It would be stale news if I told you that the Android SDK was released. And that it is Java-like platform, so that developers are comfortable programming it using Java based IDEs, E@zyVG has a good overview. The news today is about how Google worked around Sun’s tactics. Sun has opened up the Java standard edition, but has IP-based licensing restrictions for J2ME, the mobile edition.
Google wanted to open source the platform, and would not have been able to do so because of this. Stefano explains how the restriction has been bypassed - by reinventing the wheel and writing their own virtual machine Dalvik. So the programmers use the Java programming language, but the code gets compiled to Dalvik’s bytecode.
Google seems to have taken another step to avoid the platform from getting fragmented and forked, all the members have signed the non-fragmentation agreement (via Slashdot). Quite thoughtful considering that it is an alliance that we are going to deal with.
However, I cannot help but naively wonder whether using Java syntax was worth all this trouble. Would it have been difficult with OpenMoko and their already open sourced platform? Maybe it was not built for multiple phones, but could it not have been extended instead of reinventing the wheel? Looking forward to more developments with Android and lots and lots of controversies around it.
