Sun's Java-Liberty moves risk industry scuffles

[R. A. Hettinga]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/26234.html

Sun's Java-Liberty moves risk industry scuffles
By ComputerWire
Posted: 17/07/2002 at 10:09 GMT

ComputerWire: IT Industry Intelligence
A potential dispute is opening over proposed integration of Sun
Microsystems Inc-backed web services security specifications with Java,
writes Gavin Clarke.

Sun is lending support to inclusion of Liberty Alliance Project
specifications for federated single sign-in to web services in future
versions of the Java platform.

Jonathan Schwartz, Sun software group executive vice president, said the
goal is to "Liberty-enable the client and server." Schwartz spoke as he
announced Liberty-enabled Sun directory and network servers yesterday.

With specifications embedded in the Java platform technologies like Java 2
Enterprise Edition (J2EE) for example, products like J2EE-based application
servers could theoretically ship Liberty-enabled.

This would minimize development efforts for ISVs and end-users as
developers would not need to add Liberty-compliant APIs to Java products
and applications. And with APIs shipping in popular products like
application server, Liberty could also achieve pervasiveness virtually
overnight. Sun's decision, though, risks re-opening old industry wounds.

IBM told Computerwire it will not support addition of Liberty
specifications unless they are first passed to an independent standards
group, like the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information
Standards (OASIS). IBM - like Microsoft - remains a non-Liberty member
having promoted the alternative WS-Security model.

Bob Sutor, director of e-business standards, said: "IBM will not support
this until the work Liberty does is moved to a real standards organization."

IBM is also concerned at the degree of control Sun wields over the Java
Community Process (JCP), a 300-member body that debates and approves Java
specifications. Sun has constitutional power to veto changes to the Java
language. IBM is a JCP participant.

This issue risks perpetuating the schism that impeded the write-once
run-anywhere concept of Java. Java vendors are free to implement APIs to
their version of Java that are outside of the core specification. IBM could
potentially ensure its own implementation of Java in popular products like
the WebSphere application server remain Liberty free, while Sun adopt
specifications in its application servers.

Key to the battle are application server vendors BEA Systems Inc and Oracle
Corp who have yet to declare for Liberty.

Sutor said if the JCP does adopt Liberty, then IBM would wait to see how
Liberty developed before it too adopted the specifications. "It really
depends on what the charter is and how Liberty is fleshed out," he said.
-- 
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

---------------------------------------------------------------------
The Cryptography Mailing List
Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at wasabisystems.com