Hi.
Do you know the source of that report? Would be extremely interesting to read.
WR
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Duffey, Kevin [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: den 19 december 2000 05:46
> To: Orion-Interest
> Subject: RE: Orion and J2EE licensing
>
>
> Interesting perspective Scott. At first it seemed you were
> bashing Orion for
> their quotes. While I agree..how can Orion claim to be J2EE
> (much less the
> only one available) while not licensing J2EE from Sun nor
> running the suite
> of tests that "supposedly" iPlanet and BEA have run, I would
> also tend to
> believe after working with BEA, trying out iPlanet, and what
> not that there
> is some major biased from Sun towards the big money making
> products over
> smaller open-source or "almost free" products such as Orion,
> jBoss, etc. Its
> amazing to me how many people have displayed WebLogic's inability to
> properly support J2EE, yet somehow BEA claims its the first
> J2EE licensed
> app server. Meanwhile, iPlanet is claimed to be the first
> J2EE certified app
> server (which raises the question..how can there be two first
> J2EE certified
> app servers?). And for God's sake..if Sun makes iPlanet, why
> in the world
> ISNT it the first FULLY J2EE supported app server?!!
>
> My CTO read a report on some app servers and Orion didn't do too well,
> accept in the department of ease of use, price, performance
> and stability.
> Hmm..isn't this what we want? :) iPlanet wasn't bad, WebLogic
> 5.1 had some
> problems and was difficult to work with, SilverStream was a
> bit arcane in
> its use of a database for persistence storage of HttpSession
> (as well as
> deploying an app from a database instead of a file), and
> WebSphere is way
> behind the times..not even close to fully support J2EE. Thus
> far, I look at
> the 4 big guys and laugh. While Orion leaves a lot to be desired, it
> supports J2EE very well (as far as I am able to tell..still
> got a bit of EJB
> stuff to learn before I can know in that area). Its very
> simple to install
> and get running (for the most part). It lacks documentation,
> has terrible
> "customer" support (per telephone for the most part), and is
> otherwise not
> exactly a product that a company can depend on because of the
> small company,
> no idea what is going on with them or what is happening in
> the near future,
> and no market share (mostly meaning the name Orion doesn't
> stand out to many
> people).
>
> My personal take on what your saying is that if Sun tries to
> apply licensing
> at the ridiculous price they are charging for it to small
> companies, there
> will be no small companies around to offer a product. Also,
> how can they
> charge a FREE product, or an open-source product? I am hoping
> Sun doesn't
> pull that crap, because if they do, we may see app servers go
> the way of
> .com companies..pretty soon only a few, if not one, will be
> left, leaving
> little choice for ASPs and companies alike to use. I sure
> would hate to be
> stuck with only one or two choices all because Sun, one of
> the few companies
> I would ever expect to do something like this, actually does
> it. That to me
> is a Microsoft move, one of which I personally would find a
> bad PR move (not
> that Sun cares about my personal opinion or anything),
> especially when J2EE
> is still at the early stages. If enough developers and
> technical people balk
> at the limited choices because Sun pushed licensing on all app server
> vendors, I hope they have some other products coming up to
> replace J2EE,
> because I can't imagine it continuing it success if only a
> few companies are
> left to implement it and nobody wants to use it.
>
> But who am I? ;)
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Scott Stirling [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> > Sent: Friday, December 15, 2000 7:34 PM
> > To: Orion-Interest
> > Subject: Orion and J2EE licensing
> >
> >
> > I'm trying to grasp some J2EE licensing concepts. I'm trying
> > to decide if
> > Sun is fleecing some companies over J2EE branding fees while
> > leaving others
> > alone for arbitrary or capricious reasons. I just posted a
> > long message
> > about it to the jbosslicense group at
> > http://www.egroups.com/group/jbosslicense. There are some
> > very disturbing
> > issues that are not only philosophically interesting, but
> > important to Java
> > developers, organizations and companies who are basing
> > business goals and
> > decisions on server-side Java software. If any of the folks
> > at Orion can
> > comment, that would be fascinating, since Orion is one of
> the few J2EE
> > servers I know of that's closed-source, but not (as far as I
> > know) branded
> > J2EE. However, I believe the open source J2EE servers out
> > there are as much
> > at risk of being sued or halted by Sun as Orion, based on my
> > understanding
> > of J2EE licensing and branding thus far. If anyone can point
> > to me to some
> > resources on this, please do.
