Richard Green, Sun's executive vice president of software, made it absolutely clear that Java would be opened source.

"It isn't a question of whether, it is a question of how," Green said to cheers from the developers on hand for JavaOne.

To give the announcement extra weight, Green described the plan in response to questions from Sun's new CEO Jonathan Schwartz. The two men were on stage at the Moscone Center when the announcement was made.

The company did not set a schedule for when the open-source release would take place and said some problems first have to be solved.

"There are two battling forces here: There is the desire to completely open this up, complete access -- and so many changes in the licenses have been made that it's virtually all there," said Green, referring to the licensing models now available to developers.