Tuesday, 28 November 2006

Sun VP Quits over Open-Source Java Move

Graham Hamilton - Sun Fellow and VP, has left the company over the decision to open source Java. Hamilton, has been with Sun since 1995, and has contributed to a wide variety of Java technology initiatives, including technologies such as CORBA support, the JDBC APIs, JavaBeans, the Java Plug-in, RMI-IIOP, JAX-RPC, and others. Most recently he acted as the specification lead for J2SE releases 1.3 and 1.4. He has helped encourage community participation in Java API development and he was one of the designers of the Java Community Process for amending Java.

Sun on November 13 announced intentions to offer Java via the GNU General Public License, after years of resistance to the pressure from developers and others in the industry for an open source path for Java. Hamilton, a strong advocate of Java compatibility, was one of the principle voices against open sourcing Java.

"Sun thanks Graham for his many contributions to the company and to Java technology. Graham is widely respected by Sun employees and developers around the world. While it is always sad to see an employee of his caliber depart, we wish him well in all his future endeavors." said Sun in a statement

James Gosling, Sun vice president and Fellow, will take over for Hamilton.