Re: Is Java free software?

[MJ Ray]

GNU Herds work team <address@hidden> wrote:
> Proposed rule to tag a technology-skill as being Free:
>
>   "If there are several implementations of such technology, and
>    at least one of them is 100% Free Software, then such
>    technology can be tagged as Free.
>
>    That is to say, having at least one free software option to
>    choose is enough to tag such technology-skill as Free."

Doesn't whether a technology is Free Software depend on whether
hackers are free to use it for any purpose, free to adapt it to our
needs and so on?

In other words, it depends on both how the implementations are
licensed and how the technology is developed.

For Java, I think that's still under the control of Sun (isn't it?),
which would suggest non-Free (because Free Software implementations
always have to play "catch up" with the Sun non-Free-Software one)
until Sun's implementation is Free Software.

Alternatively, I think C# is an ECMA standard (isn't it?) so there's
no inherent reason for it not to be Free, if ECMA C# is actually used,
rather than some vendor-specific C#.

Is that clear?
-- 
MJ Ray http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html tel:+844-4437-237 -
Webmaster-developer, statistician, sysadmin, online shop builder,
consumer and workers co-operative member http://www.ttllp.co.uk/ -
Writing on koha, debian, sat TV, Kewstoke http://mjr.towers.org.uk/