End of an Era
Monday, November 9th, 2009
An Event that happened this week marked the end of an era for me: I lost the lid to my stainless steel thermal coffee tumbler (rendering it useless for on-the-go coffee) that I got at what some say could be the last JavaOne ever.
Now, you may say, “Matt, get a grip, it was just a coffee mug!”, but the coffee mug isn’t the issue. The issue is that Sun will be passing the keys to Java over to Oracle (if there is anything left of Sun when the EU finally lets the acquisition through).
There is no doubt in my mind that Java is here to stay and the Java platform will remain viable for a long time to come, but how will things change under Oracle’s leadership? Many argue that Sun didn’t really have much say in Java any more anyway, that it is really the community that was driving the language and the rich open source ecosystem around it. Oracle has even released an FAQ (PDF) detailing their rosy plans for Sun’s technologies (with no mention of JavaFX, which could be a good thing or a bad thing for JavaFX).
Will this continue to be the case with Oracle after the acquisition is finalized? Will Oracle move to make changes, for better or worse, to the Java platform or the community that develops it? We will just have to wait and see. I, for one, am not going to be buying an Oracle thermal coffee tumbler anytime soon as I have several t-shrits, a polo and a regular coffee to remind me of Java’s roots. 
Well, I think that Java is in safe hands. btw you are correct in your statement that Java is driven by JCP and not by the Sun. I don’t think that Oracle is interested in Javafx. I think they are more interested in JavaEE and not the consumer side of Java.