Re: to work around Java completely - if only

Their mistake was in NOT working around Java *completely*.

We've seen a lot of horseshit about how much of the Java class lib is required by the language spec when what they really mean is the libs are so crosslinking it's near impossible to separate the actually essential elements from the bulk. However since Google were abandoning it being a Java system they could have dumped all pretence of compatibility and stripped down to minimal compatibility with Sun's Java systems.

Instead they decided to rely on Suns own public statements about how to bypass Java licensing. It's Suns problem that compatibility with their versions of Java was necessarily lost in doing that!

My belief is the choice to stay so compatible with Java (the language) was more determined by the need to use existing toolchains, tools that simply would not work with *any* change to the core libs. Java is that crippled by its own dependence on reflection and having so much language spec embedded in the lib structure. Most depressing is Java output is already translated to Dalvik after compilation and it would be pretty easy to remove those dependencies during that, meaning the Android libs would no longer need to match the structure of Java! So easy, expect that to be done if Oracle win.

Expect to see a lot of time spent this week establishing that Sun operated a bait&switch scheme when pretending to open Java while binding it in a web of control. That Sun didn't pull the trigger for years, showed no sign of doing so and that it's now too late for Oracle to do it.