Sun has announced that the source code behind Java will be released under the GPL (the same license as Processing)

http://java.net/

I never thought we'd see this, but it's terrific news. I have no illusions that this will somehow cure all that ails Java, or that the project will suddenly lurch forward because of the emergence of some large number of developer volunteers, but I do think it helps remove at least one tether regarding the relationship of the project to industry: that Sun's intentions with Java were always a bit murky. While it was free to download and use, that fact had more to do with 1) the fact that they wouldn't really be able to "sell" it, 2) they still wanted to somehow be able to use it to pound Microsoft, and 3) it's not clear if they would have tried to actually sell it or give it a more onerous license if they had the chance to (i.e. if adoption was far higher).

My thoughts on the actual impact are that:

+ Perhaps this will have the greatest impact in the mobile area, where as I understand it, J2ME is still clobbering the neutered version of Flash that's used on mobile devices. As this will presumably remove licensing overhead for manufacturers, it may help adoption where Flash has begun to make inroads.

+ On the other end of the spectrum, the "enterprise" editions of Java will likely be invaded by engineers from IBM, who have shown an in interest in the big 'n fat edition of Java.

+ And back in the middle, the J2SE (what's included with P5) may benefit most by its simpler inclusion with web browsers. Personally, if someone could simply solve the issues of the slow startup time of the Java VM inside a browser, then I would consider the open-sourcing of the project a success.

But again, i think the impact will not be so much that the code will magically get fixed from volunteer hordes, but the perception of the project and how it can be licensed and distributed more freely.

hm, that was going to be a quick note since i'd not formed intelligent arguments about these things, but instead you get a ramble.

... In the meantime, is there any way to displaying something else while the applet is initialising apart from the java logo? Even if the load time stays long, it would be great to be able to customise the display during initialisation.