Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz stated at the Oracle OpenWorld Conference this week that Sun will announced the open-sourcing of the core Java platform within 30 to 60 days. This is a more aggressive timetable than previous comments by Sun's Rich Green who had indicated portions of Java being open-sourced starting this year and continuing into 2007.
Schwartz also indicated that Sun would likely use the Community Development and Distribution License to govern open-source Java. Sun's use of CDDL is not a surprise. Solaris and Sun's Glassfish application server are currently open-sourced under the CDDL, which is derived from the Mozilla Public License.
Geir Magnusson blogged on Sun's possible use of the CDDL earlier this year:
What license will Sun use? This has been and will be a source of rampant speculation. Sun needs to balance two things - dealing with their darkest fears around compatibility with the need for a licensing regime in which all players can innovate and control their own IP. Clearly the GPL won't do. While I am a big fan of the Apache License and the full freedom it offers, I can live with the CDDL and other soft-copyleft licenses. At least then, people could invest in innovation, and choose how they wished to license the IP for the things they created that were truly new...
Earlier this month InfoQ talked to Eclipse Foundation Director Mike Milinkovich who suggests that a way for Java to be truly free and independent would be to use an Eclipse-style governance model.