Over the past two weeks I've been mostly focused on MySQL, but the big-ticket item in the Sun/Oracle deal is not databases, it's Java. However, it's also the domain which is far less clear to predict. It was a big deal when Sun decided to open source Java, but the fact of the matter is that the first fully open source release isn't out yet, and Sun has been keeping the testing and certification kit off-limits for open source communities. This means it would still be far too easy for OpenJDK to be killed off.

I've been keeping clear of Oracle for several years, and can't even begin to guess what their position on this is. Oracle has been a pretty active contributor to Linux in particular for several years, and I'm sure their open source strategy and how it works together with their business is pretty well established within at least the engineering parts of the company. At the same time, their notoriously aggressive market tactics make sure that everyone's wary of their next move. Java is a huge part of Oracle's business, and after they purchased BEA, I wouldn't be surprised if Oracle wasn't already the biggest Java company (in terms of revenue) ahead of both Sun and IBM. After completing the Sun acquisition, that'll be guaranteed.

That's a big balance shift for the overall Java community. Now, Oracle is a smart company. My worry is they might emphasize short-term tactical market advantage (owning all of Java, JRockit, Glassfish and WebLogic to compete against other middleware and business applications) over long-term strategic benefit of a unified platform competing with .NET and the host of open source platforms from PHP and Ruby to Python. With such a wide field, following up on, and improving on the open source platform process would be the right thing to do - and it would help me :)