s thoughts turn to a hot cup of Java after being outside playing “where’s the icescraper” in the trunk of the car.

For those in warmer climes, or perhaps nestled somewhere away from windows that aren’t of the code-development variety, programmers started receiving the news today about the 2008 edition of JavaOne.

Sun announced today they had culled nearly 1,700 submissions to a neighborhood of 350 for conference sessions. Some featured ones mentioned cover topics like JavaServer Faces, touch UI in mobile Java-based devices, and creating location-based services and apps on the Java platform.

Java University takes place May 5, the day before JavaOne opens. Morning and afternoon classes, a few bonus evening classes, and an all-day course on enterprise application design list in the curriculum.

As a final note, the Duke’s Choice awards return for a sixth appearance. Submissions for award consideration need to be made by March 14th, only a month away. Who will be the next Bang! Howdy?

If approved, knol will join several other trademarked terms owned by Google. Along with the company’s name, Google sought a few other trademarks this year.

Resource Shelf listed ‘knol’ and some other words to the trademark queue. These represent the search ad company’s recent, publicly discussed initiatives, like the world of mobile phone software.

Google’s trademark applications related to mobile include Android, Dalvik, and Open Handset Alliance. Android is the mobile application platform, while the Open Handset Alliance consists of those companies that have agreed to be part of Google’s plans.

Dalvik presents a more interesting concept than just a virtual machine to execute files on Android. Apache developer Stefano Mazzocchi said in November 2007 that Dalvik offered Google a break from Sun’s Java licensing schemes:

The trick is that Google doesn’t claim that Android is a Java platform, although it can run some programs written with the Java language and against some derived version of the Java class library.

Not only this allows Google to avoid having to battle thru the JCP for any change to the Java ME “standard” or tolerate Sun’s unique ability to veto any JCP change, but gives users a much more ‘fresh‘ and modern class library to play with…

Google makes Android and not only unlocks development abilities on the mobile phone but also unlocks millions of potential Java mobile programmers from Sun’s grip on it.

As a custom virtual machine, Dalvik does not interfere with the usual Java development for creating class and jar files. Dalvik runs these programs, as noted.

Where Dalvik should shine is with its minimal CPU requirement. Google needed a low-power consumption benefit for Android, in order to attract developers and hardware manufacturers to the platform.

When someone creates a knol about Dalvik, we’ll look for two things. One: if someone from Google writes it. Two: if AdSense displays Sun or Java related ads in the knol (if ads are enabled for it, of course.)

Fake Steve Jobs (AKA Forbes senior editor Dan Lyons) has been penning the Fake Steve satirical blog of the Apple co-founder to the bemusement of folks in the Valley. With potrayals of Microsoft boss Bill Gates as “Beastmaster Bill” (both Bill and the real Steve are fans of the blog), it’s garnered nothing less than a rabid following.

The blog contains nuggets of Silicon Valley life, like the recent entry “Java Developers Finally Realize The Party’s Over“:

But I think they don’t quite know which party they’re talking about. See this screed where some Javatard says Apple has been spitting in his face because we didn’t include Java 6 in Leopard. Or something. So he says he’s selling his Mac. His headline is, “So long, Apple. The party’s over.” Well he’s right about one thing. The party is over — the Java party, that is. Glad to see the Javatards have finally figured that out.

The pithy entries, are as amusing as the videos like “No Violence, But Clearly An IP Violation”

WebProNews conducted an interview with FakeSteve in conjunction with the launch of the new 248-page “Options” penned by FakeSteve, here’s an excerpt of an interview WebProNews did with FakeSteve:

1) The black turtlenecks you wear – humble article of well-made clothing, or a divine right conveyed upon you by the higher power that inspires gadgets like the iPod and the iPhone?

The former. I view my outfit as a form of monk’s robes. The idea is to abolish vanity and express my humility so that I can focus completely on my art. All I want to do is create beautiful objects. That is the only thing I want to think about. Not trivial things like clothing.

-

If anything, this is a classic case study that strong content can bring you to high places…

Now on with beautiful objects and creating things…

No Java. So, can’t run Kyte.tv’s application. Can’t run the Google Maps application I’m using on my Nokia. Can’t run something cool coming soon from eBay that I’m testing out. Can’t run Radar.net. Etc. Etc.

No .NET apps. Er, no Silverlight apps. So, your favorite app from the Windows Mobile Smartphone you were hoping to give away won’t work.

Will it allow Flash to load? Walt Mossberg just got an iPhone. I wonder what happens when he goes to Google’s Finance site? Does the chart show up? I doubt it.

By the way the folks who sent me the Nokia N95, Pure Mobile, say they’ll have unlocked iPhones for sale via the Internet (that’s counter to what we were told before). They doubt they’ll be able to meet the demand. They say they’ve seen demand for this phone that’s off the scale for any other mobile product launch they’ve been involved in.

UPDATE: here’s a video of Steve Jobs on stage today talking about iPhone and what developers can do for it. He keeps pointing out that it has the full Safari engine. That gives us hope that Flash will run fine on it, but probably not “native, non-browser” technologies like Java and Silverlight. It’d be nice to have someone who actually has an iPhone to verify this, though.

Comments

Tag:

JavaFX is said to be a new scripting variant of Java with a focus on development for the consumer communications market, including desktops, mobile clients, and TVs. The first product release is JavaFX Mobile, a software system for mobile devices.

The object-oriented applications programming language that is Java was once the cool kid on the block, a base from which a new generation of applications would be launched, taking over our desktops. And yet it never happened. The new product, with its focus on mobile technology presents the potential of dealing Sun back into the application game in a big way if it’s well received today by developers.

JavaFX Script centers on content creation and leverages the high-volume distribution of Java. “JavaFX Script is a scripting language focused on the content-authoring and content creation crowd. It is a means of creating visually impactful, high-performance, dramatic Web and network-facing artifacts or experiences that run all the way from the desktop running Java SE (Standard Edition) all the way down to mobile devices powered by JavaFX Mobile.” JavaFX, which will be open sourced, leverages 2D graphics APIs in the Swing GUI toolkit.

Sun is confident, “There are already 5 million programmers who work with Java Platform, Standard Edition (Java SE) for building Java programs on desktops, according to Sun. A shrinked-down version of Java, called Java Platform, Mobile Edition (Java ME), is already installed on 2 billion phones worldwide.”

REFERENCES

• Sun’s JavaFX to take on AJAX, Silverlight
• Sun tries again with consumer-flavored Java

Comments