(January 24, 2003) - Both Sun and Microsoft claimed a victory in the wake of recent developments in the Sun vs Microsoft case. On Tuesday, Federal Judge J. Frederick Motz formally ordered Microsoft Corp. to distribute Sun Microsystems Inc.'s Java programming language in its Windows operating system.

"Sun is grateful to the Court for its thorough review of the issues and its speedy implementation of this important Order. This preliminary injunction is a huge victory for consumers who will soon have the best, latest Java technology on their PCs. It is also a victory for enterprises and for the worldwide Java Community of developers and system vendors," said Lee Patch, vice president for Sun's Legal Affairs.

As was anticipated by Judge Motz, who granted a two-week stay (until February 4) to give the appellate court time to consider Microsoft's appeal, Microsoft has filed a notice with the district court that it does intend to appeal. Microsoft also claimed victory with Motz's ruling. In an exclusive interview with JDJ last week, Microsoft spokesman Jim Desler stated, "For the most part, we feel that the court has sided with Microsoft, in that only a few products will be affected instead of the thousands that could have been included."

Under the order, Microsoft has 120 days after February 4 to include Sun's JVM into Windows. Microsoft also has a different deadline to meet: it must offer a download of Sun's Java Runtime Environment as a recommended update within 30 days of Sun supplying Microsoft with an updated version of Java. Microsoft is also prohibited form carrying a version of the JRE that's incompatible with Sun's version. Sun must provide a $25 million security to pay Microsoft's costs and damages in case the court order is overturned.

On December 23, 2002, the U.S. District Court in Maryland decided to grant both Sun's copyright infringement and Java-Must-Carry motions for preliminary injunction in Sun vs Microsoft. Now, the Court has entered its Order that specifies how Microsoft and Sun must implement the preliminary injunction rulings. The order includes compromises on suggestions from both Microsoft and Sun on how Microsoft will comply with the December 23 ruling. (For the text of the court order and the ruling, see www.sun.com/lawsuit.)