Microsoft Ordered to Ship Java in 120 Days. According to report published on Reuters, a federal judge on Wednesday ordered Microsoft Corp. to begin shipping Sun Microsystems Inc.'s Java program within 120 days, after the companies fought over implementing a ruling he made last month.

Sun had complained in a court filing that Microsoft wanted to take up to a year before including the Java program to copies of Windows it sells.

Microsoft told U.S. District Judge J. Frederick Motz that shipping Java with Windows was not a simple matter and a sudden change in the operating system could harm large corporate users of Windows.

But Motz ruled, "I can't sit here hearing after hearing, I want this done in 120 days."

And so, Microsoft had to eat the humble pie... for once! (I still get a niggling feeling that Microsoft will wriggle out of this hole too!)