Java Committee Process reform continues with merge of Executive Committee

Following last month’s Java Community Process Executive Committee elections, which saw the London Java Community and CloudBees grab the two elected seats, the Java steering board has now been fully merged.

As part of the JCP.next reform, JSR 355: Executive Committee Merge will go through on Tuesday 13th November, meaning the two old Executive Committees (representing Java SE/EE and ME respectively) become one. With the industry converging, it was decided that having two separate boards no longer made sense.

For this to occur, IBM and Oracle have each given up one of their seats, as both held two seats in the old format. Four members (AT&T, Deutsch Telekom, Siemens and Vodafone) didn’t run for re-election, whilst RIM forfeited their seat in October for missing five consecutive meetings.

This now means there are 24 Executive Committee Members making decisions across the Java spectrum. Members are expect to vote on all JSRs and help foster Java’s evolution through approving them. They are also responsible for defining the JCP’s rules and governance and the legal agreement between members and the organisation.

The latter is a potential sticking point for JCP.next, as it enters the third stage of reform in JCP.next.3, which will tackle a wide array of outstanding issues with the JCP and redefine them. JCP Chair Patrick Curran said back in June that JSR 358 will “tackle a large number of complex issues” including new transparency requirements, the role of members, patents, IP flow and TCK and compatibility policy.

With so many corporations and individuals sitting on the Executive Committee, it won’t be an overnight job to sort out the legal requirements. Curran expects the final stage of JCP reform to take around a year to thrash out all the issues. Fortunately, the amount of preparation put in so far makes us believe that there is enough momentum within the Executive Committee to see this through.

It’s a great achievement getting this far down the line, with so much needing to change within the JCP. Now the really hard work starts, with a reinvigorated and merged Executive Committee leading the way.