All Java in ONE cup

BANGALORE: There are four major flavors of Java: J2EE for servers, J2SE for desktop computers, J2ME for gadgets and Java Card for chip-enabled "smart" cards. To make Java more successful in the future, it's Sun's task to unify these, Sun believes. A lot of disparate Javas that "don’t work together" won’t help. However, Sun also reiterated that although the various categories of Java will be better tied together, the categories themselves won't be eliminated.

Sun’s new logo for Java retains the old coffee cup logo, but replaces the drawing of wispy lines with fewer, bolder strokes. Sun wants to make the Java logo has ubiquitous as the "Intel Inside" logo or the Dolby stereo logo on most sound systems. Sun will spend tens of millions of dollars on the campaign. The company hired pop singer Christina Aguilera to plug Java-powered mobile phones.

Although Java is not a money-raker for Sun, it contributes to the company’s influence over the market and the developer community. Sun sees a unified, successful Java as the means to keep Microsoft at bay.

J2EE has stood its ground against .NET for server applications. And Sun has gained a huge headstart with the widespread acceptance of J2ME on cell phones. Sun and its partners will unveil improvements that make it easier to link Java programs running on mobile phones with Java programs running on servers in the network.

Sun has recently tied up with Intel for pushing mobile Java and is looking at more partners. The Intel and Sun collaboration would allow J2ME to be integrated with Intel's XScale technology to provide a platform to mobile device manufacturers and, application developers.

The tie-up aims to provide rich, Java technology-enabled audio, visual and multimedia applications to users of mobile devices using Intel XScale technology based processors. Apart from Intel, Sun has a strong support from mobile players like Nokia and Vodafone. For these companies, Java game sales are the second-largest revenue source in its push to sell new cell phone services