Actually, this looks like a pre-emptive move to me to thwart Sun. They have asked to have Microsoft forced to ship the Sun JVM. Microsoft knows their JVM is seriously out of date, and good for little besides web applets these days. By putting their JVM back into the mix, they can show intent to ship a JVM; too bad (for Sun) it's now an incredibly out-of-date one. I thought Microsoft's point about security problems was an interesting one, too. Are there any outstanding exploits for MSJVM that remain unpatched because of the license agreement? [The .NET Guy]

Perhaps, but MS even says they're going to phase out Java support over the next few years. I just don't see the point... other than maybe they want to play nice to avoid further trouble in court. As for outstanding exploits, I don't know, but it definitely is a fair argument on Microsoft's part. Heck, they didn't phase out Gopher support and look what that did to them. ;)

Just noticed this article, entitled "Controlling Web Pages on the Server Side", over on the O'Reilly network. It's pretty basic, but still good for people who are looking for an introduction ASP.NET web controls.

Microsoft to reinstate Java in Windows. In an about-face triggered by Sun's recent antitrust lawsuit, Microsoft says it will reinstate the ability to run Java programs in Windows XP. [CNET News.com]

The MSJVM is back! Too bad it's still only 1.1.4 compliant. I don't really see how this is a win for Sun, but I guess they need to put that spin on it. Actually, I can't understand why Sun feels they need Microsoft's implementation at all. Why doesn't Sun just promote downloading their own Java2 runtime plugin for people who need to run client side Java? Macromedia manages to install their entire FlashMX platform without Microsoft. The developer just redirects the end user to the Flash download page whenever it's not detected as being installed. The same type of thing will happen with web pages that require the .NET framework to be installed. While they do show it on Windows update, it's an optional download. Why should Sun's Java technology get special treatment?

Here's my favorite (over)statement from the article:

Java is widely used on Web pages.

Really? I think that's just what Sun wishes were true. C'mon... Java the language was great, on the server it's a great technology, but even the most hardcore zealots have to admit that it failed to deliver on the client side.

Drew is wondering what the SVG.NET Viewer is, and he's right. The aim is to use the SharpVectorGraphics project (creating the SVG DOM in C#) to produce a SVG viewer written in C#. It will also come with a GDI+ renderer. The first major goal is to produce a static renderer and then hopefully hock up JScript to it to add interactivity.More info when I get the time :-) [protocol7]

Cool, gonna keep my eye on this one. Is support for SMIL also being considered?