Oracle has a right to sue, but it may pay a price from a long-term public relations perspective, said Forrester Research analyst Jeffrey Hammond.

"Google can always probably give Oracle some money and have this go away," Hammond said. "But this sets a bad tone, as you see a lot of people wondering what kind of steward Oracle is going to be for Java."

The suit makes it clear that Oracle intends to control Java innovation, he said. "If you want get something done [with Java], you've got to go through Oracle to make it happen," he said.

A flip side to the lawsuit is that it gives Google a reason to look at alternatives in the long term, such as working on compatibility with Microsoft's Silverlight framework for rich Internet applications, Hammond said.