DEV Community

Discussion on: Supreme Court sides with Google over Oracle. Copying an API is fair use.

Collapse
 
bestape profile image
Kyle MacLean Smith

Canada uses fair dealing and this fair use case is very unique anyway. Probably not wise to rely on this precedent without a hefty grain of salt. eff.org/deeplinks/2021/04/victory-...

Collapse
 
kspeakman profile image
Kasey Speakman • Edited

Microsoft legal seems to think it is pretty solid.

From the announcement:

Microsoft Build of OpenJDK 11 binaries may contain backported fixes and enhancements we deem important to our customers and our internal users. Some of these may have not yet been formally backported upstream and are clearly signposted in our release notes.

Although to be fair OpenJDK is licensed differently.

Collapse
 
gochev profile image
Nayden Gochev

it was never an issue to use OpenJDK :) the Oracle issue was Google used Classpath JDK and not OpenJDK (which was non existent at that time) :)

Thread Thread
 
kspeakman profile image
Kasey Speakman • Edited

Yeah, you are right. What Google did was more like replacing the JRE with their own version. Whereas the OpenJDK has a different license and is for a different purpose even though it contains what's in the JRE. It is still interesting though that MS mentions backported fixes if it's not going to be the same environment on client devices... I guess build-only fixes. I must admit I am not as familiar with the JVM as with .NET.

Thread Thread
 
gochev profile image
Nayden Gochev

JDK = .NET
JRE/JVM = .NET Runtime

now you are familiar :D

But about the topic basically Microsoft have their own build of OpenJDK I guess so they can provide Azure instances with MS JDK where the support and upgrades are completely end to end triggered by them and not depending on third party OpenJDK builds I believe this is the whole idea.

Collapse
 
bestape profile image
Kyle MacLean Smith

That's very interesting, thanks for the share! I assume Microsoft has a consistent strategy regarding its OSS transition. Thinking about copyright law only, this case will take some time to absorb, especially in jurisdictions that don't apply fair use doctrine.