> >
> > I notices these relevant comments from the Orion FAQ:
> >
> > "Q: What sets Orion apart from other application servers?
> >
> > A: Many things make Orion a leader among application servers.
> > A few of these
> > things are:
> > Superb performance. Orion is easily the fastest J2EE-based
> Application
> > Server
> > Orion is the only commercially available application server
> > with full J2EE
> > support
> > Unique development features like auto-deploy and full hot-swap.
> > Very affordable pricing"
> >
> > Now, since Orion has not (so far as I am aware) licensed J2EE
> > from Sun,
> > there's no way they have the Sun compatibility test suite
> > (CTS) for J2EE, so
> > they obviously haven't even tried to pass the tests. Since
> > BEA, IONA and
> > iPlanet have passed the CTS, I hardly think Orion is "the
> > only commercially
> > available application server with full J2EE support." And I
> > would think
> > that sort of claim is precisely what would put Orion at the
> > risk of being
> > dogged by Sun attorneys.
> >
> > Here's another interesting quote:
> >
> > "Q: Any plans to offer your source under a Linux-style license?
> >
> > A: No, there are currently no such plans.
> > In fact, if we did, Sun might sue us since they see any
> > implementation of
> > the J2EE specification as their intellectual property that we
> > can not show
> > to anyone."
> >
> > This makes no sense. The source code for the RI of J2EE can
> > be downloaded
> > by anyone who agrees to the Sun Community Source License.
> > jBoss implements
> > a large part of the J2EE specs, and that's LGPLed. While I
> > agree with the
> > Orion FAQ that there are certainly issues of intellectual
> > property with J2EE
> > software, I don't agree with that logic at all.
> >
> > I'll say the same thing I said about jBoss on the other list
> > (substituting
> > "Orion" for "jBoss" everywhere):
> >
> > "If Orion is allowed to implement many of the foundational J2EE
> > specs (JNDI, JTA, EJB, etc.), without paying a commercial
> license fee
> > for the specs and Sun APIs like BEA, IBM, IONA and others have done,
> > doesn't that tear a huge hole in the integrity and legality of Sun's
> > J2EE branding and licensing? It makes it appear as though Sun is
> > unfairly targeting large businesses who use their APIs and specs,
> > while leaving open source/small businesses alone. That would be
> > capricious, and I think illegal of Sun.
> >
> > This may not be an issue now, because Orion is just gaining
> ground in
> > the business world. But in 6-9 months, if Orion gains momentum, I
> > would expect the J2EE licensees to start complaining about loss of
> > market share to a product that's never commercially
> licensed the APIs,
> > never paid the contractual fees, and never passed the compatibility
> > tests. They would pressure Sun to enforce the J2EE and Sun
> Community
> > Source License rules on Orion as a commercial product. This could
> > also apply to JONAS, OpenEJB, Enhydra, jBoss etc."
> >
> >
> > I know this stirs up the pot, so to speak, and I know some
> > people couldn't
> > care less. But for my career and my interests in
> server-side Java and
> > things like open source and open standards, I think these
> > issues are very
> > important. I'm trying to get some feedback from like-minded
> > folks or from
> > official representatives of commercial concerns on how these
> > issues touch
> > them, whether they feel they've been resolved, how they
> > understand/cope with
> > them, or even if their attitude is "we'll cross that bridge
> when Sun's
> > lawyers bring us to it."
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> > Scott Stirling
> > West Newton, MA
> >
>
