lawsuit – Kev's Development Toolbox

August 14, 2015

Oracle: Google has ‘destroyed’ the future of Java on mobile devices

As a long time Java developer (since 1996) and advocate of the language and platform, the legal action from Oracle against Google and Android deeply saddens me. If anything, what Google has achieved is nothing but incredible and outstanding, as they have turned an arguably Java based/influenced platform into the most successful mobile device platform by far, something which Sun and now Oracle were never able to achieve.

Instead of crying over their lost opportunity, Oracle should be doing everything possible to partner with Google and license Android and/or adopt it as the mobile device platform for Java.

The joke that is Java ME needs to be ditched. It’s had it’s time. It was on almost all (what are now called) feature phones sold years back, but no-one apart from (some) Java developers knew this, so now even that potential success is nothing but a lost opportunity.

Please Oracle, do yourself a favor, preserve what little respect you have left from your loyal Java developers: if there’s anything being destroyed here it is our faith in you as a Company and as the guardian of Java.

Ditch Java ME, and license Android from Google as the new Java ME.

Android is what Java ME should have been from day one.

August 24, 2012

Sad day for manufacturers and consumers of ‘rectangular devices with round corners’

Samsung have said the final court ruling in the patent case with Apple is ‘a loss for the American consumer’, and I can’t help but agree.

In a statement after the ruling, Samsung continue:

“It is unfortunate that patent law can be manipulated to give one company a monopoly over rectangles with rounded corners, or technology that is being improved every day by Samsung and other companies”

That one statement for me sums up the ridiculous nature of his patent lawsuit. So what next, is Apple going to continue to sue every other phone manufacturer who manufacturers a device that is essentially a rectangle with rounded corners? To avoid infringing on Apple’s patents on rectangles, all other phones must be square, or circular, or any other shape but not a rectangle? This is the ridiculous part of this case. Imagine if someone was able to patent the shape of a car? A house? A table? A TV?

May 7, 2012

Jury has partial verdict in favor of Oracle in case against Google

The Jury in the Oracle v Google case over Android has come to a partial verdict in favor of Oracle, but does not have a unanimous verdict for the other questions they were asked by the Judge to answer to arrive at their verdict.

To complicate the partial verdict, the verdict of the first question is only for 1 part of the question (“Has Oracle proven that Google has infringed the overall structure, sequence and organization of copyrighted works?”) and apparently the jury are not able to come to a decision on the second part (“Has Google proven that its use of Oracle’s Java documentation constituted “fair use”?”). Google’s attorneys are therefore asking for a mistrial stating that this question cannot be partially answered.

It’s obviously not clearcut at this point where this is heading, and I imagine this could still swing either way.

If the end result of this case is that it is ruled that an API is Copyrightable, it will be interesting to see what the repercussions of this will be for other follow-on lawsuits.