Open source: how Sun sees it

Sam Varghese
Friday, 30 January 2009 03:57

Opinion and Analysis

Simon Phipps is a natural when it comes to speaking. The man has a good turn of phrase, is skilled in the art of repartee, and can engage an audience very well.
Sun's chief open source officer was one of three keynote speakers at the recent Australian national Linux conference.

He spoke to iTWire soon after he had given his keynote. Edited extracts:

iTWire: Do you think that Sun made a small mistake in delaying the open sourcing of Java?

Simon Phipps: I would have personally preferred to see it happen sooner. But there were really good reasons why it took as long as it did. And where we're at now, I think I'm very pleased with the results we've had. Java is available now in all the main Linux distributions. It's available in a ready-to-use format that works with the package management system on those platforms - so it's there in Synaptic on Ubuntu. It's... integrated into Fedora. So despite probably a year or so delay, I think we've actually reached a really good place with it.

iTWire: Do you think it has cost you anything in terms of adoption vis-a-vis .NET?

SP: Not really because .NET isn't really an aspect of the Linux platform despite the very best efforts of people to get it there.

iTWire: No, I'm asking about the broader community.

SP: No, I don't think that Java and open source is relevant to the space where it's competing with .NET.

CONTINUED