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I see no foul. I'm not saying that Oracle owns the notions of loops/if then decision/variables and the like. I'm saying Oracle owns the Java language....not just their implementation of the java language. You want to build your own computer language...go right ahead. But if your language just implements the one Oracle owns...then no, that's not ok.
And yes, it can be a bad think with Open Office depending on how far they take their copying of Word. Think back to Lotus vs Quarterdeck or dBase vs Foxpro. You can't build a clone of someone else product.
As to the OpenOffice supporting the Word file format. I wonder if Msft has simply not pursued litigation. I know that support for certain video and formats are indeed covered by patents/copyright. I'm not sure of the specific details that allow or disallow.
And yes....all of these issues end up needed to be judged in a court of law and, of course, IANAL.
But I do think the common sense comparison of a computer language to a book and it's characters is valid. Google creating a platform based on Oracle's Java without licensing from Oracle is the same as me writing Harry Potter books using the same names and universe details of the Harry Potter books.
It's not like Google had to use java...they could have used any language. They could have bought a license. But they wanted to be able to leverage the knowledge and support that Sun/Google had built up with java. Just as any author might desire to sell books to the millions of Harry Potter fans
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