Tech Dirt reports that Off We Go: Oracle Officially Appeals Google's Fair Use Win:
It was only a matter of time until this happened, but Oracle has officially appealed its fair use Java API loss [PDF] to the Federal Circuit (CAFC [US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit]). As you recall, after a years-long process, including the (correct) ruling that APIs are not covered by copyright being ridiculously overturned by CAFC, a new trial found that even if APIs are copyright-eligible, Google's use was covered by fair use. Oracle then tried multiple times to get Judge William Alsup to throw out the jury's ruling, but failed. In fact, on Oracle's second attempt to get Alsup to throw out the jury's ruling, citing "game changing" evidence that Google failed to hand over important information on discovery, it actually turned out that Oracle's lawyers had simply failed to read what Google had, in fact, handed over.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 28 2016, @08:50PM
Yeah, because the vendors controlling .NET and MariaDB [infoworld.com] are much less greedy.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 28 2016, @09:29PM
Oracle has been about getting those multi million dollar contracts for a long time. I have seen no less than 3 projects to remove them out of the picture just on cost alone. Not technical. Oracle DB is a fairly good piece of software if a bit esoteric to use. The mid end and low end is lost to Oracle from now on. The high end realized very quickly that oracledb is not what is needed but something that can smash through data quickly is. That is where the nosql DBs come in. No one deliberately starts a new oracle db project these days. Then only if 'we are an oracle shop' and it is commanded from on high. It is an early 80s bit of software trying to pretend it is a late 2000s bit of software. It shows.
MS is a decent platform to write on but mostly closed. However, it is also one of the more open ones to target. As MS is fairly live and let live. The tool set is decent and well rounded. The whole thing is a decent late 90s bit of kit that has aged fairly gracefully. MS decided to basically abandon the low end market and their SQL cost is going up. So it is basically 'nice software but kinda pricey'.
Linux and BSD are also decent platforms to target as everything is open. However, it is a bit of pain if you want to move between distros. Usually involving some reintegration to fix that oddball issue that pops up because this version of ubuntu is not exact the same as redhat. Not terrible but a pain enough to cause a bit of grumbling. After you have moved around a bit you usually have most of the issues abstracted. The tools range from 'this is bad ass' to 'what freshman in college tinkered this together and then abandoned it because it was hard to support'.
Mac is pretty good but they want to lock you into their particular way of doing things. If you are able to ignore that bit it is as good as linux/bsd.
I am currently looking for a job. Lots of .net, C/C++, iOS/Android, python, perl. But little in the way of actual java jobs that are little more than 'we have this software from 10 years ago please support/enhance it'. Very few greenfield apps for java these days. Oracle has made it clear 'stay away from our toys unless you pay'. Rust and Go are the ones to keep an eye on.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 28 2016, @11:13PM