Sun Microsystems, Canonical and Red Hat have announced the inclusion of OpenJDK-based implementations in Fedora 9 and Ubuntu 8.04 Long Term Support Server and Desktop editions.

Sun branded the move as a "key plank" in furthering its open source Java technology initiatives.

In addition, the NetBeans 6.0 Integrated Development Environment is being delivered as part of the Ubuntu 8.04 LTS release.

In a parallel announcement Canonical has certified Ubuntu 8.04 LTS Server Edition on several Sun x86 systems.

Developers using Fedora 9 or Ubuntu 8.04 LTS will receive free software implementations based on Java technology as a standard element of an open source developer stack.

Sun said that this announcement has the potential to open the door for numerous Java technology-based offerings to be included in the core of these GNU/Linux distributions.

"Open sourcing Java under GPL v2 has always been about bringing the power of Java technology to new markets and enabling new innovations," said Jeet Kaul, vice president of the Client Software Group at Sun.

"With an OpenJDK-based implementation included in Fedora and Ubuntu, developers can now rely on a stable open source Java as an integral part of these GNU/Linux distributions."