Today, we make another significant announcement. SpringSource is launching an enterprise Java cloud—SpringSource Cloud Foundry.

This initiative is a logical extension of our integrated Build/Run/Manage approach to unifying the application lifecycle, extending our vision of simplifying enterprise Java beyond the traditional data center. As cloud computing becomes more important, we want to ensure that Java developers can take full advantage of it. We believe that our leadership in Java development, coupled with our strength in the runtime and management phases, enables us to provide a…

Today I want to share some exciting news. We have signed a definitive agreement with VMware, who will acquire SpringSource. Subject to regulatory approval, we expect the transaction to close in Q3. SpringSource will become a division within VMware. I will continue to lead SpringSource, reporting to VMware CEO Paul Maritz.

Today I would like to explain the vision and careful reasoning behind this deal: why it’s natural and logical; why it can lead to the creation of amazing technology that will immensely benefit users; why it’s good for Spring and other technologies SpringSource leads or contributes to; why it’s good for the Spring community…

As the Register and several bloggers have noted, Red Hat recently announced a defensive move motivated by trying to play catch-up with SpringSource. Clearly the momentum of SpringSource tc Server and dm Server has Red Hat worried, along with the continued advance of the Spring Framework as the de facto standard component model for enterprise Java.

The “JBoss Open Choice strategy” appears to be a repackaging, rather than new technology, which attempts to position JBoss as still relevant in a brave new world of changing requirements. Not only is the repackaging obviously reactive, but much of…

A few weeks ago, I laid out SpringSource's vision for creating a unified enterprise Java solution that spans the application lifecycle. Today, we announce a significant advance in realizing that vision: SpringSource's acquisition of Hyperic, which greatly strengthens our capabilities for the management of modern applications and infrastructure.

As SpringSource has grown, like the Spring open source projects, the company has taken on a wider range of problems. Today's announcement is the logical continuation of our push into the server space, and offers the potential to further simplify the…

Last year, Oracle acquired BEA Systems, the hottest company in enterprise Java…until around 2001.

Today, they announced the acquisition of Sun Microsystems, the architects of the infrastructure of the dot com era. Remember the "dot in dot com"??

Both companies represent the history of enterprise Java, and are far less important to the future.

Larry Ellison states that “Java is the single most important software we've ever acquired."? Ellison is right about the importance of Java: Java is the world’s #1 programming language and the dominant choice of the enterprise. But the question is exactly what has Oracle acquired? There is no purpose to be served by Oracle trying to milk the Java language itself for profit--and, in any case, it's now open enough to make that impossible. (Open sourcing Java did turn out to matter. A lot.) And it is a long time since Sun controlled enterprise…

You may remember the AMC Gremlin--a strong claimant for ugliest car ever. The Gremlin was produced back in the 70s, but there are still a few around, like this one, which I photographed last year in San Francisco.

The enterprise Java experience today reminds me of this piece of American motoring heritage. The Gremlin was a desperate response to the oil shock. AMC needed a “compact” car, so they took the smallest car they had and chopped it in half. The end result sold surprisingly well, but showed unmistakable signs of the fact that its front and rear were produced by different teams and…

It's the conference season. Despite the busy schedule, however, one conference stands alone for Spring content. SpringOne Europe is approaching fast. This year, it will be in Amsterdam, from April 27-29. Not only is Amsterdam a great destination in itself, the conference ends just before the Queen's Day holiday in the Netherlands: a fun cultural experience if you can spare an extra day.

SpringOne has always been a great conference, offering deep technical content and comprehensive coverage of Spring topics. We've been particularly busy over the last few months, so this year should be better…

I am delighted to announce that SpringSource has acquired G2One, the company behind Grails and Groovy.

Why?

I’m excited about this deal for many reasons.

Grails is a great fit with Spring and SpringSource technologies. Grails is built on Spring. It offers another route to adopt Spring, the de facto standard component model for enterprise Java. All the power of Spring (and Java) lies beneath the surface of every Grails based application—a key reason that Grails can scale to enterprise use, as well as a validation of Spring’s power and flexibility.

Like Spring, Grails is a technology that simplifies the lives of developers and makes them more productive. As our new tagline, Weapons for the war on Java complexity, reflects, simplification has always been core to what we’ve done as a company and as technologists…

No, not the Obama/McCain smackdown on Nov 4. As you may have read in SD Times, SpringSource has been elected to the JCP Executive Committee for Java SE/EE, along with SAP, Ericsson, Nokia, Philips, and IBM. I will be the SpringSource representative.

Not that the JCP matches the scale of the presidential race. But this is an important moment for SpringSource, and one that reflects the years of hard work and leadership the entire team at SpringSource has provided in enterprise Java. More importantly, I believe that our election will help us to make Java stronger.

From the first book through the…

Running a business is like writing code in at least one respect: You don't always get it right the first time, even if you know what you want to achieve—but you do get a better result in the end if you are prepared to rework things when necessary. At SpringSource, we had a clear vision for our recently announced maintenance policy: balancing the needs of the open source community with those of enterprise users and the creators of Spring, for the benefit of all. However, we didn't get the balance quite right first time, and it's time for some refactoring.

Over the last couple of weeks, I've…