Over the weekend there have been a number of stories on the web that have said that some of the source code in Android was copied from Java, and a number of software experts have reported this after looking at the code.
It seems that the copied code was actually found in Google’s Android OS, but the code didn’t actually ship with Google Android, instead the code that was found were unit test code and other files that had been uploaded to the Android code repository, none of the code actually shipped with Android or any Android devices according to Cnet.
How this leaves Google remains to be seen, but it looks like Oracle will be taking action against Google, and Engadget are reporting that Oracle may be looking for a per handset royalty, which could end up costing Google a fair amount of cash.
Google’s Android OS is basically free software, Google don’t charge manufacturers to use Android, instead they make their money from Advertising, and if a judge finds in favour of Oracle this could end up being expensive for the search giant.
