Ubuntu developers are still sifting through the packages that need to stay and through the ones that could be removed from the upcoming Ubuntu 14.04 (Trusty Tahr) distribution.

Even if the release of Ubuntu 14.04 LTS (Trusty Tahr) is still pretty far ahead, some very important aspects are now being discussed. This includes the necessity of removing the OpenJDK package.

“The foundations team have been reviewing whether we should continue to provide OpenJDK as the default Java implementation in Ubuntu; this package is quite a resource drain on both the foundations and security teams from a SRU perspective so demotion of openjdk7 to universe is being considered. Most Java-ish things in main can be built using gcj; however Tomcat7 is not going to work with gcj so would end up being demoted as well,” said Ubuntu developer James Page.

This doesn't mean that OpenJDK won't be available in the official repositories but, if it's not included by default, Canonical doesn't have to keep an eye on any security problems that need fixing.

The idea is still being discussed, but we'll keep you apprised if any decision is reached.