OSNews > Thread > "I went over the code" by nt

Oracle Claims Google Copied Java Code - Not So Fast, Though

Linked by Thom Holwerda on Thu 28th Oct 2010 20:07 UTC, submitted by poundsmack

Now, this is an interesting development in the ongoing war against Android. Oracle didn't just sue Google for allegedly infringing its Java patents; it also claimed copyright infringement. Oracle has amended its complaint, and, fair is fair, they've got the code to prove it: indeed, Android contains code that appears to be copied verbatim from Java - mind you, appears. However, the code in question comes straight from Apache's Harmony project, which raises the question - would a respected and long-established cornerstone of the open source world really accept tainted code in the first place?

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I went over the code

by nt_jerkface on Thu 28th Oct 2010 20:50 UTC

Member since:
2009-08-26

It's a rip off.
http://www.binplay.com/2010/10/look-at-copied-oracle-code.html

Reply Permalink Score: 4

RE: I went over the code

by Matzon on Thu 28th Oct 2010 20:56 in reply to "I went over the code"

Member since:
2005-07-06

I agree.

Why are the methods in the same order?
Same private method names - what are the chances of that??

probably decompiled and then re-created. tsk tsk.

Reply Parent Score: 2

RE[2]: I went over the code

by Delgarde on Thu 28th Oct 2010 22:45 in reply to "RE: I went over the code"

Member since:
2008-08-19

Absolutely - everything about those comparisons screams "decompiler". All the names that would appear in the bytecode (class name, field names) are identical; all local variables have been given obviously machine-assigned names based on their type (set1, flag1, etc).

Looks awfully damning... if this code really came from Harmony, the Apache guys have been *really* careless about the code they accept.

Reply Parent Score: 3

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RE: I went over the code

by rjamorim on Thu 28th Oct 2010 23:07 in reply to "I went over the code"

Member since:
2005-12-05

I love one of the comments there

"Well, I guess that's what happens when you sponsor a 'Summer of Code...'"

Reply Parent Score: 2

RE: I went over the code

by segedunum on Fri 29th Oct 2010 15:19 in reply to "I went over the code"

Member since:
2005-07-06

It really doesn't matter what someone thinks. The lineage of that code will need to be established, it will depend on how that code is licensed and if it was a Sun/Oracle employee that dropped that code in........

Reply Parent Score: 2

RE: I went over the code

by JAlexoid on Fri 29th Oct 2010 22:52 in reply to "I went over the code"

Member since:
2009-05-19

It's a rip off.
http://www.binplay.com/2010/10/look-at-copied-oracle-code.html

And yet, reading Oracle's code once, I can write the code that is very similar to the one found in Harmony. That, btw, would not constitute a copyright infringement. (Since it follows common industry conventions and has to conform to a published specification)

But then again, I am a Java dev for 10 years now. And Java has common naming conventions.

EDIT: Interesting point, the code is in the repository, but it's a test...

Edited 2010-10-29 23:11 UTC

Reply Parent Score: 2

RE[2]: I went over the code

by Kebabbert on Mon 1st Nov 2010 11:27 in reply to "RE: I went over the code"

Member since:
2007-07-27

In how many ways can you declare 10 variables? The answer is 10! = 3.6 million ways. Almost 4 million ways.

The probability that the Google programmer chose exactly the same ordering as Oracle, would be 1 in 4 million. Highly unlikely.

Chances are more than 99.99999% the code is a copy.

Reply Parent Score: 2