All the small things

Last week I gave an interview for my companies developer network. Of course such thing isn’t much of a big deal. I mean it’s the company you are working for – they are always looking for content for their website, but for me however this was different. In my blog I usually tend to talk about technical things and not so much about the actual things I am working on. This has several reasons, for one I am kinda happy to be able to be involved in more than just one thing. Diversity is great, because it gives you the chance to think outside the box, so it became a hobby of mine to do some small side project to get to know different technologies just for fun. Another reason is that you never know what your allowed to say. Is this topic meant to be communicated to the outside or not, is it strategic,… you know what I am talking about.

In the interview, I had the chance to actually talk about our latest development and highlight some of the amazing things we are working on. Being involved in OSGi for years now, I got to see quiet some OSGi based projects and designs and believe me most of them seem like toy projects compared to the degree of OSGi utilization the team I am working in has achieved. Working with OSGi behind the curtains for about 4 years we have several products based on a core framework, which is currently driven towards the first product line that is actually worth being called so. Unfortunately I have to note that only very little of this credit belongs to me. Most of it was done before I joined the company. Although it was the reason, why I joined, I am still amazed by how much we are working on the cutting – sometimes more “bleeding” – edge, like OSGi security. I don’t want to sound like some marketing guy promoting something, but if you’re interested in the technology and are looking for real applications running in the field – have a look at my interview. Enough said… Many thanks to my team for the great work and the inspiring and friendly environment one just have to love working in.

Cheers,
Mirko

Usually when I am blogging, I am talking about the latest technology, standards or general trends. This time however, I wonna talk about politics. No, not about the elections in US, but about politics in software development practiced by the big players to achieve their business goals. Don’t get me wrong from the start. I think this is completely normal in general. We all are trying to achieve our goals the one way or the other, but something just doesn’t feel right…

Yesterday I read about the latest news concerning Sun’s plans about the future of JSR 277, JSR 294 and its new plans on inventing componentization for its JVM called Jigsaw. I hate to say it, but for me, it seems like Sun behaves like a small child trying to insist to be the one driving all development and not letting someone else play with its toys. It’s anything but the behavior of a well establish and industry leading company or one who wants to become one. First they completely ignored the problem of componentization in Java while persuing enterprise development with J(2)EE and missed their chance to actually set the foundation for real software reuse what you would expect from and enterprise ready language specification. Later, when OSGi began to rise they started the JSR 277 and tried to create a competing standard in secret, which didn’t work out too well as we all know. Now, because of the pressure of the community and the lack of showing a better solution they are abandoning the JSR and start developing their own “internal” componentization approach with the Jigsaw project. Of course they are claiming it is not intended to be used outside their own use case for componentizing the JVM, but it is hard for me to believe this. Call me paranoid, but for me it sounds much more like an attempt to develop another system, which after completion is suddenly moved into an official standard. Sun’s statement that they are going to revive JSR 294 and are inviting even the OSGi Alliance to participate to work on it feels more like a distraction so that Sun is able to pursue its plans with Jigsaw in private that without public notice they suddenly can come up with a self made de-facto standard. Again, I might be to paranoid, but it just doesn’t feel right. Is all that just a coincident? I don’t think so. Why can’t they embrace the work done already and see it as a great chance to propel their Language and create a true reusable software stack, no other vendor can offer? Hal Hildebrand just blogged about Sun’s attempt to introduce this new project and the way they are trying to persuade big industry players about their great intents… Well, you should really read his post about it and please tell me, if they have such humble goals, why does everyone they consult have to sign a NDA? I strongly believe that if those ideas are so great, why not share them and let the community decide and participate?

To wrap things up, I ask all of you who feel like me, share you’re opinion! Comment on Hal’s post, blog about it, link to it, spread the word. I believe we – as a community – have to stand up and say what we think to show Sun, that those kind of guerrilla tactics, especially when so easily to look through are not working. Keep your eyes open and don’t fall for the dark side

Cheers,
Mirko