Hewlett-Packard Co is backing off from its Java spat with Sun Microsystems Inc. In a conciliatory tone Jim Bell, HP’s general manager of embedded software told PC Week that rather than seeking an alternative to ISO’s Publicly Available Submitter standardization route for Java that Sun is following, HP is accepting that and watching Sun’s stewardship of the Java specification and making sure that Sun keeps its commitments. At the recent JavaOne show HP revealed a ‘clean room’ implementation of an embedded Java virtual machine and licensed it to Microsoft. HP said Sun’s Embedded Java licensing terms were too costly and in any case it wanted the standardization of Java taken away from Sun. At the time, HP’s Joe Beyers, general manager of HP’s internet software division, said HP’s ultimate goal wasn’t to build a business selling Java software based around the embedded JVM but to pry control of Java away from Sun and place it in the hands of an industry-wide group that no single company controls. Some observers, including Sun officials, saw HP’s action as nothing unusual given previous actions, which include crafting a cloned implementation of Adobe Systems Inc’s PostScript printer control language for use in its high-end printers, claiming the Adobe license fees were too expensive.
