Java problem

[Craig White]

On Thu, 2008-01-03 at 06:50 -0500, Gene Heskett wrote:
> On Thursday 03 January 2008, Peter Boy wrote:
> >Am Sonntag, den 30.12.2007, 12:49 -0600 schrieb Les Mikesell:
> >> It would be better if you tried to understand the consequences of this
> >> choice instead of blindly defending it.
> >
> >As with most decisions in real life: most benefits in one dimension have
> >drawbacks in others. If I want the freedom of free software, I may have
> >to struggle with issues in using non-free software. It is simply a
> >matter of choice (and conscious decision).
> >
> >> > Fedora did not choose "not to be compatible with..." but Fedora choosed
> >> > not to include an non-free program (i.e. Sun's Java)
> >>
> >> They did both.  Including or not including isn't the issue.  Making it
> >> difficult for the user to install his own freely available copy is one
> >> problem.
> >
> >Fedora does not make it specifically difficult. You may install the Sun
> >provided Linux rpm, are free to search the Sun bugzilla database why it
> >doesn't work out of the box (doesn't work in any Linux distribution, the
> >bug report is some years old and Sun choosed not to fix it), install one
> >of the suggested workarounds (e.g. edit a shell script
> >in /etc/profile.d) and you are ready to go. As with any distributions
> >Fedora does only care about software, which is part of its distribution.
> >Third party vendors have to care ybout their software.
> >
> >And don't confuse the Fedora model with RHEL. In RHEL Red Hat takes care
> >about Sun java integration and customers have to pay for it. Or the
> >former SuSE distribution where SuSE made a different regarding the
> >licence issue.
> >
> >> A whole separate 'jpackage' project has to exist just to fix
> >> this problem in the distribution. The problem wouldn't exist if the
> >> distribution included a java-*-sun-compat package of perfectly legal
> >> symlinks.
> >
> >You may think of the jpackage distribution as just another workaround
> >for the fact that Sun didn't care about Linux compatibility of their
> >Linus rpm's. And it is a general purpose workaround, not a Fedora
> >specific one.
> >
> >> The bigger problem is distributing something that is not java compatable
> >>   but executing it with the java name.  Microsoft tried to promote an
> >> incompatible program that similarly fit their agenda with the java name
> >> and Sun successfully sued them over it.  The fedora-shipped not-java
> >> program that executes with the java name does just as much damage and
> >> shouldn't be named java until it passes the compatibility tests.  I'm
> >> surprised fedora's legal dept. allowed this abuse of a trademarked name.
> >
> >The software is not shipped as java, but as gcj (and with some starter
> >scripts with the filenama java for compatibility). And in contrast to MS
> >the gcj project aimed to full compatibility and the lack thereof was an
> >intermediate state during development. All this is quite different.
> >
> >> > So you can develope (or simply run) against the reference version and
> >> > you can test (and support the devel of) the truly free alternative in
> >> > parallel. That's the Fedora way.
> >>
> >> It's not an alternative java until it passes the compatibility test.
> >
> >You are free, not to use (and just to ignore) it! Remember, you just
> >have to use one of the above mentioned alternative ways.
> 
> Here, with a fresh install of x86_64 on my lappy, an about:plugins gives a 
> long list of IcedTea stuff.
> 
> So I sent FF off to http://www.cnn.com.  Clicking on the first video in the 
> list, it said I needed flash, so I clicked on the download button.  Then I 
> became root and installed it, and restarted FF.  It was there in the about 
> list, so I went back to cnn.com and they all played just fine.
> 
> Now, this thread was saying what about IcedTea?
----
thanks for you analysis but this thread was about java, not flash. what
does CNN and flash have to do with java? Absolutely nothing

Craig